Trubek, Anne. "We are all Writers Now." Intelligent Life. 29 Jul 2009. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/anne-trubek/we-are-all-writers-now
In “We are all Writers Now,” Trubek argues that contemporary social media allows more people to write than before. This creates a culture where we do not talk as much but write and type, and the sinking ship of older media must find a way to help their enemies to be fact checkers and retain quality.
Approaches to Digital Rhetoric: Ludology and the Syncretic Nature of Mashups
Walther, Bo K. "Reflections on the Philosophy of Pervasive Gaming - With Special Emphasis on Rules, Gameplay, and Virtuality." Fibreculture Journal. 19 2011. Web. 16 Jan. 2012. http://nineteen.fibreculturejournal.org/fcj-134-reflections-on-the-philosophy-of-pervasive-gaming%E2%80%94with-special-emphasis-on-rules-gameplay-and-virtuality/
Bo Kampmann Walther’s “Reflections on the Philosophy of Pervasive Gaming – With Special Emphasis on Rules, Gameplay, and Virtuality” comes from the 19th issue of The Fibreculture Journal, which is a “transdisciplinary critique” of digital media and networks. Being interdisciplinary allows scholars of nearly any field to contribute, and nearly everyone who cares about new media will find something of interest – as long as they can read scholarship. The article mostly continues Walther’s own work (Playing and Gaming; Atomic Actions – Molecular Experience; Pervasive Gaming: Formats, Rules, and Space; etc.), but also uses help (but strays) from G.A. Deleuze and older gaming studies such as Neumann and Morgenstern’s “Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (1953) to round out his rhetorical analysis of contemporary pervasive gaming.
Though Walther’s aim is to move “the traditional ludological concept of computer games to an extended ludology of pervasive games,” it is still rooted in traditional videogames and classic games, mostly creating examples from soccer, chess, and 1990s computer games and shifting it into the virtual real-space of pervasive gaming. Here lies my problem with the article: it might be too soon. Pervasive games have a big potential with mixing real-space and virtual worlds, but right now games like “Pac-Manhattan” look more like a fun diversion as opposed to an enthralling and artistic game.
What if we could walk Shibuya to move around The World Ends With You?
What this article does is show how gaming works (as in, what is gaming, playing, gameplay, and virtuality) and poses that pervasive gaming allows us to do our adventures while surrounded by people, traffic jams, and waits at bus stops. It distorts the idea of virtual worlds; the game can no longer be thought of (no matter how falsely) as a fictional entity taking place in a digital creation: it now takes place in what is undoubtedly reality, and it is dynamic enough to change with the geographical features of the land the player inhabits.
Aside from my initial concerns about this article being too soon, I do find Walther’s work interesting and persuasive. My favorite section is his use of classical rhetoric to demonstrate how and when gameplay occurs: the play of the game (the past) and the game (a goal-oriented future) are always pointing to the present chronos, or true present, in which gameplay occurs. Gameplay is the actualization of the virtual conditions of gaming and playing. In my own experience of playing, I can see these definitions working, though I am not too sure of his definition of “play” being in the past.
Walther strictly bases his scholarship on his own rhetorical analysis of gaming, other scholars’ works, and using examples to demonstrate how his ideas come to life. There could be some form of empirical data or polling to see what gamers/players believe when their gameplay or even enjoyment of the game happens, or whether the virtual world inhibits them if they wish to do more exploring ,or if the expansiveness of our own world and the poor habits of other people would be too bothersome to play. Would it matter if we can play a game where Ayer’s Rock will give us a different treasure than Podunkville, USA? Completionists would go berserk.
To conclude, what I love about this article is its rhetorical ludology. This is a new field to me, and though I have usually thought of game analysis in a narratological sense (especially in things like “Final Fantasy and Philosophy”), it is certainly refreshing to see analysis of the play, or gameplay, itself. I would enjoy building my own analysis, perhaps one that puts play in the present (or something completely different). It would be easy to join the conversation; there needs to be more voices.
Staley, David J. "Syncretism: Mashup." Kairos. 16.2 2012. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/16.2/disputatio/staley/index.html
David J Staley’s “Syncretism: Mashup” is an experimental work of scholarship which demonstrates that which he is trying to prove: the “mashup” used by so many people is a form of syncretism in the classic use of the term.
The piece comes from the open topic volume 16 issue 2 (Spring 2012) of Kairos, which is an online peer-reviewed journal that publishes on the topics of rhetoric, technology, and pedagogy. Thus, the target audience are scholars in those areas, particularly with an emphasis on computers and writing. However, they have enough open topics that other generally interested parties will find something interesting in the back catalog if the current issue has a specialized topic.
As for Staley’s work, his objective is to show readers that the quite informal “mashup” is the current global culture’s means of conveying syncretism. Citing the OED and Wikipedia, Staley claims that syncretism is “Union or reconciliation of diverse or opposite tenets or practices, esp. in philosophy and religion,” which he understands is “a condition of our global market.” A mashup is a digital media which uses text, images, video, music and sound to create something out of these pre-existing materials. This mashup is a composition which employs this condition of our global market: an expression of the mixture of culture (and cultures) that is ubiquitous in our home and homepage.
The issue he is tackling is that this is in fact an artform, and it is specifically a new artform which we need to honestly look at and is worthy of our understanding because it is now a part of our culture. Staley wants us to see that these mashups are not just meandering minds throwing something together, but the expression of our amalgamative culture which continually builds new things with a cross-cultural perspective. If Staley is wrong, then the global culture we live in is perhaps just a façade, and we are really just making art out of our own microcosms built on our unique experiences: the old fashioned way.
The strongest case for Staley’s argument is that he puts an example right in front of the reader: after the introductory definitions and thoughts, the rest is a presentation of what he is arguing. I came across many pictures which I was familiar with: Béla Fleck in Jamaica, Kurosawa’s “Ran,” the Rosetta Stone, a game of cricket, a romaji qwerty keyboard, the Hagia Sophia, a 2 Euro coin, Ash with Pikachu, and Danger Mouse’s Grey Album. All of these have the syncretic-mashup theme in common, which was strong and useful imagery. However, the quotes were all modern scholarly texts which all said the same thing about globalization and modern culture. This is where I thought Staley could have used more art to prove his case; if he had at least switched some of the quotes with more syncretic artist statements, then he would have the stronger case. It also needed one other thing to keep it interesting, either an interactive video player embedded in a few slides or some music.
Steve Roggenbuck's open-source flarf poetry is about as technical.
The question it leaves me with is what I usually first ask when encountering something in digital rhetoric: how is this supposed to be different? Mashups are basically the product of the internet-age, but it is something that was a long way coming. Since the 1960s and 1970s, The Chieftains, an Irish folk band, will often play with pop groups and other folk music. John McLaughlin has more or less mastered American jazz, flamenco, and Hindustani folk and classical guitar, similar to how syncretic the more modern Béla Fleck is. I believe these mashups are different, mostly because they happen so much faster and are executed in a manner that could not be done before by so many people with the ease of use our technology of the last decade has allowed us to do.
What this project does specifically for me is show a way of how to do artistic criticism with digital rhetoric. I devote almost all of my leisure time to fine arts, music, movies, games (both in and out of digital spaces) and literature, which happen to include the cultural variety Staley enjoys to employ in his mashup.
"These are a few of my favorite things."
In “We are all Writers Now,” Trubek argues that contemporary social media allows more people to write than before. This creates a culture where we do not talk as much but write and type, and the sinking ship of older media must find a way to help their enemies to be fact checkers and retain quality.
Approaches to Digital Rhetoric: Ludology and the Syncretic Nature of Mashups
Walther, Bo K. "Reflections on the Philosophy of Pervasive Gaming - With Special Emphasis on Rules, Gameplay, and Virtuality." Fibreculture Journal. 19 2011. Web. 16 Jan. 2012. http://nineteen.fibreculturejournal.org/fcj-134-reflections-on-the-philosophy-of-pervasive-gaming%E2%80%94with-special-emphasis-on-rules-gameplay-and-virtuality/
Bo Kampmann Walther’s “Reflections on the Philosophy of Pervasive Gaming – With Special Emphasis on Rules, Gameplay, and Virtuality” comes from the 19th issue of The Fibreculture Journal, which is a “transdisciplinary critique” of digital media and networks. Being interdisciplinary allows scholars of nearly any field to contribute, and nearly everyone who cares about new media will find something of interest – as long as they can read scholarship. The article mostly continues Walther’s own work (Playing and Gaming; Atomic Actions – Molecular Experience; Pervasive Gaming: Formats, Rules, and Space; etc.), but also uses help (but strays) from G.A. Deleuze and older gaming studies such as Neumann and Morgenstern’s “Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (1953) to round out his rhetorical analysis of contemporary pervasive gaming.
Though Walther’s aim is to move “the traditional ludological concept of computer games to an extended ludology of pervasive games,” it is still rooted in traditional videogames and classic games, mostly creating examples from soccer, chess, and 1990s computer games and shifting it into the virtual real-space of pervasive gaming. Here lies my problem with the article: it might be too soon. Pervasive games have a big potential with mixing real-space and virtual worlds, but right now games like “Pac-Manhattan” look more like a fun diversion as opposed to an enthralling and artistic game.
What if we could walk Shibuya to move around The World Ends With You?
What this article does is show how gaming works (as in, what is gaming, playing, gameplay, and virtuality) and poses that pervasive gaming allows us to do our adventures while surrounded by people, traffic jams, and waits at bus stops. It distorts the idea of virtual worlds; the game can no longer be thought of (no matter how falsely) as a fictional entity taking place in a digital creation: it now takes place in what is undoubtedly reality, and it is dynamic enough to change with the geographical features of the land the player inhabits.
Aside from my initial concerns about this article being too soon, I do find Walther’s work interesting and persuasive. My favorite section is his use of classical rhetoric to demonstrate how and when gameplay occurs: the play of the game (the past) and the game (a goal-oriented future) are always pointing to the present chronos, or true present, in which gameplay occurs. Gameplay is the actualization of the virtual conditions of gaming and playing. In my own experience of playing, I can see these definitions working, though I am not too sure of his definition of “play” being in the past.
Walther strictly bases his scholarship on his own rhetorical analysis of gaming, other scholars’ works, and using examples to demonstrate how his ideas come to life. There could be some form of empirical data or polling to see what gamers/players believe when their gameplay or even enjoyment of the game happens, or whether the virtual world inhibits them if they wish to do more exploring ,or if the expansiveness of our own world and the poor habits of other people would be too bothersome to play. Would it matter if we can play a game where Ayer’s Rock will give us a different treasure than Podunkville, USA? Completionists would go berserk.
To conclude, what I love about this article is its rhetorical ludology. This is a new field to me, and though I have usually thought of game analysis in a narratological sense (especially in things like “Final Fantasy and Philosophy”), it is certainly refreshing to see analysis of the play, or gameplay, itself. I would enjoy building my own analysis, perhaps one that puts play in the present (or something completely different). It would be easy to join the conversation; there needs to be more voices.
Staley, David J. "Syncretism: Mashup." Kairos. 16.2 2012. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. http://kairos.technorhetoric.net/16.2/disputatio/staley/index.html
David J Staley’s “Syncretism: Mashup” is an experimental work of scholarship which demonstrates that which he is trying to prove: the “mashup” used by so many people is a form of syncretism in the classic use of the term.
The piece comes from the open topic volume 16 issue 2 (Spring 2012) of Kairos, which is an online peer-reviewed journal that publishes on the topics of rhetoric, technology, and pedagogy. Thus, the target audience are scholars in those areas, particularly with an emphasis on computers and writing. However, they have enough open topics that other generally interested parties will find something interesting in the back catalog if the current issue has a specialized topic.
As for Staley’s work, his objective is to show readers that the quite informal “mashup” is the current global culture’s means of conveying syncretism. Citing the OED and Wikipedia, Staley claims that syncretism is “Union or reconciliation of diverse or opposite tenets or practices, esp. in philosophy and religion,” which he understands is “a condition of our global market.” A mashup is a digital media which uses text, images, video, music and sound to create something out of these pre-existing materials. This mashup is a composition which employs this condition of our global market: an expression of the mixture of culture (and cultures) that is ubiquitous in our home and homepage.
The issue he is tackling is that this is in fact an artform, and it is specifically a new artform which we need to honestly look at and is worthy of our understanding because it is now a part of our culture. Staley wants us to see that these mashups are not just meandering minds throwing something together, but the expression of our amalgamative culture which continually builds new things with a cross-cultural perspective. If Staley is wrong, then the global culture we live in is perhaps just a façade, and we are really just making art out of our own microcosms built on our unique experiences: the old fashioned way.
The strongest case for Staley’s argument is that he puts an example right in front of the reader: after the introductory definitions and thoughts, the rest is a presentation of what he is arguing. I came across many pictures which I was familiar with: Béla Fleck in Jamaica, Kurosawa’s “Ran,” the Rosetta Stone, a game of cricket, a romaji qwerty keyboard, the Hagia Sophia, a 2 Euro coin, Ash with Pikachu, and Danger Mouse’s Grey Album. All of these have the syncretic-mashup theme in common, which was strong and useful imagery. However, the quotes were all modern scholarly texts which all said the same thing about globalization and modern culture. This is where I thought Staley could have used more art to prove his case; if he had at least switched some of the quotes with more syncretic artist statements, then he would have the stronger case. It also needed one other thing to keep it interesting, either an interactive video player embedded in a few slides or some music.
Steve Roggenbuck's open-source flarf poetry is about as technical.
The question it leaves me with is what I usually first ask when encountering something in digital rhetoric: how is this supposed to be different? Mashups are basically the product of the internet-age, but it is something that was a long way coming. Since the 1960s and 1970s, The Chieftains, an Irish folk band, will often play with pop groups and other folk music. John McLaughlin has more or less mastered American jazz, flamenco, and Hindustani folk and classical guitar, similar to how syncretic the more modern Béla Fleck is. I believe these mashups are different, mostly because they happen so much faster and are executed in a manner that could not be done before by so many people with the ease of use our technology of the last decade has allowed us to do.
What this project does specifically for me is show a way of how to do artistic criticism with digital rhetoric. I devote almost all of my leisure time to fine arts, music, movies, games (both in and out of digital spaces) and literature, which happen to include the cultural variety Staley enjoys to employ in his mashup.
"These are a few of my favorite things."
