15 research outputs found
Testing the Margins of Leisure
This volume offers eight studies on different historical and present-day aspects of leisure in Asia. It critically engages with the predominant Eurocentric focus of leisure studies, bringing into the discussion a number of crucial issues such as the role of leisure as a transcultural contact zone. The volume engages with a field that has been rapidly growing due to the heightened role of leisure activities in defining a personâs identity, the fading of the work/leisure divide in the post-industrial age, and the increasing economic importance of leisure pursuits such as tourism. Bringing Asia into the discussion contributes in resetting the study of leisure into a truly global context.
Abstract in other language
The Use of digital games to enhance the physical exercise activity of the elderly : a case of Finland
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), population ageing is a global phenomenon, which brings both challenges and opportunities for society. The current longer expected lifespan can create opportunities for the elderly to contribute in many ways to their families and communities. However, it greatly depends on their quality of life, which is affected by many factors, including physical and functional health, social well-being, and cognitive abilities. The WHO (2012) states that physical health is one of the indicators for the elderlyâs quality of life, and it declines with increasing age. Participation in regular physical exercises can help the elderly improve their physical and mental health, and this has been aided by the use of modern technologies to promote the elderlyâs physical and functional health.
Of these latest technologies, digital games have shown promise to improve and enhance the elderlyâs physical activities through fun and engaging gameplay. The literature highlights that some commercial games in the market (e.g. Microsoft Kinect- Sports and Nintendo Wii Sports games) have the potential to improve the elderlyâs physical health such as gait, balance, and fall prevention. However, researchers argue that these commercial games are not designed specifically for the elderly and their physical exercise activities. They state that most commercial games are not user-friendly for the elderly whose functional and physical abilities are limited due to their advanced years. The literature points out that more studies need to be undertaken to understand the usability and usefulness of digital games for physical exercise activities so that game designers can create elderly-friendly digital games in the future. In Finland, the government has been focusing on promoting healthy ageing and increasing home care services for the elderly. In recent years, Finnish researchers have used digital games to promote older Finnsâ healthy and active ageing. The existing literature, whilst showing the potential of digital games for elderly Finnsâ physical health, also acknowledges further research is needed particularly in the context of Finland.
Thus, in this study, we aimed at investigating digital games to specifically assess their applications for older Finnsâ physical activities, focusing on the quality of usersâ experiences, and their reported ease of use and perceived usefulness. We used the mixed methods approach, which applies both qualitative and quantitative research methods. The study design included four stages: requirements gathering, analysis and design, prototyping, and evaluation. Firstly, we conducted pre-studies to elicit usersâ requirements. This was followed by the analysis of the resulting data to identify trends and patterns, which fuelled ideas in the brainstorming game design and development phases. The final product was a digital game-based physical exercise called the Skiing Game. We then evaluated the Skiing Game in Finland with 21 elderly Finns (M=7, F=14, Average Age =76). By using questionnaires, observation, and interviews, we investigated user experiences, focusing on the gameâs usability, and usefulness for enhancing the physical activity and wellbeing of the elderly. We also conducted a comparative test of the Skiing Game in Japan with 24 elderly Japanese participants (M=12, F=12, Average Age = 72) to further understand non-Finnish elderly usersâ experiences.
The findings from the usability study of the Skiing Game in Finland demonstrated that elderly Finns had a positive experience in the gameplay, and their motivation was noticeably high. It also confirmed that elderly Finns have a genuine interest in digital game-based exercises and strong intentions to play digital games as a form of physical exercise in the future. Although prior to the study most of them had negative views and misconceptions about digital games, after the gameplay their attitudes were decidedly positive. They acknowledged that whilst playing digital games could be an alternative way of exercising for them their use would primarily be when they donât have access to their usual non-digital physical exercise. The Japanese usability of the Skiing Game showed that the elderly Japanese people also had positive user experiences in playing digital games, and also intend to use them in the future. Similarly, after playing the game they reported that their attitudes towards digital games become positive, and indicated playing digital games could be an alternative way of exercising. Although the comparison of the two studies suggests that the elderly Finns had relatively more positive experiences whilst playing the Skiing Game, compared to their Japanese counterparts, in general, both groups had a positive experience in the gameplay and showed interest in digital games as an alternative exercise.
Based on the usability lessons learned from these two studies, recommendations for practitioners and designers regarding improvements in game design and development are made in this report. Implementing these modifications into future designs and further development of digital games for the elderly will improve their commercial viability and user uptake. The findings from this study can provide valuable insights, particularly for Finnish policymakers and healthcare practitioners who are keen to introduce digital games into the aged-care sector in Finland. The studies have also provided valuable insights into the optimal methods for introducing Finnish digital games to international markets, in particular, digital games tailored specifically for the physical exercise needs and motivations of the elderly. By taking into consideration the limitations of the study, we provide our future studies and further improvements of the game to be conducted
Ageing with Smartphones in Urban China: From the cultural to the digital revolution in Shanghai
If we want to understand contemporary China, the key is through understanding the older generation. This is the generation in China whose life courses almost perfectly synchronised with the emergence and growth of the âNew Chinaâ under the rule of the Communist Party (1949). People in their 70s and 80s have double the life expectancy of their parentsâ generation. The current oldest generation in Shanghai was born in a time when the average household could not afford electric lights, but today they can turn their lights off via their smartphone apps.
Based on 16-month ethnographic fieldwork in Shanghai, Ageing with Smartphones in Urban China tackles the intersection between the âtwo revolutionsâ experienced by the older generation in Shanghai: the contemporary smartphone-based digital revolution and the earlier communist revolutions. We find that we can only explain the smartphone revolution if we first appreciate the long-term consequences of these peopleâs experiences during the communist revolutions.
The context of this book is a wide range of dramatic social transformations in China, from the Cultural Revolution to the individualism and Confucianism in Digital China. Supported by detailed ethnographic material, the observations and analyses provide a panoramic view of the social landscape of contemporary China, including topics such as the digital and everyday life, ageing and healthcare, intergenerational relations and family development, community building and grassroots organizations, collective memories and political attitudes among ordinary Chinese people
Workshops of our own : analysing constraint play in digital games
Players are at the heart of games: games are only fully realised when players play them.
Contemporary games research has acknowledged playersâ importance when discussing
games. Player-based research in game studies has been largely oriented either towards
specific types of play, or towards analysing players as parts of games. While such
approaches have their merits, they background creative traditions shared across different
play. Games share players, and there is knowledge to be gleamed from analysing the
methods players adopt across different games, especially when these methods are
loaded with intent to make something new. In this thesis, I will argue that players
design, record, and share their own play methods with other players. Through further
research into the Oulipoâs potential contributions to games research, as well as a
thorough analysis of current game studies texts on play as method, I will argue that the
Oulipoâs concept of constraints can help us better discuss player-based design. I will
argue for constraints by analysing various different types of player created play
methods. I will outline a descriptive model that discusses these play methods through
shared language, and analysed as a single practice with shared commonalities. By the
end of this thesis, I will have shown that playersâ play methods are often measured and
creative. Players create play methods not only to enrich their play, but also to enrich
other playersâ play and to create new future ways to approach games, and playing them.
Furthermore, I will argue that players realise the productive potential in their play, and
they record their play both to preserve their adopted methods, but also to realise the
creative aspects latent inside their play.peer-reviewe
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Propriety, Shame, and the State in Post-Fukushima Japan
This dissertation tracks the effects of state recognition across a series of vanishing and emerging social worlds in post-Fukushima Japan. Based upon two years of fieldwork, the dissertation focuses on ethnographic sites at which the failure of state subjectivization activates both a reinvigoration of state discourse, and the formation of counter-discourses within the temporality of Japanâs endless âpostwarâ (sengo). In so doing, the dissertation seeks to disclose the social violence and iteration of shame as it is mobilized by the state to produce an obedient subject â willing to die for the nation in war â and as the failure to conform precipitates alternate socialities that may be either opposed to or complicit with state interests.
The ethnographic sites of which I write concentrate on: the compulsory enactment of propriety in public school ceremonies, and the refusal by teachers to stand for, bow to the ânational flagâ (kokki), and sing the ânational anthemâ (kokka), the self-same imperial symbols under which Japan conducted World War II; a group of Okinawan construction workers in the old day laborer district of Tokyo, Sanya; the stigmatized âradicalâ (kageki) leftist student organization, the Zengakuren; the âinternet right-wingâ (netto uyoku) group, the Zaittokai, whose street protests are performed live before a camera; and âFukushima,â where the charge of guilt has short-circuited memories of the Japanese state sacrificing its citizens during World War II.
As a foil for the remaining ethnographic sites, the obviousness of giving ârespectâ (sonchĆ) to state symbols in public school ceremonies discloses the formation of subjects in a constitutive misrecognition that eliminates â or kills â difference in the enactment of social totality. A veritable stain on which the Japanese state drive to war was dependent, the singular figure of the sitting teacher formed part and parcel of what rightist politicians referred to as the ânegative legacyâ (fu no rekishi) of World War II. S/he constituted the object of an overcoming that â alongside the Okinawan construction worker, the âradicalâ (kageki) leftist, the âresident foreignerâ (zainichi) as object of Zaittokai hate speech, and âFukushimaâ â at once marked the ground of intensification and failure of state discourse. For the graduation ceremony of March, 2012, the official number of teachers who refused to stand and sing fell to â1â in Tokyo, where the state employs 63,000 teachers.
With neither family ties, romantic involvements, nor social recognition that would confirm their masculinity, the vanishing day laborers of Sanya made all the more insistent reference to the trope of otoko or âman.â Closely articulated with the mobster world of the yakuza with which many workers had connections, the repetition of masculinity in work, gambling, and fighting constituted a discourse that repulsed the shaming gaze of general society. Thus, the excessive life-style of the otoko was located at the constitutive margins of the social bond of propriety, where he also provided a dying reserve army of labor that could be mobilized to undertake the most undesirable tasks, such as work at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
Echoing the death of Sanya, the Zengakuren numbered in the tens of thousands in the 1960s and 1970s, but had dwindled to under 100 active members in 2012. While the anti-war âstrikeâ (sutoraiki) constituted the apotheosis of the Zengakuren discourse, their espousal and shameless mandate of âviolentâ (bĆryoku) revolution subverted the origins of the Zengakuren into a prohibitive discourse which replicated the form of state rhetoric, and demanded the eradication of the Stalinist from within their own ranks.
No less shameless than the Zengakuren, the emergent hate speech of the âinternet right-wingâ (netto uyoku) iterated state discourse among the working poor. Having grown from 500 to 10,000 members within only four years, the Zaittokaiâs notorious hate speech aspired to the instantaneous effect of âkillingâ (korosu) another legacy of World War II: the âresident foreignerâ (zainichi). Yet, replicating online forms of writing, the iterability of their performative triggered repetition, and in a shamelessness specific to cyberspace â in which the reciprocity of the gaze and shame were lacking â the Zaittokai directed their paranoid speech at the state, whose representatives were said to be controlled by zainichi.
Lastly, âFukushimaâ marked the apogee of the effectivity and failures of the state in containing both the excesses of capitalism, and the ânegative legacyâ (fu no rekishi) of World War II, the memories of which were short-circuited by radioactive outpour
The ambivalent identity of Wong Kar-wai's cinema
[Ă l'origine dans / Was originally part of : ThĂšses et mĂ©moires - FAS - DĂ©partement de littĂ©rature comparĂ©e]Ayant rĂ©alisĂ© neuf longs-mĂ©trages entre 1988 et 2007, aussi que plusieurs campagnes publicitaires, vidĂ©o-clips, courts-mĂ©trages et projets collectifs, Wong Kar-wai est un des rĂ©alisateurs contemporains les plus importants actuellement. Issu de l'industrie cinĂ©matographique fortement commerciale de Hong Kong, Wong est parvenu Ă attirer l'attention du circuit international des festivals de cinĂ©ma avec son style visuel unique et son rĂ©cit fragmentĂ©. ConsidĂ©rĂ© par plusieurs critiques comme le poĂšte de la recherche dâidentitĂ© de Hong Kong aprĂšs 1997, Wong Kar-wai dĂ©fie toutes les tentatives de catĂ©gorisation.
LâĂ©tude qui se poursuivit ici a donc pour objet essentiel de fournir une analyse attentive et complĂšte de son oeuvre, tout en se concentrant sur les traits stylistiques qui donnent Ă ses films une unitĂ©. Ces caractĂ©ristiques correspondent Ă une certaine façon de raconter des histoires, de composer des personnages et des rĂ©cits, de manipuler le temps et d'utiliser des ressources techniques de sorte que ses films offrent une identitĂ© cohĂ©rente. L'objectif est d'analyser les diffĂ©rents composants de ses images pour dĂ©couvrir comment ses films communiquent les uns avec les autres afin de crĂ©er une identitĂ© unique.
Pour atteindre cet objectif, je pose comme hypothĂšse de travail que le cinĂ©ma de Wong est marquĂ© par une structure dualiste qui permet Ă ses films de prĂ©senter des qualitĂ©s contradictoires simultanĂ©ment. La plupart de mes arguments se concentrent sur le travail du philosophe français Gilles Deleuze, qui a proposĂ© une thĂ©orie du cinĂ©ma divisĂ© entre lâimage-mouvement et lâimage-temps. Je considĂšre que sa thĂ©orie fournit un cadre valide sur lequel les films de Wong peuvent ĂȘtre projetĂ©s. Tandis que ma recherche se concentre sur lâinterprĂ©tation textuelle des films, je profiterais Ă©galement dâune analyse comparative.With nine feature films released between 1988 and 2007, as well as several advertising campaigns, music videos, short films and collective projects, Wong Kar-wai is one of the most important contemporary filmmakers currently working. Hailing from Hong Kongâs highly commercial film industry, Wong has managed to attract the attention of the international film festival circuit with his visual style and fragmented narrative. Considered by many critics as the poet of Hong Kongâs quest for identity post 1997, his cinema defies every attempt of standardization.
The main goal of this study is to provide an attentive and comprehensive study of his body of work, concentrating on the stylistics traits that make his films part of a coherent unity. These characteristics correspond to a certain way of telling stories, of composing situations and characters, of manipulating time and the use of technical resources so that his films offer a coherent identity. The objective is to analyze the different components of his images, to show how his films communicate with each other in order to create something unique.
To achieve this objective, I put forward the hypothesis that Wongâs cinema is marked by a dualistic structure that allows his films to present opposite qualities at the same time. Most of my arguments are based on the thoughts of French philosopher Gilles Deleuze, whose own dualistic theory of cinema presented in his books Cinema 1: the movement-image and Cinema 2: the time-image, provides a valid framework upon which Wongâs films can be projected. While the research concentrates on the textual analysis of films, I will also benefit from comparative analysis and additional disciplines