/pdf/the-precariat-the-new-dangerous-class-3tq7b7h7fg.pdf

The Precariat. The New Dangerous Class

aimed to attract a more diverse audience of gamers and non-gamers – and to bring video games off the screen and into the living room. While not all games are well suited for multiplayer play – ‘It’s hard to avoid getting in each other’s way and impeding rather than advancing game progress’ (p. 133) – most games are intended to be played while in the room with other people. ‘The Wii is just the latest attempt by Nintendo to bring a version of this kind of social gaming into the living room, closer to arcade parties and karaoke than to, say, bouts of online multiplayer military simulations’ (p. 142). Jones and Thiruvathukal’s book is as much a user’s manual for the potential of the Nintendo Wii as it is an academic and technical deconstruction of the console as a computing platform. Their joint approach to considering the topic works well, but it isn’t until the very end of the book that Jones’ cultural contextual approach really shines. In the final six pages of the sixth chapter (pp. 143–148), the authors consider the paratext of the Wii, as well as the diegetic and nondiegetic elements of video games – and the various layers of the platform and the games, interactions and activities it supports. ‘This social layer of a video game platform is an essential part of what the system means, because it’s the environment in which the platform gets used’ (p. 148). Much of the existing literature on Nintendo – such as Osamu Inoue’s (2010) Nintendo Magic: Winning the Videogame Wars and Jeff Ryan’s (2011) Super Mario: How Nintendo Conquered America – concentrates on the company’s success as a business. The more technical literature to date focuses on the use of the Wii Balance Board, another controller for the platform, in healthcare and therapeutic settings. This text sits comfortably in the middle, Wiimote and Nunchuk controllers in hand, making a valuable contribution to the study of the Nintendo Wii and how technology and culture work together.

It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens

/pdf/netnography-doing-ethnographic-research-online-3kekz41pi8.pdf

Netnography. Doing ethnographic research online

Confronting the challenges of participatory culture

from topic, providing both stand-alone chapters and a logical, progressive structure through the volume. It is neither too wide nor too narrow in time or geography, making it an excellent and enduring choice for libraries internationally. Yuill has produced an academic book that is not light on history, theory, examples or argument, but is yet eminently readable and accessible for students, practitioners in social care and health, policy-makers and people facing the issues in their own families and communities alike. There may well be a couple of editorial slips in referencing here and there, but Assisted Suicide is still by far the best book on this subject in many years; the author should be proud of this important volume that brilliantly and eloquently tackles injustice and prejudice around assisted suicide. In hardback, it will also provide a useful tool of defence against the next medic who tries to use the Liverpool Care Pathway when I am in hospital.

Revolting subjects: social abjection and resistance in neoliberal Britain

The relevance of videogames in the contemporary cultural ecosystem and their social impact make it necessary to develop theories and analytical models to understand the expressive potential of videogame design, and how videogames work as texts, giving shape to certain values, behavioural patterns and ideological visions. To do so, it is crucial to build a bridge between game studies and contemporary semiotics. Thus, with this aim, we present in this paper an analysis model for studying videogames as texts that combines theoretical and methodological elements from social semiotics and procedural rhetorics, a specific branch of game studies. Our model is based on four levels: the narrative, ludo-narrative, system-gameplay and designer-player dimensions. As a case study, the model is applied to the videogame The Last of Us.

Videogame analysis: a social-semiotic approach

The emergence of new media, devices, narratives and practices has compelled media literacy scholars and professionals to review their theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches. Based on a new conception – ‘transmedia literacy’ – that moves from traditional media literacy to informal learning and participatory cultures practices, the research program behind the present article tries to understand how new generations are doing things with media outside schools and how they learnt to do the things they do. The article begins by describing the transformations of media literacy in recent years as a consequence of the mutations of the media ecology and, in that context, proposes a methodological approachfor analysing the acquisition of transmedia skills in informal learning environments by teens. The article describes, analyses and evaluates the development and initial implementation of this methodology working with teenagers in a high-school in NAME CITY. It ends with a Research Kit that includes surveys, creative workshops, interactive interviews and media diaries with teens between 12-18 years old.  The article also describes the evolution of this methodological approach from its original formulation to the evaluation of the model after it was tested, and reflects on the possibilities of developing specific research devices to be applied in transnational research.

/pdf/what-are-teens-doing-with-media-an-ethnographic-approach-for-2dbxm89jwj.pdf

What are teens doing with media? An ethnographic approach for identifying transmedia skills and informal learning strategies

This article aims to identify the relationship between video games and neoliberal values. To fulfil this aim, it analyses the covers of the 20 top-selling video games in the United States each year...

/pdf/choose-collect-manage-win-neoliberalism-enterprising-culture-527r0phd42.pdf

‘Choose, collect, manage, win!’: Neoliberalism, enterprising culture and risk society in video game covers:

An ideological analysis of video games should include both the narrative and ludic dimensions, since there can be frictions between these two dimensions and they can even contradict one another. Th...

Video Games, Dystopia, and Neoliberalism: The Case of BioShock Infinite:

The centrality of the media in the contemporary public sphere has led political institutions to adapt their communication strategies to its logic. Politics and entertainment are increasingly converging and one of the most significant examples of this trend is the tendency to turn politicians into celebrities, i.e. using elements of celebrity culture to build candidates’ public image. This article aims to develop theoretically what celebrification of a candidate means. Drawing upon the main contributions of celebrity studies and political marketing, we identify three fundamental aspects that become useful to recognise and understand celebrification. Additionally, these three elements are applied to analyse the construction of the candidates’ image in the 2012 Catalan Parliamentary Elections.

Óliver Pérez-Latorre

Papers

Videogame analysis: a social-semiotic approach

What are teens doing with media? An ethnographic approach for identifying transmedia skills and informal learning strategies

‘Choose, collect, manage, win!’: Neoliberalism, enterprising culture and risk society in video game covers:

Video Games, Dystopia, and Neoliberalism: The Case of BioShock Infinite:

Celebrificación del candidato: cultura de la fama, marketing electoral y construcción de la imagen pública del político