Games and virtual environments are playing an increasingly powerful role in
Western entertainment and narrative culture. Of particular importance are
the constant re- and de-construction of the embodied playing self and the
post-industrialist, customisable fluidity of personal and social
identity.This interdisciplinary conference will shed light on how virtual
communities are ‘read’ and ‘written’, i.e. constructed textually through
linguistic and semiotic en- and decoding, by producers and receivers of
video and massively multiplayer online games as well as virtual worlds such
as Second Life.
The conference’s major intention is to bring together researchers from a
wide range of different areas, who share an interest in semiotics,
stylistics, codification, new media design, 3D programming and
media/cultural studies but do not always speak the same ‘language’. The
conference will facilitate cross-disciplinary dialogue and understanding by
providing room and material for discussions between scholars, scientists
and professionals from the gaming industry. By doing so, it will help
experts identify and debate current and future developments particularly in
relation to the textual construction of subjectivities, communities and
ideologies. Date: 24-25 October 2008. Venue: Bangor University.
Abstracts of 250-300 words are invited on any topic relating to the
following themes and questions:
- How do we ‘read’ and ‘write’ virtual communities, i.e. how are
identities, communities and ideologies constructed textually and
discursively in video games and other digital environments?
- How are user identities ‘coded into’ virtual communities?
- To what extent and to what effect can we apply contemporary stylistic and
semiotic theory and analysis to virtual, interactive communities?
- How do avatars impersonate networks, communities and societies?
- What are the roles of body and mind in virtual communities? Do they
separate or amalgamate?
- To what extent do we need to revisit the notions of ‘virtual’, ‘actual’
and ‘real’ in relation to entextualised social and communal worlds and
realities?
- How does and will 3D graphic design contribute – now and in the
foreseeable future – to the construction of social identity?
- What programming tools and methodologies are/may be used to create
virtual communities and inter-'personal' relationships?
Keynote speakers will include Prof Espen Aarseth, Co-founder and Editor-in-
Chief of Gamestudies.org and author of Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic
Literature, and Fred Hasson, founding CEO of TIGA, the UK Games Development
Trade Association.
Deadline for abstracts: 5 May 2008 (to be sent to [log in to unmask])
The Conference is organised by the NIECI Research Centre for Video Games
and Virtual Environments and sponsored by The Game Creators Ltd.
For further enquiries, please contact Astrid Ensslin at
[log in to unmask] or visit the Conference website at
http://nieci.bangor.ac.uk/conf/?q=callforpapers/3.
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Dr Astrid Ensslin
Lecturer in New Media
National Institute for Excellence in the Creative Industries (NIECI)
Bangor University
Bangor, Gwynedd,
LL57 2DG
UK
WWW: www.bangor.ac.uk/creative_industries/astrid.php.en
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