Syftet med denna studie har varit att undersöka och få insikt i förskollärarnas syn på att använda digitala medier som stöd och hjälpmedel i den pedagogiska verksamheten. Särskilt fokus lades på språkutveckling. I studien undersöks hur förskollärarna säger att de använder digitala verktygen samt inom vilka områden. Dessutom omfattar den en analys av förskollärarnas digitala kompetens. I studien användes kvalitativ intervjumetod där fyra förskollärare har intervjuats. Förskolorna ligger i en storstad i Mellansverige. Resultatet från denna studie påvisar att digitala medier är uppskattade och gillas av både förskollärare och barn. Ipad är det mest populära verktyget i verksamheten. Den används dock inte så mycket som pedagogiskt verktyg då förskollärarna känner sig sakna kompetens för det, vilket leder till osäkerhet och försiktighet. Ipaden används därför mer spontant och inte så målinriktat. Barnen är intresserade och blir språkligt aktiva och engagerade när de får använda den. Det uppstår ett socialt samspel mellan barnen och förskollärarna, barnen kommunicerar sinsemellan och med förskolläraren. Det är ganska tydligt att deras språk utvecklas.

In this thesis, I argue that traditional Chinese thinking and its manner of approaching art can be successfully expanded onto a different platform: digital media art. My research (both in theory and practice) shows how this transformation expands the notions of time and space and forges new interdisciplinary correlations by addressing traditional Chinese culture in four different but interrelated manifestations: the philosophy of Dao, calligraphy, painting and sculpture. As a result, I claim that digital media can shift the notions of time and space from traditional Chinese thinking into contemporary digital art. Conversely, the digital concept of time and space can be interpreted by an analysis of (i) the traditional Chinese philosophy of Dao, so as to understand how ancient Chinese perceived the universe of time and space; (ii) four areas of Chinese art addressed in my theoretical and practical research (as elaborated in subsequent chapters). For example, a new understanding of ‘scroll format’, ‘play-appreciation’ and Chinese digital art has been introduced through my own practice. In fact, this direction has not been sufficiently dealt with in the past, and deserves more attention in the future. The thesis demonstrates how my practical research was heavily influenced and contextualized by my theoretical research, while the result of my practical artwork applies, expands and transforms that theory. This thesis aims, both theoretically and practically, at providing the reader with a new experience – the perception of the notions of time and space inherent in traditional Chinese thinking – by combining these concepts with digital technology.  Many different methods used in traditional Chinese scroll painting and calligraphy have in their day investigated and developed new ideas of time and space – e.g. multiple perspectives, binary visual modes, visible and invisible spaces, reversed images and inverted vision. All of these concepts could be further extended through digital moving images and interactive art in order to provide the audience with a new spatiotemporal dimension as an enhancement of visual experience and knowledge.

Through my experimental practice (i.e. interactive art, moving images, workshop and exhibitions), I have illustrated how digital art and digital technology can build on the notions of guan (觀; ‘to observe’), and you (遊; [1] ‘to tour’, ‘to travel’; or [2] ‘to roam’, ‘to saunter’). Furthermore, digital art can help viewers use the notions of play and appreciation – wan shang (玩賞, ‘play-appreciation’) – in Chinese context exhibition spaces. By exploiting this new dimension of experience, contemporary Chinese artists will, it is hoped, be able to introduce the spirit of traditional Chinese thinking to digital platforms, creating a guide that not only broadens the notions of time and space for digital media artists and audiences, but also forges new correlations between the various disciplines of philosophy and media art.

This thesis, therefore, rests on three investigative pillars: (1) contextual analysis through the history of Chinese art and – to a lesser extent – Western art; (2) the possibilities of modern digital media art; (3) analysis and application of the Chinese philosophical tradition (art theory and the notion of time and space) to elucidate and develop the interface between traditional Chinese and modern digital art. The result of my research has shown that what emerges from – and also motivates – the investigation is an understanding that digital art (moving images and interactive art) is an appropriate and effective medium for the communication and deepening of Chinese cultural awareness. My research structure and development is divided into six steps as follows: Firstly, in developing this thesis, I posit that the ideas of time and space [Chinese terms and terminologies: shi jian (時間,‘time’), kong jian (空間, ‘space’), and yu zhou (宇宙, ‘the universe’)] have been handled in traditional Chinese scroll painting and calligraphy through the application of multiple perspectives, binary visual modes, visible and invisible space, the passing of time, and non-linear narratives. When these potentials are reproduced by media artists, novel insights, experiences and knowledge about time and space are re-interpreted for their audiences, while the history of time and space tends to collapse. Secondly, I examine the idea of the ‘Yellow Box’, whose original aim was to suggest a novel approach to the understanding of the relation between contemporary Chinese artworks and museum-based exhibition space. I argue, however, that such a direction does not consider the potential of digital media art, and my practical projects demonstrate that the ‘Yellow Box’ idea still has room for further development in its application to digital art history. Moreover, the analysis of time and space offered here in the context of my own media-art production process (custom software and hardware) can benefit other researchers and artists. The attempt to illustrate Chinese art theories and to document and reflect upon different ways of perceiving the position and role of the audience can provide a unique and fruitful insight into the incorporation of Chinese thinking and manners into media art practice. Thirdly, I analyse the correlation between traditional art and contemporary digital media art in relation to time. I first illustrate how multiple spatiotemporal experiences merge into one pictorial space in terms of non-linear narrative in some significant traditional Chinese art pieces, and then argue that digital art can actually help to re-interpret the traditional Chinese notion of time in a modern dimension. The results of my study reflect how the notions of (1) cycle, (2) non-linear narrative, and (3) ‘play-appreciation’ in ancient Chinese art correlate to the elements of ‘looping’ and ‘layering of content’ in digital art, which allow viewers to have real-time experience of ‘time passing and transitioning’. My analysis, however, also indicates that some contemporary Asian digital artworks (all relating to time transition) have not yet considered the viewer’s spatiotemporal experience in relation to such idea as ‘play-appreciation’ through viewers’ bodily engagement. Fourthly, I examine the spatial correlations between Chinese and media art, and argue that there are many correlations between the past and contemporary Chinese art in the ways in which viewers’ virtual and physical experiences have been applied. I analyse how the idea of ‘two different positions of the viewer’, through painting, reliefs and gunpowder in China, correlates with digital media art today. Such correlation allows the artist to play with the idea of ‘multiple identities’ through digital media (e.g. dual and multiple screens). The results of the analysis reveal a strong correlation between traditional art forms and modern digital media art that permits the artist and the viewer to manipulate the idea of ‘multiple identities’ through dual and multiple screens in both real and virtual spaces. 
Reflecting this, my practical project demonstrates how pictorial and virtual space function as part of one’s cultural identities through viewers’ bodily engagement. For example, in line with my experience of multiple-identities in relation to my own Indonesian-Chinese background on the one hand, and the ‘upstairs culture’ of Hong Kong on the other, I combined a series of fragmentary stills and moving images in the ‘Upstairs / Downstairs’ project (2004-2012) to demonstrate how digital technology can help visualize the notions of multiple viewpoints through multiple screens. From there I went on to ask whether my Asian cultural background could help transform traditional visual experiences onto a digital platform by integrating a sense of ambiguity and multiple identities.

The research uses Burgert (1998) and Brody Neuenschwander’s (2000) ideas of the ‘Linear Graphic’ to explore the creative and expressive qualities of the line. In addition, the characteristics of Ch’i are also analysed and identified. This is achieved by exploring and interpreting classic Chinese principles such as ‘Ch’i Yuen Shen Tung’ (Rhythmic Vitality), ‘Harmony of the Mind and Hand’ and ‘Stilling the Heart’. As a result, new approaches of ‘Simplicity’ and ‘Spontaneity’ have been developed for Western calligraphy. These approaches demonstrate the requirement of the control and integrity of the calligrapher. The research also places emphasis on the development of one’s ‘self-being’ to cultivate the internal and external aspects of calligraphy. This is achieved through the creation of calligraphy pieces as part of this developmental process. Digital media are also explored by using these same principles and approaches. New characteristics and processes such as ‘Layering’, ‘Reusability’ and ‘Simplicity and Complexity’ in print based calligraphy, as well as ‘Dynamism’, ‘Customisability’, ‘Impermanence’ and ‘Interactivity’, in computational calligraphy have emerged as a result.

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences. / Department of Communication

This dissertation examines the nature of the American digital public square in the 2010’s, a place where people learn about and come together to discuss matters of public concern. The newly digital public square is a key component of any functional democracy in the twenty-first century. The dissertation seeks to shed light, not only on the capacities of today’s news media institutions to produce and efficaciously distribute news and information and support a capacity for discussion and deliberation that provides a “public intelligence” on matters of concern, but also on the newly enlarged role of the public in new rituals of digestion of such news. The work draws upon multiple systems-focused analyses of the public square, interviews, and analyses of news production, the economics and dynamics facing those who both produce and distribute news, and the broader literature about and studies of the public square. Despite the manifest uncertainty regarding how journalism will be supported and the success of a politics where rhetoric is often untethered to the truth, a temptation still exists to see the changes to the public square in a piecemeal fashion and to assume the institutions, business models, and practices of the future will be minor modifications on or variations of the past. Much scholarship concludes that the patterns of decay and growth in this area will eventually generate equilibria in terms of press freedom, news production, news distribution, and engagement that are familiar, no less efficacious than, and only marginally distinct from those of the latter half of the twentieth century. In his book The Marketplace of Attention, Professor James Webster concludes that “the cultural ballast provided by the old media will remain with us,” and that polarizing forces will meet their match with the forces that concentrate public attention (Webster 2016). In contrast, this dissertation argues that the combination of forces acting upon the digital public square and its emergent dynamics in the late 2010s means it is already functioning in a qualitatively different manner than the largely analogue public square of the past and, as structured, it is increasingly failing to serve individuals, groups, communities, the public writ large, and most importantly our democratic processes. This argument is built on insights from my nearly a decade of work in the media reform community—specifically, from three systems analyses I developed leading the Public Square Program at the Democracy Fund of the dynamics surrounding civic engagement and the production of local news, the dynamics of audience attention, and public trust and press freedom. After making the case for the difference that already exists, the dissertation argues that, without engagement of a wide range of actors (civic, political, and commercial) in support of much-needed changes to institutions, along with policies that will support a renewal of civic media and a focus on new practices more appropriate for the rituals of the digitally and data-infused world we live in, it is entirely possible the public square will fail to adequately support democratic ends. The dissertation concludes with recommendations to avoid this outcome.

While youth media production work has increased dramatically over the past two decades, researchers still lack an adequate theorization of how institutionally-mediated youth production programs instigate democratic acts. Central to this deficiency ares hortcomings in the two dominant frameworks typically used to conceptualize the democratic potential of young people's media work. In response to this, I turn to the work of Hannah Arendt and use her conceptualization of public action as framed in relation to a "pedagogy of natality" to assess the relationship between creative youth practice and democracy. While Arendt's framework offers a compelling vision of democratic action, her model is also invaluable for mapping how production work affects adolescents' democratic experience. It focuses the analytic lens on agonistic struggles that expand the way youth register and pay heed to plurality. I demonstrate this utility through a critical ethnographic study of the Summer Visions Film Institute, an initiative designed around a series of two-week digital video production programs for youth aged 14-19. In examining the Summer Visions program, I address the experience of student video producers but focus close attention on the work and experience of peer-to-peer youth mentors in the program for the following reasons. First, peer education has a role in many youth media programs but there continues to be a dearth of research on peer mentorship in media production settings. Second, while student participants take part in Summer Visions for ten days, the mentors are involved in production work on a daily basis over a seven-week period. Most are also former students of the program and so they offer a more robust set of case studies. Using Arendt, I demonstrate how media production programs contribute in contradictory but nonetheless important ways to the formation of new publics, not because such work leads to straightforward forms of position taking about specific political projects, but because it leads to forms of thoughtfulness that challenge the lure of oblivion that haunts our lives and prevents us from seeing those who are different and yet part of our worlds.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Delaware, 2009. / Principal faculty advisor: Ronet D. Bachman, Dept. of Sociology & Criminal Justice. Includes bibliographical references.

While youth media production work has increased dramatically over the past two decades, researchers still lack an adequate theorization of how institutionally-mediated youth production programs instigate democratic acts. Central to this deficiency ares hortcomings in the two dominant frameworks typically used to conceptualize the democratic potential of young people's media work. In response to this, I turn to the work of Hannah Arendt and use her conceptualization of public action as framed in relation to a "pedagogy of natality" to assess the relationship between creative youth practice and democracy. While Arendt's framework offers a compelling vision of democratic action, her model is also invaluable for mapping how production work affects adolescents' democratic experience. It focuses the analytic lens on agonistic struggles that expand the way youth register and pay heed to plurality. I demonstrate this utility through a critical ethnographic study of the Summer Visions Film Institute, an initiative designed around a series of two-week digital video production programs for youth aged 14-19. In examining the Summer Visions program, I address the experience of student video producers but focus close attention on the work and experience of peer-to-peer youth mentors in the program for the following reasons. First, peer education has a role in many youth media programs but there continues to be a dearth of research on peer mentorship in media production settings. Second, while student participants take part in Summer Visions for ten days, the mentors are involved in production work on a daily basis over a seven-week period. Most are also former students of the program and so they offer a more robust set of case studies. Using Arendt, I demonstrate how media production programs contribute in contradictory but nonetheless important ways to the formation of new publics, not because such work leads to straightforward forms of position taking about specific political projects, but because it leads to forms of thoughtfulness that challenge the lure of oblivion that haunts our lives and prevents us from seeing those who are different and yet part of our worlds.

This study is positioned within a specific South African context where many learners not only lack access to resources but are considered underprepared and therefore are seen as academically disadvantaged. Research findings presented here centre on learning theories within the social constructivist paradigm, make use of a developmental research methodology and use a number of different research instruments. The main objective of this study was to investigate the use of virtual learning environments, constructed as educational adventure games, as viable learning tools and to determine the influence of game play on skill development and overcoming learning difficulties. More specifically two educational games, Zadarh and ãKhozi developed at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, were used to investigate the use of technology in classrooms that included underprepared and academically disadvantaged learners. Zadarh was designed to challenge learner misconceptions related to photosynthesis and photorespiration and was used to investigate and evaluate the effectiveness of games to overcome these misconceptions. ãKhozi was used to introduce learners to issues related to HIV/Aids and to evaluate the use of such tools to develop skills. However, It was first necessary to develop an instrument, based on the Persona Outlining Model (POM), to evaluate and measure skills. The POM uses a number of interfaces (literacy, communication and visualization skills) and properties (age, gender and socio-economic background) to describe a typical learner, or game player. The instrument based on these interfaces and properties was used to evaluate the skills of young South Africans from Buhlebemfundo, Qhakaza and Tholokuhle schools and two universities, namely, University of Zululand [UniZulu] and University of KwaZulu-Natal [UKZN]), all from the region of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa. The majority of the sampled learners appear to lack appropriate visualisation, logical, mathematical, reading and writing skills and results suggest that poor performance may be associated with a low household income and poor English language skills. While participants (Buhlebemfundo, Qhakaza and Tholokuhle schools, and UniZulu and UKZN university students) who played Zadarh individually solved game problems, they still held many of the misconceptions. Further investigation revealed that when participants were unable to solve a problem they learnt by rote the solution to the problem. Playing Zadarh in groups and allowing participants to ask for clarification of assessment instrument questions showed that many participants developed a deeper understanding on the relationships between photosynthesis and respiration. Participants from Qhakaza were asked to play ãKhozi in flexible groups whichchanged from session to session. Using the previously developed skills assessment instrument showed improve visual, literacy and communication skills. Results strongly suggest that only through dialogue can misconceptions be overcome and that learning is a social activity as proposed by Vygotsky over 80 years ago. More specifically research presented here supports Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development, the role of play in development and the need for written language skills. The new art form of digital games when conceived as microworlds can play an important role in education if games support co-operation between players, peers and mentors, allow for exploration through play and support the development of reading and writing skills. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.

This study concerns itself with the relationship between game design and emergent social behaviour in massively multiplayer online games and virtual worlds. This thesis argues for a legitimisation of the study of ‘communities of play’, alongside communities perceived as more ‘serious’, such as communities of interest or practice. It also identifies six factors that contribute to emergent social behaviour and investigates the relationship between group and individual identity, and the emergent ways in which these arise from and intersect with the features and mechanics of the game worlds themselves. Methodology: Under the rubric of ‘design research’, this study was conducted as an ethnographic intervention, an anthropological investigation that deliberately privileged the online experience whilst acknowledging the performative nature of both game play and the research process itself. The research was informed by years of professional practical experience in game design and playtesting, as well as by qualitative methods derived from the fields of Anthropology, Sociology, Computermediated Communications and the emerging field of Game Studies. The process of conducting the eighteen-month ethnographic study followed the progress of a sub-set of members of the ‘Uru Diaspora,’ a group of 10,000 players who were made refugees when the massively multiplayer game ‘Uru: Ages Beyond Myst’ was closed in February of 2004. Uru refugees immigrated into other virtual worlds, using their features and capabilities to create ethnic communities that emulated the culture, artefacts and environments of the original Uru world. Over time, players developed ‘hybrid’ cultures, integrating the Uru culture with that of their new homes, and eventually creating entirely new Uru and Myst-inspired content. The outcome is the identification of six factors that serve as ‘engines for emergence’ and discusses their relationship to each other, to game design, and to emergent behaviour. These include: • Play Ecosystems: Fixed-Synthetic vs. Co-Created Worlds: Online games and virtual worlds exist along a spectrum, with environments entirely authored by the designer at one end, and those comprised primarily of player-created content and assets on the other, with a range of variations between. The type of world will impact the sort of emergent behaviour that occurs, and worlds that include player-created content will be more inclined to promote emergent behaviour. • Communities of Play: Distributed groups formed around play demonstrate distinct characteristics based on shared values and play styles. The study describes in detail one such play community, and analyses the ways in which its characteristic play styles drove its emergent behaviours. • The Social Construction of Avatar Identity: Individual avatar identity is constructed through an emergent process engaging social feedback. • Intersubjective Flow: A social reading of the psychological notion of ‘flow’ that describes the way in which flow dynamics occur in a social context through play. • Productive Play: Countering the traditional contention that play is inherently ‘unproductive’ as some scholars suggest, the thesis argues that play can be seen as a form of cultural production, as well as fulcrum for creative activity. • Porous Magic Circles and the ‘Ludisphere’: The magic circle, which bounds play activities, is more porous than game scholars had previously believed. The term ‘ludisphere' is used to describe the larger context of aggregated play space via the Internet. Also identified are leakages between ‘virtual worlds’ and ‘real life’. By identifying these factors and attempting to trace their roots in game design, the study aims to contribute a new approach to the making and analysis of user experience and creativity ‘in game’. The thesis posits that by achieving a deeper cultural understanding of the relationship between design and emergent behaviour, it is possible to make steps forward in the study of ‘emergence’ itself as a design material.