Once a year over the week leading up to and including Labor Day, tens of thousands of people drive hours into Nevada’s barren Black Rock Desert to build an ephemeral city equal to “the size of downtown San Francisco.” This place, Black Rock City, home of the annual Burning Man event, only exists for a fraction of the year. For one week, participants gather together at Burning Man and operate under its ten guiding principles, including “radical self-reliance,” “communal effort,” “radical self-expression,” and “participation.” Everything, with the exception of porta-potties and ice, must be brought in and packed out by individuals. The decommodified, volunteer-run city is what its inhabitants make of it. At Burning Man, attendants are their own event planners, food providers, structure builders, gift givers, and activity coordinators. On the penultimate night of the event, an effigy of a forty-foot man is set aflame, a ritual left open for interpretation by participants. Two days later, the entirety of Black Rock City is torn down, leaving scarcely any trace that it ever even existed. Burning Man has gained social traction exponentially since its launch in 1986, leading to the formation of dozens of individually organized regional burns across the United States of America and internationally. Scholars from many disciplines have flocked to the event attempting to unpack its distinct subculture. While publications have analyzed Burning Man’s ethos, logistics, business organization, community, art, rituals, fire, and performances, only two have considered sound worthy of focus and few have addressed the regional burn network. “Aural Substance: An Ethnographic Exploration of Regional Burn Soundscapes” analyzes Burning Man’s regional network, expanding on sound artists Stephan Moore and Scott Smallwood’s brief initial study of the national event's sound by way of ethnography and field recording. From June 2016 through February 2017, I conducted fieldwork and collected fifty-five hours of field recordings at seven different regional burns. I employ ethnomusicologist Steven Feld’s concept of “acoustemology,” or “sound as a way of knowing.” Through my observation, analysis of recordings, and interviews, I consider how the sounds at regional burns can signify the time, date, and location to burn participants. Sound-studies scholar David Novak writes that “noise is a crucial element of communicational and cultural networks.” In this study, I analyze how noise at a burn is not solely a by-product of participants’ “anarchistic freedom,” but a key part of the burn that relays information about regional burn values, public and private spaces, and burners’ lived experience. / Music History / Accompanied by one compressed .zip file: Archive.zip

This dissertation uses in depth interviews and participant observation in order to understand an important contemporary subculture: anarcho-punks. The research was done in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania between the years of 2006 and 2012. The overarching theme that connects the different chapters of the dissertation together is a focus on the ways in which the identification narratives of participants are ethical in nature, meaning that the narrators are working to maintain an ethical sense of self in their narration. In addition, I show the identitarian consequences of the ways in which the hyphenation of the anarcho-punk identification works to both separate and join the two different identifications "anarchist" and "punk." I also show the ways in which identifications are narratively structured. This is done throughout the ten chapters of the dissertation. Each of the substantive chapters focuses on the different narratives used by the participants to understand a particular theme that is important to developing an understanding of the subculture overall. / Sociology

The culture of honor theory proposed by Nisbett and Cohen (1996) addresses the historically higher rates of violent crime in the Southern United States, as well as the disparities that can be observed in the laws, beliefs, and social expectations between the South and other regions. Previous research has reported significant differences between the beliefs of acceptable violence among Southerners compared to non-Southerners; however, no research has been conducted comparing different demographic groups of Southerners. The current study sought to evaluate whether there were observable differences between various demographic attributes such as gender, race, age, educational attainment, political affiliation, prior law enforcement or military experience, and adherence to the culture of honor. It was found that there is a statistically significant relationship between experience in the military/law enforcement and culture of honor adherence, as well as statistical significance between an individual’s political affiliation and adherence to culture of honor beliefs.

The design from the counterculture of the 1960 and 1970s USA is an often overlooked or forgotten part of design and art history (Auther & Lerner 2011, s.XXIX) with the graphic designers of the movement often being portrayed as nothing more than drug influenced amateurs (Kaplan 2013, s.80). This is an all too simple and reductive view on design from this era with its undeniably politically charged and radical messages. This paper therefore aims to examine design from this movement, specifically from the alternative press, to give the reader a deeper understanding of the methods and rhetorical devices used to communicate their messages of resistance and counter cultural values. This is done through a visual rhetorical analysis focusing on the use of tropes as well as a critical discourse analysis examining the messages being created and the subsequent discourses they produce. This results in a conclusion and discussion centered around what tropes are represented in the material as well as how graphic design was used to communicate their countercultural values.

Dong Dong. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 127-136). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Chapter I. --- Introduction --- p.5 / Chapter II. --- Youth Culture Practiced in Virtual Community --- p.10 / Chapter III. --- "Background, Research Questions and Research Design" --- p.36 / Chapter IV. --- Style of Chinese University BBS Youth Culture --- p.45 / Chapter V. --- Youth Cultural Community as Identified by Style --- p.68 / Chapter VI. --- Resistance within Contexts --- p.84 / Chapter VII. --- Conclusion --- p.108 / Appendix 1 Captions of Postings & Discussion Threads --- p.111 / Appendix 2 Style of BBS Discussion Threads --- p.114 / Appendix 3 BBS Member's Composition --- p.118 / Appendix 4 Personal Reflections on the Film --- p.120 / Appendix 5 --- p.123 / Collective Discussions in Chinese University BBSs --- p.123 / Bibliography --- p.127

He, Xiao. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 196-202). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Abstract --- p.3 / Acknowledgement --- p.5 / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.8 / Chapter 1.1 --- Who are the Cosplayers? --- p.13 / Chapter 1.2 --- Why Cosplay? --- p.15 / Chapter 1.3 --- Why Hong Kong? --- p.17 / Chapter 1.4 --- Research Questions --- p.19 / Chapter 1.5 --- The Background of Cosplay --- p.21 / Chapter 1.6 --- Cosplay Events in Hong Kong --- p.24 / Chapter 1.6.1 --- Large-scale commercial conventions --- p.25 / Chapter 1.6.2 --- Cosplay and dôjinshi events held by universities --- p.27 / Chapter 1.6.3 --- Small-scale privately organized photo-taking events --- p.28 / Chapter 1.7 --- How to Get the Costumes --- p.31 / Chapter 1.8 --- Literature Review --- p.33 / Chapter 1.8.1 --- Globalization and Localization --- p.33 / Chapter 1.8.2 --- Youth Subculture and Fandom Culutre --- p.36 / Chapter 1.9 --- Methodology --- p.39 / Chapter 1.9.1 --- In-depth Interview --- p.39 / Chapter 1.9.2 --- Participant Observation --- p.40 / Chapter 1.9.3 --- Media Studies --- p.43 / Chapter 1.9.4 --- Language --- p.44 / Chapter 1.10 --- Outlines of the Chapters --- p.45 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- The Japaneseness for the Cosplayers --- p.48 / Chapter 2.1 --- Emphasis on Japanese Originality --- p.48 / Chapter 2.2 --- Japanese Elements in their Cyberculture --- p.56 / Chapter 2.3 --- High Reputation for Japan --- p.61 / Chapter 2.4 --- "From ""Odorless"" to ""Japanese""" --- p.66 / Chapter 2.5 --- Summary --- p.70 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- Cosplayer Cyberculture --- p.73 / Chapter 3.1 --- Cosplayers Online --- p.74 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Public Space --- p.76 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Dark Space --- p.79 / Chapter 3.1.3 --- Personal Space --- p.84 / Chapter 3.2 --- The Contradiction --- p.88 / Chapter 3.3 --- A Long-lasting Discussion: Effort or Enjoyment --- p.98 / Chapter 3.4 --- Summary --- p.105 / Chapter Chapter 4 --- "Pretty Girls, Pretty Boys, and Their Audiences" --- p.108 / Chapter 4.1 --- "Pretty Girls, Photographers, and the Other Girls" --- p.109 / Chapter 4.2 --- Pretty Boys --- p.116 / Chapter 4.3 --- Pretty Boys in Love --- p.132 / Chapter 4.4 --- Summary --- p.143 / Chapter Chapter 5 --- The Meanings of Cosplay --- p.146 / Chapter 5.1 --- Mainstream Values and the Education System in Hong Kong --- p.146 / Chapter 5.2 --- Cosplayers as Secondary School-Students --- p.150 / Chapter 5.3 --- The Meanings of Cosplay: Four Cases --- p.157 / Chapter 5.3.1 --- "Te's Story: ""I'm going to work in art and design""" --- p.157 / Chapter 5.3.2 --- "Tsu's Story: ""I mustn't let my parents knew that I'm cosplaying""" --- p.166 / Chapter 5.3.3 --- "Story of a Mother: ""I want to let her try anything that interests her""" --- p.171 / Chapter 5.3.4 --- "Saki's Story: ""Cosplay is just an interest after all'" --- p.175 / Chapter 5.4 --- Summary --- p.179 / Chapter Chapter 6 --- Conclusion --- p.181 / Chapter 6.1 --- A Review of the Chapters --- p.181 / Chapter 6.2 --- Comparison with Previous Studies --- p.186 / Bibliography --- p.196

In the course of 20th century, various subcultures became important part of our society. They were formed by mutual belief and shared interest in values often dissonant to those of majority. This paper describes larp community, fellowship that creates and organizes theatre- like role playing sessions. Live action role playing is about establishing new fictional worlds and retrieting legendary tales with main focus on joy experienced during the game. A radio documentary "Fenomen larp" (i.e. Phenomenon LARP) complementing this paper provides detailed insight. Main goal of the work is to put together the overview of the means of communication within larp community with accent on zines, webzines and Facebook. It also describes the way mainstream media covers the topic and what is the public opinion towards larp together with content analysis of texts published in "Pevnost" (i.e. Citadel) magazine. In appendix there are photographs from documentary shooting, interview with Helena Jiskrova (creator of Common sign social network) and overview of media outputs on larp in Czech Republic during 2014.

This diploma thesis aims to describe and explain the phenomenon of the community radio broadcasting. Despite the fact, that this sector has not been implemented in the Czech media system to supplement the dual system of public and private stations, broadcasting of this type does exist. As a subject of my case study I chose the internet radio StreetCulture as I consider it to be a unique example within the Czech media market. StreetCulture proves its specificity with a very wide range of contents. It acts as a platform for a large number of different communities and it also interconnects the participants within the public space StreetBar. The analytical part of the thesis investigates how this radio station fulfils four basic dimensions of community media as defined by the media theorist Nico Carpentier: community aspect, alternative aspect, civil aspect and rhizomatic aspect. For each of these specifics I tried to demonstrate how it relates to the StreetCulture radio station concerning both the organization and content of the broadcast and how it is reflected in various non-broadcasting activities of StreetCulture. The aim of this study is not to draw general conclusions which could be applied to other community stations in the Czech Republic. It rather offers a detailed insight into the...

Intéressée par la situation sociolinguistique de notre pays d'origine, la Pologne, où l'argot carcéral finit par pénétrer dans d'autres sociolectes, nous nous sommes aussi intéressée au cas français en vue d'explorer la même question. Pour ce faire, notre étude a été réalisée dans deux milieux de référence, à savoir celui des détenus d’une part et celui des non détenus d’autre part. Dans le cadre de la méthode d’enquête sociolinguistique nous avons soumis à ces deux milieux de référence un questionnaire comportant un ensemble choisi d’argotismes carcéraux. Notre travail de recherche nous a permis d’examiner la fiabilité du lexique recueilli et de confirmer l’existence d’une pratique langagière essentiellement carcérale, ce qui nous amène à définir la spécificité de l'argot des prisons utilisé dans un cadre carcéral. Par ailleurs est étudiée la perméabilité de la langue familière française au vocabulaire argotique carcéral, ce qui aboutit à mettre au jour les fonctions remplies par l'argot des prisonniers en milieu carcéral. De plus, la confrontation des deux publics permet de dégager les similarités et les différences dans les résultats, ainsi que d'établir une correspondance entre leur profil social et leur pratique linguistique. / The interest in the topic arose by dint of inspiration drawn from observing a sociolinguistic situation in my native country, Poland, where prison slang proves to permeate other sociolects, in particular youth slang, which turned out to be an excellent point of departure for embarking on a similar survey in France. The research was carried out in two different groups: prisoners and non prisoners. Within the framework of a sociolinguistic study, both of them were requested to complete a questionnaire containing 40 units of prison slang vocabulary. First of all, the research was designed to examine the reliability of a selected lexicon and to confirm a genuine prison slang usage in this particular environment. Furthermore, the paper was supposed to define the degree of permeability of the French colloquial language to prison slang vocabulary as well as to shed some new light on different roles played by this specific language within a prison community. Moreover, the comparison of two groups' performance revealed important similarities and differences and brought to light the correlation between social and linguistic variables.

A presente dissertação busca delimitações de termos mais legitimados - a partir da indústria da moda e da cultura hegemônica - para então compreender indefinições e alguns de seus fluxos aparentemente incoerentes. Partindo de uma compreensão dos estudos de moda e da linguagem legitimada de moda, investigará as possibilidades de modas ditas alternativas, suas nuances e formalizações. Para isso são capturadas e analisadas imagens de frequentadores da região do Baixo Augusta na cidade de São Paulo, levando em consideração e como contextualização conceitualizações como sociologia da moda e do consumo, difusões de tendências, cultura e subcultura, tribos urbanas, moda e anti-moda, imagem, processos de dados, complexidade e emergência / The present work seeks delineations of the most legitimized terms - on the fashion industry and the hegemonic culture - and then understand uncertainties and some of their apparently incoherent flows. Beginning with an understanding of fashion studies and fashion industry legitimated language, investigate the possibilities of so-called alternative fashions, nuances and formalizations. For this, are taken and analysed images of goers of Baixo Augusta area in Sao Paulo city, taking into account and as contextualization concepts in sociology of fashion and consumption, broadcasts trends, culture and subculture, urban tribes, fashion and anti-fashion, image, data processes, complexity and emergence