Congratulations to Interactive Media Theory and Design Professor Dr. Kelly Boudreau, who served as one of two keynote speakers featured at the Digra Nordic 2018 gaming research conference at the University of Bergen in Norway Nov. 28-30.
Boudreau delivered a presentation titled, “Whose Games are They Anyway? Problematic gameplay, boundary keeping, and the growing player community,” during the conference that convenes researchers in the Nordic countries that focus on the study of games and gaming, be it on computers, online or in the physical world.
“Being part of a social group is something almost everyone has experienced. But being part of a group also means there are those who are excluded,” Boudreau said in an extract from her discussion that is posted Here. “Exclusion can take many forms and is determined by the group itself. Secret handshakes, slang and lingo, required skill level for participation, or a demonstration of specialized knowledge all function to maintain the norms of the group. New membership to the group typically entails enforcing a set of rules and behavioral norms that potential members must follow to prove themselves worthy of full group acceptance. This policing of behavior around rules and norms is what is often defined within Sociology as ‘boundary keeping’.”
The event’s other keynote speaker was Dr. Jaakko Stenros, who presented “Outside wisdom and folly: Transgressions in Play,” during the conference. Stenros is a game and play researcher at the Centre of Scellence in Game Culture Studies at the Game Research Lab, University of Tampere.
