What Can the Digital Humanities Learn from Feminist Game Studies?

When game studies became an area for scholarly inquiry in the academy, feminist game studies soon followed. The first generation of feminist theory in game studies built on the work of Sherry Turkle, Brenda Laurel, and Janet Murray, although some might argue that the legacy of challenging gender norms in game studies goes back even earlier. Now feminist game scholars organize international conferences, edit journals and scholarly collections, and shape trends in the profession, much as their counterparts in the digital humanities attempt to do, but critics in feminist game studies have been able to take advantage of what is seen as a relatively long trajectory of feminist theoretical inquiry and field development. Articulating a need for a feminist corrective in the digital humanities has come at a much slower pace, perhaps because the instrumentalism of a “tool” seems much less blatantly anti-feminist than the instrumentalism of a gun. Furthermore, calls to action from more radicalized forms of feminist approaches to science and technology studies have been noticeably absent in the literature around digital information retrieval in the humanities. This issue of DHQ indicates that a sea change may finally be taking place

Wear and Care Feminisms at a Long Maker Table

Although there is a deep history of feminist engagement with technology, the FemTechNet initiative (a feminist collective of which we are both a part) argues that such history is often hidden and that feminist thinkers are frequently siloed. At the same time, initiatives to promote critical making, acts of “shared construction” in which makers work to understand both the technologies and their social environments, often exclude women and girls from hacker/makerspaces that require both explicit permissions and access to implicit reserves of tacit knowledge. Even attempts to provide superficial hospitality can inflict microagressions on those who feel excluded from the sites of technology. When these bastions for tinkering under the hood promote “pinkification” with hyper-feminized projects and materials empha - sizing servility, consumerism, or beauty culture, the results are often counterproductive. Take, for example, Google’s recent “Made with Code” effort, which emphasized accessories and selfies as projects appropriate for girls. Even the otherwise admirable “Girls Who Code” site tends to rely on the default design schemes of stereotypical gender typing, including a curling cursive script for section heads, a color palette dominated by a rose-pink, and the iconography of sisterhood and empowerment in the graphics and scrolling images.https://scholarworks.wm.edu/asbookchapters/1004/thumbnail.jp

Rhetoric and Digital Media

Critics of computational media can often be seen as being allied with one of two genealogies, that of Marshall McLuhan or that of Friedrich Kittler. McLuhan famously declared that the medium is the message (1964: 7) and expanded the range of cultural messages worth celebrating to include media that might seem to resist interpretation, such as lighting and clothing. McLuhan also distinguished between hot media, such as film, which supposedly provide an audience experience of deep immersion through sequential, linear, and logical arrangements, and cool media, such as comics, which require perception of abstract patterning and a simultaneous decoding of all parts. Like Vannevar Bush, who viewed the computer largely as a storage and retrieval device, McLuhan saw the computer as a research and communication instrument 1995: 295) and compared it to print genres like the encyclopedia or print storage systems like the library.https://scholarworks.wm.edu/asbookchapters/1005/thumbnail.jp

Sex differences and within-family associations in the broad autism phenotype

While there is a strong sex bias in the presentation of autism, it is unknown whether this bias is also present in subclinical manifestations of autism among relatives, or the broad autism phenotype. This study examined this question and investigated patterns of co-occurrence of broad autism phenotype traits within families of individuals with autism. Pragmatic language and personality features of the broad autism phenotype were studied in 42 fathers and 50 mothers of individuals with autism using direct assessment tools used in prior family studies of the broad autism phenotype. Higher rates of aloof personality style were detected among fathers, while no sex differences were detected for other broad autism phenotype traits. Within individuals, pragmatic language features were associated with the social personality styles of the broad autism phenotype in mothers but not in fathers. A number of broad autism phenotype features were correlated within spousal pairs. Finally, the associations were detected between paternal broad autism phenotype characteristics and the severity of children’s autism symptoms in all three domains (social, communication, and repetitive behaviors). Mother–child correlations were detected for aspects of communication only. Together, the findings suggest that most features of the broad autism phenotype express comparably in males and females and raise some specific questions about how such features might inform studies of the genetic basis of autism. </jats:p

Consistency between research and clinical diagnoses of autism among boys and girls with fragile X syndrome: Rates of autism in fragile X syndrome

Prior research suggests that 60–74% of males and 16–45% of females with fragile X syndrome (FXS) meet criteria for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in research settings. However, relatively little is known about the rates of clinical diagnoses in FXS and whether such diagnoses are consistent with those performed in a research setting using gold standard diagnostic tools

Developmental Markers of Genetic Liability to Autism in Parents: A Longitudinal, Multigenerational Study

Genetic liability to autism spectrum disorder (ASD) can be expressed in unaffected relatives through subclinical, genetically meaningful traits, or endophenotypes. This study aimed to identify developmental endophenotypes in parents of individuals with ASD by examining parents’ childhood academic development over the school-age period. A cohort of 139 parents of individuals with ASD were studied, along with their children with ASD and 28 controls. Parents’ childhood records in the domains of language, reading, and math were studied from grades K-12. Results indicated that relatively lower performance and slower development of skills (particularly language related skills), and an uneven rate of development across domains predicted ASD endophenotypes in adulthood for parents, and the severity of clinical symptoms in children with ASD. These findings may mark childhood indicators of genetic liability to ASD in parents, that could inform understanding of the subclinical expression of ASD genetic liability

Rapid automatized naming as an index of genetic liability to autism

This study investigated rapid automatized naming (RAN) ability in high functioning individuals with autism and parents of individuals with autism. Findings revealed parallel patterns of performance in parents and individuals with autism, where both groups had longer naming times than controls. Significant parent-child correlations were also detected, along with associations with language and personality features of the broad autism phenotype (retrospective reports of early language delay, socially reticent personality). Together, findings point towards RAN as a potential marker of genetic liability to autism

Designing an Educational Game: Case Study of ’Europe 2045’

Abstract. This paper presents a theoretical framework, which has been adopted in designing an on-line multi-player strategy game Europe 2045. Europe 2045 is an educational tool for high school social science courses, aimed at familiar-izing students with political, economic, and social issues in contemporary Europe. Apart from learning facts, players develop a range of key skills: discus-sion ability, negotiation, teamwork, and group decision-making. The presented theoretical framework is based on a critical analysis of crucial issues, which seem to determine the success or failure of development and implementation of an educational game in the formal school environment. It demonstrates key ap-proaches the authors of Europe 2045 have adopted in order to overcome already known problems related to game-based learning. On a general level this paper discusses issues related to formal fact learning in educational systems and the possible role of educational games in enhancing these systems