The new issue of G|A|M|E proposes a re-examination of the concept of
agency in games. We welcome contributions that address the idea of agency from
a variety of academic perspectives, taking into account its interdisciplinary
history and application, in order to expand our critical understanding of the
concept more broadly. We therefore invite scholars from all fields to reflect
on different notions of agency, not only in relation to physical and digital
games, but also to other media and art forms as they impact on games and game
studies. At the end of the influential first-person shooter Bioshock (2K Games,
2007), its critique of the rhetoric of choice and freedom emerges from the
dialogue between the protagonist Jack and the visionary despot of Rapture,
Andrew Rayan. Rayan's seemingly innocent question ‘Would You Kindly?’ conceals
a cognitive trigger that casts a shadow over the protagonist's actions. By
shattering the illusion of free will for both character and player, the game
breaks the fourth wall and confronts the user with the question: who is
being/has been controlled?
Already central to the fields of Human-Computer Interaction as well as
that of design (e.g. Sherry Turkle, 1984; Brenda Laurel, 1991), agency was
redefined more than twenty years ago in Janet Murray's seminal volume Hamlet on
the Holodeck (1996, p. 123) as ‘the satisfying power to take meaningful action
and see the results of our decisions and choices’. To this day, the concept of
agency is still prominent in scholarly debates on video game and game design:
to describe a key ontological category that delineates the multiplicity of
paths as well as the breadth of choices made available by interactive texts;
and also –closer to Murray’s acceptation– to define a primary category of video
game aesthetics, a textual effect attached to the pleasure of taking meaningful
decisions within virtual environments.
On one level, agency informs media objects, texts and devices. Agency
can be observed in relation to old and new game genres (adventure games with
branching narratives, interactive movies, sandbox and open-world games);
degrees of agency are provided by the affordances of VR/AR and mixed reality
technologies (Oculus, PlayStationVR, HoloLens etc.); forms of agency are
conceptualised across diverse media and art forms (interactive design,
experimental film, on- demand TV, experiential theatre, museum installations)
as well as in physical and digital hypertexts (Choose You Own Adventure books);
agency is reallocated through new modes of distribution and fruition (VoD,
streaming platforms and digital piracy); and agency is also embedded in
sub-cultural practices and products (machinima, fan-fiction etc.).
On another level, agency is crucial to debating conceptual categories
relevant to interactive digital media. Digital artefacts are immersed in a
cross- and trans-media landscape, in which the interface constantly brings into
question the relationship between objects, developers and users, blurring the
boundaries between authors and audiences and questioning the sovereignty over
these objects on multiple fronts. Here, agency provides an opening to explore
aesthetic, social and political tensions (gender, race, class), and can be used
to analyse discourses that challenge the role of the spectator/reader/player in
relation to media object and their creators (art and exhibition, authorship,
fandom, prosumer culture).
With its eighth issue, G|A|M|E wants to investigate the agency afforded
by games, software and interfaces, as well as the agency claimed by players,
users and spectators. Exceeding Murray’s original aesthetic understanding of
the term, we intend to expand our examination of agency within and beyond the
virtual borders of game studies. Agency is, in fact, a pivotal concept in
philosophy, adopted to address relations of intentionality and causality
between actors and actions (e.g. Anscombe, 1957; Davidson, 1963); as well as in
social sciences, which locate agency within material and immaterial networks
between human and non-human agents (Latour, 2005). In light of the vast
interdisciplinary history of this concept, we seek contributions that can
productively inform and renew our understandings of agency in gaming and play,
while also using game agency to inform larger political, philosophical and
cultural issues, developing current critical debates in game studies and in
other disciplines.
Topics may include:
- agency in game studies
- agency and gaming technologies (VR, AR, mixed reality)
- agency and interactivity
- agency in video game criticism
- close textual analysis of games in relation to agency
- player reception and agency: modding, fandom etc.
- agency in traditional games: board games, sports etc.
- video game agency and issues of authorship
- agency as interdisciplinary concept, from games to: arts, social sciences, law and philosophy
- game agency in relation to other cultural forms (experimental film, cinema, art, architecture, design)
- agency and non-linear textuality
- politics (race, class, sexuality, gender, geopolitics) and video game agency
- agency and media ecologies
Scholars are invited to submit an extended abstract (between 500-1,000
words excluding references) or full papers by Friday the 19th of July, 2019 to
editors@gamejournal.it
Notification of
acceptance: 25th of July 2019
All accepted authors will be asked to submit the full paper by the 15th
of October 2019. We expect to release this issue in Winter 2019
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