Willamette digital humanities seminar 2009, part 2

Emergent cyberculture

Contexts for the digital humanities

Wireless and mobile devices

Pedagogies of

ubiquitous computing

What it means, top-level

“A device ecology”

-Petra Wentzel, "Wireless All the Way: Users’ Feedback on Education

through Online PDAs" (presentation at the EDUCAUSE annual

conferenceAnaheim, Calif., November 7, 2003).

2. What it means, top-levelInformation and media use:• content capture• content access (downloaded or

copied)news or information• social connection (different

speeds, synch and asynch)

Another way of looking at it

All of Web 2.0, just more so• Social media• Microcontent• Accelerando!

new interfaces• tiny but beloved keyboard• stylus• touchscreen• mouse might wane

(http://let.blog.nitle.org/2008/07/21/the_mouse_soon_to_decline_gartner/)

netbooks

• Replace the laptop?

ebook readers

• The Kindle and others

phones• iPhone’s

triumph• Media• Networke

d• Apps• Touch • Other

platforms?

Phones plus

tablets

• Tablet and tablets

GPS-enabled devices

• Gaming: geocaching

• Devices vs functions

• Ultimately: AR

Clickers

• Er, Personal Response Units

• The unsung campus success

implementing clickers

• Classroom pilot• Faculty/admin

meeting demo

• Owning units: students or institution?

• Combine with ppt

implementing clickers

Pedagogical themes• Interaction• Polling• Anonymity yet universality• Aimed at large size class, often

implementing clickers

Using results• Hide, reveal, or

share?• Snap poll• Discussion

generating

Clickers for questions

• Binary or multiple• Student-generated• Assessment vs

constructivist

implementing clickers

Other devices• Smartphone apps• Web polls accessible through

multiple devices

“Pens”

• OCR• Audio

• One classroom use:http://mediatedcultures.net/ksudigg/?

p=206

mobile game players

• PSP• Others?

• Mobile, but not wireless• -cables• -USB drives• -flash cards• -batteries and outlets (for now!)

4. Campus strategies

• Nearly a decade of practice to access

• Diverse locations of support• Multiple engagements with device

ecology

5. Pedagogies

Emergent pedagogies

• Information on demand

• Time usage changes

• Class/world barrier reduction

• Personal intimacy with units

• Spatial mapping • Mobile,

multimedia, social research

Learning spaces

In the classroom • one leading pilot

space for wireless

• mode: lecture/lab

Campus• other sites: library,

residence hall• new learning

spaces• chunks of campus

Realtime search and news

Volokh Conspiracy, April 2007

Realtime search and news

“Students who have superb search skills have introduced useful material or questions into discussion. In a few cases, I’ve had students find pertinent archival video in response to the drift of the conversation which I’ve then put up on the classroom projector.”

-professor Tim Burke, Swarthmore Collegehttp://weblogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/

2009/05/06/the-laptop-in-the-classroom/

• Backchannel

• Smartmobs• CPA• Laminated

social layer• Privacy?

Social practices unfolding

(dotguy_az)

Some practices– Assignment to class: quick finding of

facts (Randy Stakeman, Emerging Technology workshop, 2009, Colby College)

– Assignment: more extensive Web research (search, assess, discuss, present)

– Scribes: one per small group, more than 1 per class

III. Pedagogies

Multitasking

• threats: distraction, wandering index/stimulus

• generational issue• practice: shells down, machines

open

Multitasking

professor Tim Burke, Swarthmore College:“I am sure there are students in my classes

who have multitasked during a lecture or discussion. I’ll be honest with you. I’ve done the same on my laptop when I’ve been in the audience during conferences or lectures, usually email. I’ve done that in response to being bored, but I’ve also done it as a kind of thoughtful doodling while feeling quite engaged and interested in what the speaker is saying and taking copious notes…”

Multitasking

“…So it doesn’t worry or offend me that a student might be doing the same. If it’s because they’re bored, that’s an issue with my presentation. (Though I’m not going to take responsibility for getting universal engagement: you can’t get blood from a stone, and some students are stones.) If the audience is still being thoughtful, taking good notes, and retaining information while multitasking, why should I care?”

http://weblogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/2009/05/06/the-laptop-in-the-classroom/

III. Pedagogies

Campus life• Informal learning• Social organization• Emergency alerts (voluntary)• That privacy issue

IV. Examples

Mobile study journaling

John Schott, Carleton College, 2006

“The mobile phone is the primary connection tool for most people in the world. In 2020, while "one laptop per child" and other initiatives to bring networked digital communications to everyone are successful on many levels, the mobile phone—now with significant computing power—is the primary Internet connection and the only one for a majority of the people across the world, providing information in a portable, well-connected form at a relatively low price.”

NITLEhttp://nitle.org

Liberal Education Todayhttp://let.blog.nitle.org

Gaming

Long history of gaming

• Predigital– Chess, go,

Senet, mancala, backgammon, dice, cards

– Kriegspiel– Cold War games

Digital• Spacewar• Zork to IF

boom (1980s)• 1990s rebirth

Gaming in 2008

Physical platforms• Console• Cell phone• PSP• Extended forms

(DDR)• New forms: Wii

PC• CD, DVD• Browser• Downloadable

…And these can be combined

• Size: huge – (WoW: 10

million subscribers, January 2008)

• Player range: genders, classes, nations

• Interface, device driver

Eve Online, from site

Growing content diversity

• Current events (Kumawar)

• Political argument (September 12th, FoodForce)

• Religious gaming (Left Behind: Eternal Forces, 2006)

• Literary gaming (Kafkamesto, 2006)

(BBC Climate Challenge; Ayiti:

both 2007-present)

Genres

• First-person shooter

• Puzzle • Platform jumper• Strategy• “Adventure”• Sports • Minigame (Koster

fractals)

New forms• Katamari• Portal• Augmented reality

games

Economics of games

Who creates games?• Businesses• Governments• Nonprofits• Amateurs

Scales• Large games

– $millions– EA, Microsoft

• Modding– Back to Doom,

hacking, View Source

– Neverwinter Nights

• Casual games

Other economics• Gambling• Gold farming• Currency trading

Offshoot:machinima

• Tools– Counterstrike, Halo– Second Life– The Movies

• Art movement– Machinima Academy of Arts and

Sciences (http://www.machinima.org/)

(Koulamata, “The French Democracy”, 2006)

Virtual worlds

Antecedents, early digital: science fiction

1984: William Gibson, Neuromancer1992: Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash“’Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts. A graphic representation of data abstracted from the banks of every computer in the human system…”

-Neuromancer

Antecedents, digital: the MUD, Adventure (1970s-present)

(LambdaMOO, 1990-present)

Antecedents, predigital: Theater of Memory

(from Philippe Codognet, http://webia.lip6.fr/~codognet/)

Avatar spaces-Activeworlds-Atmospheres-There

(Activeworlds, 1995-present; image via www.virtualworldlets.net)

-Habbo Hotel-Cyworld (Club Penguin, 2005-present)

2d-3d worlds

-Runescape-VMK

Google Earth

-Keyhole DB-2d: KML-3d: Sketchup-reach-Geotagging

photos: videos

Mirror worlds

Augmented Reality

“Human Pacman,” Adrian David Cheok, circa 2005

-mobile devicesgame playersgeneral use tools

-science fiction explores (Vernor Vinge, Rainbows End)

Interactive FictionSpeaking of text

adventures:• 1980s boom:

Infocom• Ongoing art form• Nick Montfort,

Twisty Little Passages

(“Dead Cities”, from Lovecraft Commonplace Book project 2007http://www.illuminatedlantern.com/if/games/lovecraft/)

Interactive Fiction

Speaking of text adventures:

• Inform 7, free IF editor

(Richard Liston, Ursinus College, classroom example 2008)

Narrative

Where is storytelling in a game?

• Sequence of activities• Cut-scene or

cinematic• Writerly player• Encyclopedia world

(Murray, Manovich)• Ludology vs.

narratology

Linearity?• Game on rails• Branching

outcomes• Multilinear• Open-ended

Alternate reality games• Permeability of

game boundary (space and time)

• Focus on distributed, collaborative cognition

• Increased ephemerality

(Perplex City, 2003-2006)

Political ARGs (ex: World Without Oil, May 2007)()

Gaming and education

“Video games… situate meaning in a multimodal space through embodied experiences to solve problems and reflect on the intricacies of the design of imagined worlds and the design of both real and imagined social relationships and identities in the modern world.”

21-century boom

• James Paul Gee (author of preceding quote)

• Marc Presnsky• Henry Jenkins

• John Seely Brown

• Mia Consalvo• Constance

Steinkuehler• Kurt Squire

James Paul Gee’s argument• Semiotic domains; transference• Embodied action and feedback• Projective identity• Edging the regime of competence

(Vygotsky)• Probe-reprobe cycle• Social learning (roles; consumption-

production)

Gee on Rise of Nations

More implicit pedagogies:• “Fish tank” tutorial• Strategic self-assessment

Multimedia literacies

• Gee: multimodal principle• Selfe et al: multimodal literacy• Bogost: procedural rhetoric

Dean for American game (2004)

Archived at http://www.deanforamericagame.com/play.html

Multimedia literacies

“…within games, there are in fact multitudes of literacy practices – games are full of text, she asserted, to say nothing of the entirely text-based fandom communities online that take place in forums, blogs and social networks.”

Constance Steinkuehler,FuturePlay 2007, Toronto

Quoted in http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=16264

Pedagogical functions

Summary by Jason Mittell, Middlebury College:

• Skills • Simulations• Politics (criticism, activism)• Media studies (psych, cultural

studies, media)– NITLE brownbag, January 2008

Which educational theory?• Ian Bogost: behaviorist versus constructivist

Image from Scot Osterweil, presentation to Learning from Video Games: Designing Digital Curriculums (NERCOMP SIG , 2007)

Issues summoned up:– Media effect

(violence)– Transfer across

domains, platforms– Subjectivity and

assessment– selection

Which educational theory?

Issues summoned up:– Media effect

(violence)– Transfer across

domains, platforms– Subjectivity and

assessment– selection

Responses:– Better media– Instructor

facilitation, by various media

– More research needed

– Research and collaboration

So how is gaming used now?Classroom and courses• Curriculum content• Delivery mechanism• Creating games

Peacemaker, Impact Games

Revolution (via Jason Mittell)

So how is gaming used now?One assignment: compare with

documentary records• Gap between game and reality• Spin or ideology

[img credits]

Game studies

• Serious Games• Conferences• Scholarly articles and books (MIT

Press)• Games Learning Society conference,

http://www.glsconference.org/2008/index.html

Scholarship

•Harry J.Brown, Videogames and education (2008).•Pat Harrigan and Noah Wardrip-Fruin, eds. Third Person: Authoring and Exploring Vast Narratives (2009).

Game studies

How is gaming used now?

Libraries• Collections• Game night• Creating

games

Defense of Hidgeon, Games Archive: University of Michigan

Classroom uses

Pedagogy: virtual worlds

Ancient Spaces project, University of British Columbia

Machu Picchu, Arts Metaverse,Open Croquet

Pedagogy: virtual worlds

Second Life, Bryan Zelmanov

Pedagogy: social software

“Emotional bandwidth” (Linden Labs)

• Social presence• Self-expression

Game studies

• Serious Games• Conferences• Scholarly articles and books (MIT

Press)• Games Learning Society conference,

http://www.glsconference.org/2008/index.html

Game studies

Liberal arts instances

• Aaron Delwiche, Trinity (image)

• Christian Spielvogel, Hope

• Harry Brown, Depauw

Liberal Education Today bloghttp://let.blogs.nitle.org

Prediction Markets gamehttp://markets.nitle.org/

NITLE

http://nitle.org