The quest for identity: the role of objects in contemporary everyday life

The thesis explores the significance of material objects in the everyday life of contemporary individuals. It is suggested that the relationship between individuals and objects in modern /contemporary society is a peculiar one. This peculiarity derives from the essential and crucial role things play: they contribute to shape and support the individual's identity in a context of fragmentation of the work experience and of the whole life, of anonymity and depersonalization of social relations, of bureaucratization and accelerated change.In the first part of the dissertation the topic is discussed and developed mainly at a theoretical level. A revisitation of well -known authors intends to recover what has been said - explicitly or otherwise - on the social meanings and uses of objects in modern society. A review and critique of express discussions of the functions performed by objects - e.g., the literature on consumer behaviour, on possession and exchange of goods in different cultures, on the psychological and symbolical significance of things - provide the framework to understand the complexity of our relationship to things and the multiplicity of meanings and projections attached to them.In the second part of the dissertation the results of a small - scale, exploratory, qualitatively oriented, empirical investigation of people who experience a peculiar relationship to objects are discussed. Through the analysis of this empirical material several interesting features of our relationship to things emerge quite clearly: gender il differences in the way of relating to the material world; the limited relevance of the concept of status symbol to explain the reasons why we surround ourselves with objects; the great emotional significance attached to things; the essential role objects play in providing the individual with material for the presentation of one's self and to communicate symbolically with others.It is concluded that the analysis of the meanings and uses of objects in everyday life provides interesting elements to understand how the individual copes with the problems contemporary industrial society raises for the establishment and maintenance of personal identity

The language of food and intercultural exchanges and relationships

The article discusses the role of food as an instrument of identity and a channel of contact through cultures. This is discussed drawing from three cases of Italian food culture hybridization spanning from the early 20th century to the first decade of the 2000s: the role of Italian food in Italian-American identity as depicted in Leonardo Coviello\u201fs work, the meeting of Southern and Northern food cultures following the Italian internal migrations in the 50s and 60s, the food practices of international migrants in the context of the global flows of people and commodities in present day Italy. In this regard, food plays an essential role in the rebuilding of a familiar context in which migrants can feel temporarily \u201cat home\u201d. At the same time, food is an important form of communication and contact between different cultures and social contexts. In this process of exchange both migrants\u201f and hosts\u201f food habits and diets are modified as they incorporate elements and ingredients from each other, making boundaries more porous

Vite diseguali nella pandemia

COVID-19 affects different social groups in unequal ways: from the older to the younger, from more (MD, nurses and manual worker in the tertiary sector) to less dangerous jobs. Economic conditions affect sanitary and poverty risks across fragile social groups, revealing a strong correlation between economic and health conditions. The social consequences of COVID are extremely serious and socially stratified: young people, irregular migrants, working mothers and poor children which had to handle everyday life in extreme economic, social, housing and cultural malaise.COVID-19 affects different social groups in unequal ways: from the older to the younger, from more (MD, nurses and manual worker in the tertiary sector) to less dangerous jobs. Economic conditions affect sanitary and poverty risks across fragile social groups, revealing a strong correlation between economic and health conditions. The social consequences of COVID are extremely serious and socially stratified: young people, irregular migrants, working mothers and poor children which had to handle everyday life in extreme economic, social, housing and cultural malaise

Shifting Geographical Configurations in Migrant Families: Narratives of Children Reunited with their Mothers in Italy

Der Aufsatz untersucht die Erfahrungen von Trennung und Wiedervereinigung von Kindern und gewanderten Müttern in Italien anhand der Analyse von 32 qualitativen Interviews, durchgeführt mit Heranwachsenden, die zu unterschiedlichen Zeitpunkten ihres Lebens wieder mit ihren Müttern vereint wurden. Wir zeigen, dass internationale Migration die Ursache ist, dass Kinder mehrfach Veränderungen in der Zusammensetzung ihrer familiären Bindungen ausgesetzt sind, die aus der räumlichen Trennung und Wiedervereinigung resultieren, von der diese Bindungen abhängig sind. Die Art, in der Kinder diese Wechsel interpretieren und sich ihnen anpassen, hängt von Faktoren wie dem Zeitpunkt des familiären Wanderungsprozesses und der Häufigkeit transnationaler Familienpraktiken ab, die von den mehr oder weniger abrupten Unterbrechungen des Familienlebens nach der Abreise der Mutter und des Kindes beeinflusst werden.The article explores the experiences of separation and reunification by children of migrant mothers in Italy by analysing 32 qualitative interviews conducted with adolescents who had rejoined their mothers at different points in their lives. We show that international migration causes children to face multiple shifts in the configuration of their family ties due to the geographical dislocations and re-locations to which these ties are subject. The way in which children interpret and adjust to these changes depends on factors such as the timing of the family migration process and the frequency of transnational family practices, which are affected by more or less abrupt discontinuities in family life after their mothers’ and their own departure

Applying Prolog to Develop Distributed Systems

Development of distributed systems is a difficult task. Declarative programming techniques hold a promising potential for effectively supporting programmer in this challenge. While Datalog-based languages have been actively explored for programming distributed systems, Prolog received relatively little attention in this application area so far. In this paper we present a Prolog-based programming system, called DAHL, for the declarative development of distributed systems. DAHL extends Prolog with an event-driven control mechanism and built-in networking procedures. Our experimental evaluation using a distributed hash-table data structure, a protocol for achieving Byzantine fault tolerance, and a distributed software model checker - all implemented in DAHL - indicates the viability of the approach

Percutaneous injection of radiopaque gelified ethanol for the treatment of lumbar and cervical intervertebral disk herniations: experience and clinical outcome in 80 patients.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Chemonucleolysis represents a minimally invasive percutaneous technique characterized by an intradiskal injection of materials under fluoroscopic or CT guidance. Recently, a substance based on radiopaque gelified ethanol has been introduced. The purpose of this study was to describe the indications, procedure, safety, and efficacy of radiopaque gelified ethanol in the percutaneous treatment of cervical and lumbar disk herniations. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Between September 2010 and August 2013, 80 patients (32 women and 48 men; age range, 18–75 years) were treated for 107 lumbar disk herniations (L2–L3, n = 1; L3–L4, n = 15; L4–L5, n = 53; and L5–S1, n = 38) and 9 cervical disk herniations (C4–C5, n = 2; C5–C6, n = 2; C6–C7, n = 3; and C7–D1, n = 2) by percutaneous intradiskal injection of radiopaque gelified ethanol under fluoroscopic guidance. Thirty-six patients underwent a simultaneous treatment of 2 disk herniations. Patient symptoms were resistant to conservative therapy, with little or no pain relief after 4–6 weeks of physical therapy and drugs. All patients were evaluated by the Visual Analog Scale and the Oswestry Disability Index. RESULTS: Sixty-two of 73 (85%) patients with lumbar disk herniations and 6/7 (83%) patients with cervical disk herniations obtained significant symptom improvement, with a Visual Analog Scale reduction of at least 4 points and an Oswestry Disability Index reduction of at least 40%. Leakage of radiopaque gelified ethanol in the surrounding tissues occurred in 19 patients, however without any clinical side effects. CONCLUSIONS: In our experience, percutaneous intradiskal injection of radiopaque gelified ethanol is safe and effective in reducing the period of recovery from disabling symptoms