Playing For Keeps: Digital Games to Preserve Indigenous Languages & Traditions.

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Harbord Charly Lyons David Dempster Euan
2022 DiGRA ’22 – Proceedings of the 2022 DiGRA International Conference: Bringing Worlds Together

This paper examines the potential for digital games to be used as a conduit to preserve and share Indigenous languages and traditions. It does this by interviewing game industry and academic representatives from a variety of Indigenous communities around the world to ask their opinions on the topic via three questions. The paper aims to provide justification for a model of co-design utilizing the methodology of two-eyed seeing which allows Indigenous communities to be involved in every step of the design process and also to retain Sovereignty over their cultural practices and how they are portrayed and shared with the wider populace. The benefits of which may be felt by not only the Indigenous communities themselves but also communities like DiGRA as it will help to inform and build lasting bonds between the game industry/academia and Indigenous peoples.

 

Exhibition Strategies for Videogames in Art Institutions: Blank Arcade 2017

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Reed Emilie
2017 DiGRA '17 - Proceedings of the 2017 DiGRA International Conference

While debate over videogames’ cultural status can still become contentious, theorist Bruce Altshuler describes the contemporary exhibition form as a route into art history, and therefore, exhibitions of videogames and their curatorial and display choices have already drawn videogames into the discursive construction of the history of art. Examining past exhibitions as well as reflecting on current curatorial practices is a vital area of investigation to form an interdisciplinary history of videogames. After providing a historical background of this phenomenon, I summarize my practical work in games curation through a case study of The Blank Arcade 2016, reflecting on how exhibition strategies can incorporate a comprehensive and engaging perspective on videogames into the art world. By reviewing both the process of exhibition organization and resulting visitor feedback, I reflect on the effectiveness of the present curatorial process and issues it will benefit from taking into account in the future.