Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Central Florida, 2007. / Adviser: Paul Dombrowski. Includes bibliographical references (p. 149-159). Also available in print.

Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 2006. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 42 p. : ill., col. maps. Vita. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 25-27).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.F.A.)--Rochester Institute of Technology, 2007. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 126-130).

Thesis (M.A.)--York University, 2005. Graduate Programme in Communication and Culture. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 98-103). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url%5Fver=Z39.88-2004&res%5Fdat=xri:pqdiss &rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:MR11755

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 1999. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 153-165). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Due to immense popularity of video games the author investigates the presence of gender portrayal within them. The purpose of this study is to thoroughly analyse a general phenomenon, such as gender, within video games to develop a better understanding of its particularities in this form of media and to expand the general body of knowledge on video games as a research topic. As prior literature shows, gender within video games can be either defined by its biased and sexualized character or by a tendency towards equality and strength for woman. To explain those varied results the author introduces the category of role as an important factor for character representation based on the use of theoretical frameworks of symbolic interactionism, more particularly dramaturgical approach of E. Goffman. She then further proceeds with a qualitative discourse analysis of both protagonist and support characters from 22 different games. The author finds that there is a visible difference within the manners females are presented depending on their role. Lead characters are more likely to be strong, independent and self-sufficient whereas support characters most often require immediate help, are dependent on others and are more likely to be abused. Presented results can account for some of the variety in prior research and they open the field of video game studies to possibly new research topics.

Orientador: Gentil Luiz de Faria / Banca: Vera Helena Gomes Wielewicki / Banca: Ivan Marcos Ribeiro / Banca: Nilce Maria Pereira / Banca: Álvaro Luiz Hattnher / Resumo: Este estudo aborda o potencial lúdico da literatura brasileira, mais especificamente, da obra Caramuru: poema épico do descobrimento da Bahia, de José de Santa Rita Durão. O objetivo é evidenciar que a literatura brasileira tem potencialidade para servir de argumento para videogames, assim como já vem sendo feito com o cinema e a TV. Para dar cabo dessa empreitada, primeiramente realizou-se um estudo sobre a influência, consequências e transformações que o desenvolvimento da tecnologia da informação vem causando no modo como as pessoas se relacionam com o conhecimento e com a literatura e como os videogames passaram a fazer parte não só do lazer, mas também da cultura das novas gerações como meio de entretenimento e instrução. Para tanto, recorreu-se, dentre outros, aos textos de George Landow, Pierre Lévy, Katherine Hayles, Janet Murray e Katie Salen para averiguar como os hipertextos e a literatura eletrônica dialogam com as narrativas dos videogames e como os jogos elevaram exponencialmente a capacidade interativa do fruidor se comparado às mídias tradicionais, mostrando que os videogames, mesmo sendo prioritariamente um produto de recreação, podem abordar e portar temáticas culturais profícuas. Em seguida, para pontuar a obra de Durão no universo mítico-narrativo e, posteriormente, como potencial argumento para um roteiro de videogame, buscou-se em Joseph Campbell e Christopher Vogler as estruturas da jornada do herói da perspectiva mitológica e como um produto... / Abstract: This study approaches the ludic potential of the Brazilian literature, more specifically the work Caramuru: poema épico do descobrimento da Bahia, by José de Santa Rita Durão. The objective is to highlight that the Brazilian literature has potential to serve as a subject for video-games, just as it has been done in the cinema and television. To carry out this task, firstly was realized a study on the influence, consequences and transformations that the development of information technology has been causing in the way people relate to knowledge and literature and how video-games became part of not only leisure, but as a mean of entertainment and learning of the new generation's culture. To that end, it was studied, among others, to the texts of George Landow, Pierre Lévy, Katherine Hayles, Janet Murray and Katie Salen to find out how hypertexts and electronic literature dialogue with video-games' narratives and how electronic games exponentially increased the interactive capacity of the user when compared to the traditional medias, showing that video-games, though primarily used as a recreation product, can approach and carry profitable cultural themes. Then, to point the work of Durão in the mythical-narrative universe and, posteriorly, as a potential subject for a video-game script, it was researched in Joseph Campbell and Christopher Vogler, the hero's journey structures from the mythological perspective and as an audiovisual product. Finally, to understand the process of ... / Doutor

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Ciências da Educação, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Educação, Florianópolis, 2010 / Made available in DSpace on 2012-10-25T02:58:21Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 284483.pdf: 1306221 bytes, checksum: 9c763c07a818a025533e47586574c652 (MD5) / Esta pesquisa discute algumas relações entre videogames e aprendizagem, analisando suas potencialidades e limites na perspectiva de pré-adolescentes e adolescentes. Mais do que observar jogadores em ação, a ênfase do estudo está em dar a palavra aos jogadores para tentar compreender no que consistem as suas experiências: o que imaginam e o que pensam enquanto jogam; que tipo de consciência têm das estratégias e das formas de interação que usam para jogar; e, sobretudo, que influências referentes aos aprendizados culturais são evidenciadas em suas falas. Desse modo, optou-se por ouvir jogadores na faixa etária de 10 a 15 anos de duas escolas de Florianópolis, por meio da aplicação de questionários e produção de narrativas. Utilizando referenciais teóricos do campo da Mídia-Educação (BUCKINGHAM, RIVOLTELLA, BELLONI, FANTIN), dos estudos culturais e das mediações (KELLNER, MARTINBARBERO, OROZCO), foi possível identificar tanto as representações dos jogadores sobre os aprendizados cognitivos que fazem a partir dos videogames como os conteúdos culturais acionados a partir dos videogames. Os estudos teóricos e as situações percebidas no trabalho de campo deram sustentação para compreender que, de fato, os videogames podem desencadear diversos tipos de aprendizagem e que essas aprendizagens, além das mediações, dependem de quem joga, quando joga, como joga, o que joga, onde joga, pois os videogames incorporam uma multiplicidade de escutas. / This research discusses some relationships between videogames and learning, analising your potencialities and limits from the perspective of pré-teens and teenagers. More than observing the players in action, the study's emphasis is in giving the right to speak for the players to try to understand in what consists their experiences: what they imagine and think while the're playing, what kind of conscience they have about the strategies and the ways of interaction they use to play; and, most important, what influences concerning to the cultural learnings are evidenced in their speeches. Thereby, what was chosen was to listen to the players of 10 to 15 years old from two schools in Florianópolis, applying questionnaires and producing narratives. Using the theoretical references from the field of Media-Education (BUCKINGHAM, RIVOLTELLA, BELLONI, FANTIN), from the cultural studies and the mediations (KELLNER, MARTINBARBERO, OROZCO), it was possible to identify the players' representations about the cognitive learning that make from the videogames as the cultural contents triggered from the videogames. The theoretical studies and the perceived situations in the local research gave support to understand that, in fact, videogames can initiate many kinds of learning and from this learnings, beyond the intercessions, depend on who plays, when it's played, how it's played, what it's played, where it's played, because videogames incorporate a multiplicipity of auditions.

This research project is an answer to the question, “What is the trouble with Gender and Gaming?” Distinguishing between sex and gender, the research examines how players learn to participate in gaming culture through a gendered lens and explores the voices of participant gamers who are learning and dealing with gendered violence and sexism in video games. Specifically, I examined the complicated nature of power, gendered representations/performances and language in gaming. To accomplish this, I used a poststructural feminist theory that I call ‘theory of disruption,’ which utilizes Butler’s (1991) theories on gender performance, Foucault’s (1978) concept of the docile body, and Harraway’s (1991) theory of disruption through the metaphor of the cyborg. Methodologically, I used digital ethnography, where I took on the role of participant-researcher by examining and analyzing my experiences as a video game player, on the one hand, and played with and interviewed 12 avid North American video gamers, all of whom are English speakers, including 8 women and 4 men, on the other. In analyzing my own and the participants’ narratives, gendered violence and sexual violence perpetuated within the context of gaming was deemed as a major deterrent for self-identified female gamers, often leaving them disconnected from the gaming community, and at times driving them to stop playing online games completely. In the case of female gamers, I show, they begin gaming already orienting their performance around a male narrative and in a male-dominated space. Throughout the thesis, we see that the trouble with gender and gaming is how gender is performed in games: cultural limitations, as well as design limitations influenced by culture, restrict players to the point where performativity (i.e. the pattern of gender performance) morphs into gender norms. These norms, I also show, are not left to perpetuate. In many cases, they are disrupted, subverted, dismissed or outright ignored. Nonetheless, I conclude, all gamers, male or female, have to negotiate gendered identities and their storylines as represented and made available by game designers. Approached as a ‘null curriculum’ (Eisner, 1985), video gaming is a site where most people, but particularly young people, invest in their identities and desires, thus turning it into a learning site. Here, particular representations and gendered norms and behaviours are learned. Pedagogically, I therefore conclude, we need to critically engage with it and show its creative as well as its ‘other’ (especially when it comes to female representation) side. Membership to the gaming community, it seems, is open to anyone with a gaming system and a desire to log into play; but if those community members were more attuned to how their actions, words, and conversations impact their greater community, perhaps we would begin to see a version of the gaming culture that is safer and more open to all.