From the Publisher: 
A Question of Identity 
Life on the Screen is a fascinating and wide-ranging investigation of the impact of computers and networking on society, peoples' perceptions of themselves, and the individual's relationship to machines. Sherry Turkle, a Professor of the Sociology of Science at MIT and a licensed psychologist, uses Internet MUDs (multi-user domains, or in older gaming parlance multi-user dungeons) as a launching pad for explorations of software design, user interfaces, simulation, artificial intelligence, artificial life, agents, "bots," virtual reality, and "the on-line way of life." 
Turkle's discussion of postmodernism is particularly enlightening. She shows how postmodern concepts in art, architecture, and ethics are related to concrete topics much closer to home, for example AI research (Minsky's "Society of Mind") and even MUDs (exemplified by students with X-window terminals who are doing homework in one window and simultaneously playing out several different roles in the same MUD in other windows). Those of you who have (like me) been turned off by the shallow, pretentious, meaningless paintings and sculptures that litter our museums of modern art may have a different perspective after hearing what Turkle has to say. 
This is a psychoanalytical book, not a technical one. However, software developers and engineers will find it highly accessible because of the depth of the author's technical understanding and credibility. Unlike most other authors in this genre, Turkle does not constantly jar the technically-literate reader with blatant errors or bogus assertions about how things work. Although I personally don't have time or patience for MUDs,view most of AI as snake-oil, and abhor postmodern architecture, I thought the time spent reading this book was an extremely good investment.

스크린 위의 삶 = Life on the screen : identity in the age of the internet

What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy

The Social Contexts of Research. Edited by Saad Z. Nagi and Ronald G. Corwin. Pp. xii + 409. (John Wiley: New York and London, August 1972.) £5.65.

Sociology of Science

Preface (1999) Preface (1990) 1. Subjects of Sex/Gender/Desire I. 'Women' as the Subject of Feminism II. The Compulsory Order of Sex/Gender/Desire III. Gender: The Circular Ruins of Contemporary Debate IV. Theorizing the Binary, the Unitary and Beyond V. Identity, Sex and the Metaphysics of Substance VI. Language, Power and the Strategies of Displacement 2. Prohibition, Psychoanalysis, and the Production of the Heterosexual Matrix I. Structuralism's Critical Exchange II. Lacan, Riviere, and the Strategies of Masquerade III. Freud and the Melancholia of Gender IV. Gender Complexity and the Limits of Identification V. Reformulating Prohibition as Power 3. Subversive Bodily Acts I. The Body Politics of Julia Kristeva II. Foucault, Herculine, and the Politics of Sexual Discontinuity III. Monique Wittig - Bodily Disintegration and Fictive Sex IV. Bodily Inscriptions, Performative Subversions Conclusion - From Parody to Politics

Postmodern Subjects, Postmodern BodiesThinking Fragments: Psychoanalysis, Feminism, and Postmodernism in the Contemporary WestYearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural PoliticsGender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity

Challenging games help students learn

This paper presents a gameplay experience model, assesses its potential as a tool for research and presents some directions for future work. The presented model was born from observations among game-playing children and their non-player parents, which directed us to have a closer look at the complex nature of gameplay experience. Our research led into a heuristic gameplay experience model that identifies some of the key components and processes that are relevant in the experience of gameplay, with a particular focus on immersion. The model includes three components: sensory, challenge-based and imaginative immersion (SCI-model). The classification was assessed with self-evaluation questionnaires filled in by informants who played different popular games. It was found that the gameplay experiences related to these games did indeed differ as expected in terms of the identified three immersion components.

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Fundamental Components of the Gameplay Experience: Analysing Immersion

Introduction What is Game Studies? Game Culture Meaning in Games Play and Games in History Dual Structure and the Action Games of the 1970's Adventures and Other Fiction in the 1980S' Games Three-Dimensionality and the Early 1990's The Real and the Game Game Culture Entering the New Millennium Preparing for a Game Studies Project

An introduction to game studies : games in culture

Do digital games and play mean the same things for different people? This article presents the results of a three-year study in which we sought for new ways to approach digital games cultures and playing practices. First, we present the research process in brief and emphasise the importance of merging different kinds of methods and materials in the study of games cultures. Second, we introduce a gaming mentality heuristics that is not dedicated to a certain domain or genre of games, addressing light casual and light social gaming motivations as well as more dedicated ones in a joint framework. Our analysis reveals that, in contrast to common belief, the majority of digital gaming takes place between ‘casual relaxing’ and ‘committed entertaining’, where the multiplicity of experiences, feelings, and understandings that people have about their playing and digital games is wide-ranging. Digital gaming is thus found to be a multi-faceted social and cultural phenomenon which can be understood, practiced and used in various ways.

At least nine ways to play : approaching gamer mentalities

An Introduction to Game Studies is a core textbook for game studies as an academic discipline, and is the comprehensive guide to the field. It introduces the student to the history and character of games studies as an analytical study of games in culture, and then moves to provide an overview of games as signifying and dynamic cultural constructs. This book shows how to analyze games by introducing the core analytical concepts in the contexts of games and game cultures of four periods. It covers the prehistory of games, the 70s, 80s, and 90s and also contemporary developments. Students will be introduced to both the theoretical core and the essential genres and classics of the subject.

An introduction to game studies

Pokemon GO is a location-based augmented reality mobile game based on the Pokemon franchise. After the game was launched globally in July 2016, it quickly became the most successful mobile game in both popularity and revenue generation at the time, and the first location-based augmented reality game to reach a mainstream status. We explore the game experiences through a qualitative survey (n=1000) in Finland focusing on the positive and the negative aspects of Pokemon GO as told by the players. The positive experiences are related to movement, sociability, game mechanics, and brand while the negative experiences emerge from technical problems, unequal gaming opportunities, bad behavior of other players and non-players, and unpolished game design. Interestingly, the augmented reality features, safety issues or the free-to-play revenue model did not receive considerable feedback. The findings are useful for academics and industry practitioners for studying and designing location-based augmented reality game experiences.

Frans Mäyrä

Papers

Fundamental Components of the Gameplay Experience: Analysing Immersion

An introduction to game studies : games in culture

At least nine ways to play : approaching gamer mentalities

An introduction to game studies

The Pokémon GO Experience: A Location-Based Augmented Reality Mobile Game Goes Mainstream