Cs the Day: The Trading Card Game

In many ways, Cs the Day: The Card Game is an ode both to academia, which is imperfect but can at times be wonderful, and to my personal passion and research interest, which has helped me to find a place within this profession. It is also, as is discussed in more detail below, an extension of an existing game, and as such embodies many of the same goals and principles of that game. Thus, designing Cs the Day: The Card Game required careful attention to how the mechanics and narrative reflect both the profession and the original game. There are certainly substantial critiques to be made about academia, and in particular the tenure process. Indeed, Way Jeng’s “How I Learned to Love Despair: Using Simulation Video Games for Advocacy and Change,” a tycoon-esque simulation game addressing the use of contingent faculty in English departments, does an excellent job of modeling how games can be used to critique academia. That game places players in the role of an English department chair and asks them to balance faculty loads (both service and teaching related), the department budget, and university goals. By doing so, Jeng creates an open space for academics to play with this system, in a way that encourages further critique and engagement with the ethics of dependance on contingent faculty. Thus, the play of “Despair” is transformative in that it allows us to “see values and practice them and challenge them so they become more than mindless habits” (Sicart 5)

Writing In and Around Video Games

This undergraduate course uses video games as a lens through which to explore the infinitely broader topic of digital rhetoric. Students encounter games in several different ways: as texts to analyze, raw material for video compositions, systems to create and explore. Key topics include genre conventions and constraints, audience, procedural rhetoric, interface design, and convergence culture

Playing with Play: Machinima in the Classroom

“So, machinima is really a genre, and not a medium?” The students in my Digital Media and Rhetoric course are grappling with both how to define machinima and how to evaluate whether one is “good” or not. I frustrate them by refusing to provide a definitive answer to this and other similar questions they have asked about the form. This intentional frustration continues as, after watching a few examples they ask me what grade I would give those machinima, if they were turned in for this assignment. Rather than providing a simple answer I redirect, asking them what criteria they would use to evaluate machinima and how the examples we’ve seen in class stand up to this scrutiny. At the beginning of this particular unit, when I announced that we wouldn’t be writing another research paper, they were exuberant. Now, however, the complexity of the task before them is slowly unveiling itself. While a majority of these students are gamers, few of them have experience in video production. None of them have previously looked at fan culture as a source of meaning and knowledge production. We are in unfamiliar territory, and they are getting restless

Aubrey Anable, Playing with Feelings: Video Games and Affect

In lieu of an abstract, here is the review\u27s first paragraph: Audrey Anable provides a succinct overview of her book early in the introduction: “I make a case for why media theory is not finished with representation and subjectivity” (p. xi). Of course, as you might imagine, making that case is anything but simple. As Anable discovers, much of game studies as a field fetishizes mechanics and computation as the distinguishing feature of gaming (and therefore the most important aspect for analysis). There are also profound and troubling reactions from various members of the gameplaying public when representation is discussed. This, she argues, has left game studies ill equipped to address how feeling and emotion impact and enhance game play, a deficiency she notes is not limited to game studies. In response, Anable presents affect, which she defines as “the aspects of emotions, feelings, and bodily engagement that circulate through people and things but are often registered only at the interface—at the moment of transmission or contact—when affect gets called up into representation” (p. xviii). This definition provides an excellent outline of the main points she explores in her work

Creating Space: Building Digital Games

Studies of games, rhetoric, and pedagogy are increasingly common in our field, and indeed seem to grow each year. Nonetheless, composing and designing digital games, either as a mode of scholarship or as a classroom assignment, has not seen an equal groundswell. This selection first provides a brief overview of the existing scholarship in gaming and pedagogy, much of which currently focuses either on games as texts to analyze or as pedagogical models. While these approaches are certainly valuable, I advocate for an increased focus on game design and creation as valuable act of composition. Such a focus engages students and scholars in a deeply multimodal practice that incorporates critical design and computational thinking. I close with suggestions on tools for new and intrepid designers

Nature, Technology, and Ruined Women: Ecofeminism and Princess Mononoke

This article examines the popular anime Princess Mononoke through the lens of ecofeminism. In particular, we provide a close reading of the two female lead characters, San and Lady Eboshi, to demonstrate the problematic gender tropes that are often woven into films about ecological issues.SUNY BrockportThe Seneca Falls Dialogues Journa

Nature, Technology, and Ruined Women: Ecofeminism and Princess Mononoke

This article examines the popular anime Princess Mononoke through the lens of ecofeminism. In particular, we provide a close reading of the two female lead characters, San and Lady Eboshi, to demonstrate the problematic gender tropes that are often woven into films about ecological issues

The Largest GIS Day: How a 3-Hour Booth turned into a 3-Day Event

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) research and education are increasingly supported and promoted by academic libraries. GIS Day, an annual event celebrating GIS technologies and applications, provides an excellent outreach opportunity for librarians. GIS Day at Texas A&M University began as a small information booth in the library lobby and has become “the biggest GIS Day in the US” with broad participation and investment. It is now a three-day event hosted by the University Libraries. The event is a collaborative effort by the University Libraries, departments from three colleges – Architecture, Agrilife Sciences, and Geosciences – and administrative units such as Facilities Coordination and Transportation Services. In 2016, 35 events were held, including workshops, panelist sessions, career fair, and multiple competitions all with the purpose to educate attendees, build collaboration across campus, and provide networking opportunities between students and industry. Through event photos, participant feedback and data, and textual elements, this poster details the growth of GIS Day at Texas A&M, the important role the University Libraries plays, and lessons learned in planning a large, interdepartmental event