Today’s Plan:
- Sicart Revisions
- Final Project Possibilities
- Final Project Proposal Form
- Wrapping Up Project 2
- Office Hours Friday
Sicart Revisions
I have graded the Sicart papers. Due to COVID, I did not invest as much time in them as I normally would–so my comments are restricted solely to your introductions. I would stress (again) that you cannot write a quality introduction until you’ve finished writing the entire paper, since the introduction has to introduce your conclusions–those conclusions are the arguments, the claims, that the paper seeks to defend. Some of you did this (and in a moment I’ll share examples of introductions that do this work). If so, then congrats! You got a grade in Canvas and are done with Project 1.
Some of you didn’t do this–you either wrote your introduction before you wrote the rest of the paper or wrote a generic introduction that lacks a specific argumentative claim. There isn’t enough detail in your introduction. I actually have to read the whole paper to identify the smart thing(s) you discovered. So, if your paper doesn’t have a grade in Canvas, then you need to go back and rewrite the introduction so that it reads like an actual academic introduction: one that lays out *all* the important findings proven later in the paper.
If you get nothing else out of this class, it will be how to write the kind of introduction that sets you up for an “A” in your other classes.
Final Project Possibilities
It is time to begin working on our final paper projects. I see three possible trajectories for the final paper. Regardless of which one you choose, here’s some details on the final paper:
- It has to involve at least 5 academic, peer-reviewed sources. A major focus of the final paper involves demonstrating the ability to read and synthesize (not just summarize) academic research
- It will involve some amount of primary research (so, not just reading stuff, but doing stuff)
- It will be 1600-2000 words (7-8 pages double-spaced) not counting title page and reference list
- It will be in APA format
I see three possible avenues for a research project:
- Analyzing a specific game
- Further Developing Project 2
- Investigating a Common Place Argument
The first option involves selecting a game in order to both review previous scholarship on the game and to propose some new way of analyzing it. For instance, you might apply Sicart’s theory of ethical gaming to a different game. Your research review would look at what scholars have already said about the game. Perhaps someone has already investigated ethical decision-making in the game–cool! You could confirm or challenge their research. You could look at different decisions. Perhaps, instead of ethical decision making, you want to look at racial/gender/LGBTQ+ representation. Cool! Although this might get trickier if someone has already studied this–unless you want to challenge/complicate their interpretation.
The goal here is to make sure you have some “space” to ask a question that hasn’t been definitively answered. So we do some research to carve out that space.
The second option asks you to pick up the work we started in Project 2 and move it to conclusion. We generally skipped a proper research review in project 2–so that’s the first thing you would have to do. What have previous studies said about racial/gender representation in games? You would be doing research to flush out the research review. This will give you some numbers against which you can compare your findings.
LBGTQ+ folks: I’m not sure this would work for you. However, you could do something closer to option #1–doing a much deeper/more nuanced analysis of LGBTQ+ representation in a game. This might involve actually playing the game in order to present and analyze the complexity/subtlety of a game. You’d still need to do some research on LGBTQ+ representation (in order to set up a baseline expectation to compare/contrast your analysis, to situate it) and you’d need to do some research on your game (has anyone talked about LGBTQ+ representation in the game before). So a little bit of column A, and a little bit of column B.
The third option is the most generic, but perhaps the most appealing to the non-gamers. This option asks you to do a more traditional research project regarding what I am terming “video game commonplaces.” In Rhetoric, commonplaces are the argumentative positions people generally “step into” when they first start thinking about a topic. They are kind of like the general knowledge on a subject (note: what people generally consider doesn’t mean they are true! Just that they are the arguments you are likely to find in the wild, wild, public–hence commonplaces). For gaming, these are generally:
- Games, Gender, Race, and Toxicity
- Games and Violence
- Games, Community, and Empathy
- Games, Education, Learning
I have a link to a document that collects sources on these issues.
Let me highlight one other potential project, related to Games, Education, and Learning. James Gee’s What Video Games Have to Teach Us about Literacy and Learning is one of the most important books in the history of video game scholarship. Gee argues that video games have intrinsic educational value regardless of their content. [Quick Scan of the table of contents]. Furthermore, every chapter ends with a checklist of claims regarding the value of games. So, a research project could be selecting a game and assessing what kinds of learning it promotes (using Gee’s end of chapter checklists as a guide).
Wrapping Up Project 2
Sometime this week, I will go through the Project Two materials that were completed and assign grades based on participation in the project. That’s my homework for next week.
For Next Class
You need to complete a Project Proposal document. Make a copy of that document in Google Docs. Submit a SHARE link (set to edit) to Canvas. Completing the proposal should take you 2-3 hours.
If you have not received a grade on Project One, then you also need to revise your introduction.
