ENGL378P Videogames and the Boundaries of Narrative

In this course we will engage in a comprehensive approach to narrative video gaming–-play, interpretation, and design–-to explore how video gaming helps us to conceptualize the boundaries between our experiences of the world and our representations thereof.

We will ask how play and interactivity change how we think about the work of narrative. What do we learn by thinking about video games alongside texts focused on similar subjects but in different media? How, for instance, does Assassin’s Creed: Freedom’s Cry impact how we understand the Haitian Revolution? And how do video games help us to re-conceptualize the limits of other media forms, particularly around questions of what it means to represent differences in race, gender, or physical or cognitive ability? And, finally, how might designing or making games help us think about reading, writing, and playing as matters of technology and interface?

Section(s):
0201 -  Marisa Parham