Research Main Research Areas Digital Gaming Digital games are no longer a peripheral phenomenon in society. Computer and console games, as well as mobile games, are now an integral part of deeply mediatized lifeworlds across generations. As such they are are both carriers and accelerators of media change, serving as an interface between media industries, technologies, cultures, and practices. This makes them an ideal case to analyze contemporary societal and media-cultural transformation processes resulting from mediatization, digitization, and datafication. The research focus “Digital Gaming” suggests a holistic perspective that switches from the analysis of games to a broader notion and understanding of gaming in a deeply mediatized society. It goes beyond reducing games to mere playing, examining their placement and connection within digital media environments as gamevironments to research how our communicative practices and their contexts/situations transform through games, as well as how these games are reshaped through communicative practices. This positions computer games and gaming as a comprehensive subject in communication and media studies, demanding transmedia, diachronic, situational, and long-term transformative perspectives of (dis)empowerment and (in)equality. Journal GAMEVIRONMENTS Book Series “Routledge Critical Studies in Video Games and Culture” Cooperation with the International Academy for the Study of Gaming and Religion (IASGAR) Labs in the main research area „Digital Gaming“ Media and Education Media and Religion Media Change and Long-Term Transformation Processes Research projects in the main research area „Digital Gaming“ PhD project Value Formations in a Video-Game-Franchise. A Comparison of Value Formations in “The Last of Us” (2013) and “The Last of Us: Part II” (2020) (seit 2020) The video games “Last of Us” (2013) and “Last of Us 2” (2020) caused heated discussions during their release periods. While the first game prompted players’ to reflect on their moral compass through depictions of difficult decisions in crisis situations, the second instalment, published in the middle of the corona-pandemic, caused a polarizing controversy about (…) Lab Media and Religion ActiveResearch project Communicative Figurations of Informal Learning in Digital Gaming (CoFi ILDG) With the rise of participatory media over the past decades, a ‘new culture of learning’ (Gee 2008; Thomas and Brown 2011) has been described, in which people develop expertise in domains outside formal education, vocational training or structured apprenticeships. Ito et al. (2009: 17) coined the term ‘geeking out’ for media-rich informal learning processes, in (…) Lab Media and Education ActiveResearch project Community Formation in Digital Games Post-Doc Project Much research in game studies has focused on game communities and their effects on people and society. But with this project I argue that we need a better theoretical grounding for how game communities form, and how they are then negotiated and maintained. What are the forces, influences and affordances that shape this (…) Duration: 2023 – 2026Project lead: Dr. Dom Ford Lab Media and Religion ActiveResearch project Research field esports – Negotiating the notion of the nation and discussing value formations Postdoc project Video game cultures are central parts of contemporary societies. In addition to economic interests, due to the economic significance of the video game industry, this also involves socio-cultural and political discourses. Video games and video game cultures can be understood as expressions of globalized media cultures. However, they also have to be perceived (…) Lab Media and Religion ActiveResearch project Gaming the Nation. An intersectional approach to nation, identity and gaming The research project deals with the multiple entanglements of gaming and constructions of national identity by linking two research perspectives that are often perceived as contrary to each other - media aesthetics and communication studies. Particular attention is paid to the question of the extent to which concepts of national identity not only formulate "the own", but also "the other" in contrast to it, in order to find out to what extent constructions of nation within games can possibly transmit or even consolidate social inequalities in times of profound mediatization. Duration: 2022 – 2025Project lead: Dr. Kathrin Trattner Lab Media and Religion CompletedResearch project Video Game Development in Asia Cultural Heritage and National Identity: The Philippines Project management: Prof. Dr. Kerstin Radde-Antweiler (ZeMKI-Lab “Medien und Religion”) Research network/cooperation: University of North Carolina, Dalhousie University, University of Helsinki Funding institution: University of Helsinki Future Development Fund The role of media for the construction of cultural heritage and national identities is well accepted and partly researched already. However, much the research is so (…) Duration: 2014 – 2018Project lead: Prof. Dr. Kerstin Radde-Antweiler Lab Media and Religion
PhD project Value Formations in a Video-Game-Franchise. A Comparison of Value Formations in “The Last of Us” (2013) and “The Last of Us: Part II” (2020) (seit 2020) The video games “Last of Us” (2013) and “Last of Us 2” (2020) caused heated discussions during their release periods. While the first game prompted players’ to reflect on their moral compass through depictions of difficult decisions in crisis situations, the second instalment, published in the middle of the corona-pandemic, caused a polarizing controversy about (…) Lab Media and Religion
ActiveResearch project Communicative Figurations of Informal Learning in Digital Gaming (CoFi ILDG) With the rise of participatory media over the past decades, a ‘new culture of learning’ (Gee 2008; Thomas and Brown 2011) has been described, in which people develop expertise in domains outside formal education, vocational training or structured apprenticeships. Ito et al. (2009: 17) coined the term ‘geeking out’ for media-rich informal learning processes, in (…) Lab Media and Education
ActiveResearch project Community Formation in Digital Games Post-Doc Project Much research in game studies has focused on game communities and their effects on people and society. But with this project I argue that we need a better theoretical grounding for how game communities form, and how they are then negotiated and maintained. What are the forces, influences and affordances that shape this (…) Duration: 2023 – 2026Project lead: Dr. Dom Ford Lab Media and Religion
ActiveResearch project Research field esports – Negotiating the notion of the nation and discussing value formations Postdoc project Video game cultures are central parts of contemporary societies. In addition to economic interests, due to the economic significance of the video game industry, this also involves socio-cultural and political discourses. Video games and video game cultures can be understood as expressions of globalized media cultures. However, they also have to be perceived (…) Lab Media and Religion
ActiveResearch project Gaming the Nation. An intersectional approach to nation, identity and gaming The research project deals with the multiple entanglements of gaming and constructions of national identity by linking two research perspectives that are often perceived as contrary to each other - media aesthetics and communication studies. Particular attention is paid to the question of the extent to which concepts of national identity not only formulate "the own", but also "the other" in contrast to it, in order to find out to what extent constructions of nation within games can possibly transmit or even consolidate social inequalities in times of profound mediatization. Duration: 2022 – 2025Project lead: Dr. Kathrin Trattner Lab Media and Religion
CompletedResearch project Video Game Development in Asia Cultural Heritage and National Identity: The Philippines Project management: Prof. Dr. Kerstin Radde-Antweiler (ZeMKI-Lab “Medien und Religion”) Research network/cooperation: University of North Carolina, Dalhousie University, University of Helsinki Funding institution: University of Helsinki Future Development Fund The role of media for the construction of cultural heritage and national identities is well accepted and partly researched already. However, much the research is so (…) Duration: 2014 – 2018Project lead: Prof. Dr. Kerstin Radde-Antweiler Lab Media and Religion
