Hip-hop and Construction of Group Identity in a Stigmatized Area. : A Field Study regarding Cultural Capital among Roma Youths in Konik, Montenegro.

This research aimed for an extended knowledge and understanding of young people in stigmatized areas and their construction of group identity. With a focus on Roma youths in Konik, Montenegro, and their involvement in hip-hop we wanted to explore what this culture meant to them in relation to their context. An ethnographic approach was used in collecting the empirical data through observations, interpreting music lyrics and conducting qualitative semi-structured interviews. Five young Roma boys from Konik, all involved in hip-hop, were interviewed. Theoretical perspectives on identity, youth culture and stigmatization were central. In addition, Bourdieu’s theory regarding cultural capital was emphasized and connected to youths and hip-hop. The empirical material showed that involvement in hip-hop provided the Roma youths with a group identity that they referred to in positive terms. Contextual factors of stigmatization excluded the Roma group from the majority population and the engagement in hip-hop created a possibility for the youths to be someone. The cultural capital gained through hip-hop was not used to verify and legitimate an authentic Roma identity. It was rather a way for them to create boundaries towards the negative elements in their community.

Cross-layer optimizations in multi-hop ad hoc networks

Unlike traditional wireless networks, characterized by the presence of last-mile, static and reliable infrastructures, Mobile ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) are dynamically formed by collections of mobile and static terminals that exchange data by enabling each other's communication. Supporting multi-hop communication in a MANET is a challenging research area because it requires cooperation between different protocol layers (MAC, routing, transport). In particular, MAC and routing protocols could be considered mutually cooperative protocol layers. When a route is established, the exposed and hidden terminal problems at MAC layer may decrease the end-to-end performance proportionally with the length of each route. Conversely, the contention at MAC layer may cause a routing protocol to respond by initiating new routes queries and routing table updates. Multi-hop communication may also benefit the presence of pseudo-centralized virtual infrastructures obtained by grouping nodes into clusters. Clustering structures may facilitate the spatial reuse of resources by increasing the system capacity: at the same time, the clustering hierarchy may be used to coordinate transmissions events inside the network and to support intra-cluster routing schemes. Again, MAC and clustering protocols could be considered mutually cooperative protocol layers: the clustering scheme could support MAC layer coordination among nodes, by shifting the distributed MAC paradigm towards a pseudo-centralized MAC paradigm. On the other hand, the system benefits of the clustering scheme could be emphasized by the pseudo-centralized MAC layer with the support for differentiated access priorities and controlled contention. In this thesis, we propose cross-layer solutions involving joint design of MAC, clustering and routing protocols in MANETs. As main contribution, we study and analyze the integration of MAC and clustering schemes to support multi-hop communication in large-scale ad hoc networks. A novel clustering protocol, named Availability Clustering (AC), is defined under general nodes' heterogeneity assumptions in terms of connectivity, available energy and relative mobility. On this basis, we design and analyze a distributed and adaptive MAC protocol, named Differentiated Distributed Coordination Function (DDCF), whose focus is to implement adaptive access differentiation based on the node roles, which have been assigned by the upper-layer's clustering scheme. We extensively simulate the proposed clustering scheme by showing its effectiveness in dominating the network dynamics, under some stressing mobility models and different mobility rates. Based on these results, we propose a possible application of the cross-layer MAC+Clustering scheme to support the fast propagation of alert messages in a vehicular environment. At the same time, we investigate the integration of MAC and routing protocols in large scale multi-hop ad-hoc networks. A novel multipath routing scheme is proposed, by extending the AOMDV protocol with a novel load-balancing approach to concurrently distribute the traffic among the multiple paths. We also study the composition effect of a IEEE 802.11-based enhanced MAC forwarding mechanism called Fast Forward (FF), used to reduce the effects of self-contention among frames at the MAC layer. The protocol framework is modelled and extensively simulated for a large set of metrics and scenarios. For both the schemes, the simulation results reveal the benefits of the cross-layer MAC+routing and MAC+clustering approaches over single-layer solutions.

Il rap e l'hip-hop della Russia d'oggi: analisi di un fenomeno culturale contemporaneo (il caso Garri Topor)

L'elaborato prende in esame i fattori che hanno portato allo sviluppo del rap e dell'hip-hop in Russia, prendendo in esame i principali esponenti del genere.

The language of feminism, womanism, and hip-hop in Beyoncé’s “***Flawless”

An analysis of the language used in Beyoncé's song "***Flawless" and its thematics, including feminism, womanism, and the world of hip-hop.

Hip hop and the Afroamerican community: an oral history

Un'analisi cronologica della situazione politica e sociale della comunità Afroamericana negli Stati Uniti e di come questa abbia influenzato la nascita e lo sviluppo dell'hip hop come manifestazione culturale

Homeodomain-only protein HOP is a novel modulator of late differentiation in keratinocytes

The homeodomain-only protein (HOP) contains an atypical homeodomain which is unable to bind to DNA due to mutations in residues important for DNA binding. Recently, HOP was reported to regulate proliferation/differentiation homeostasis in different cell types. In the present study, we performed transcriptional profiling of cultured primary human keratinocytes and noted a robust induction of HOP upon calcium-induced cell differentiation. Immunohistochemistry of human skin localized HOP to the granular layer in the epidermis. Overexpression of HOP using a lentiviral vector up-regulated FLG and LOR expression during keratinocyte differentiation. Conversely, decreasing HOP expression using small interfering RNA markedly reduced the calcium-induced expression of late markers of differentiation in vitro, with the most prominent effect on profilaggrin (FLG) mRNA. Moreover, mRNA levels of profilaggrin and loricrin were downregulated in the epidermis of HOP knockout mice. Analysis of skin disorders revealed altered HOP expression in lichen planus, psoriasis and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). Our data indicate that HOP is a novel modulator of late terminal differentiation in keratinocytes.

A smart multi-hop hierarchical routing protocol for efficient video communication over wireless multimedia sensor networks

For smart applications, nodes in wireless multimedia sensor networks (MWSNs) have to take decisions based on sensed scalar physical measurements. A routing protocol must provide the multimedia delivery with quality level support and be energy-efficient for large-scale networks. With this goal in mind, this paper proposes a smart Multi-hop hierarchical routing protocol for Efficient VIdeo communication (MEVI). MEVI combines an opportunistic scheme to create clusters, a cross-layer solution to select routes based on network conditions, and a smart solution to trigger multimedia transmission according to sensed data. Simulations were conducted to show the benefits of MEVI compared with the well-known Low-Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy (LEACH) protocol. This paper includes an analysis of the signaling overhead, energy-efficiency, and video quality.