EH@UH :: Play Like An Environmentalist - Alenda Y. Chang, UCSB

April 19, 12:00pm - 1:30pm
Mānoa Campus, Meet via Zoom

What if starting up a computer game could offer us as meaningful a natural experience as going outside? Games, especially digital ones, are frequently dismissed as frivolous, arcane, or violent, and people tend to picture those who play them as antisocial homebodies. But research shows that games are played by nearly everyone, often together with others, and increasingly, that they are played wherever we go. This talk contends that games offer unique and playfully persuasive opportunities not only to engage directly with environmental issues, but also to foster moments of empathy, loss, care, experimentation, and optimism—important ways of coming to terms with our planetary troubles. *********************************************** Alenda Y. Chang is an Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her 2019 book, Playing Nature: Ecology in Video Games (U of Minnesota P), develops environmentally informed frameworks for understanding and designing digital games. At UCSB, Chang co-directs Wireframe, a studio promoting collaborative theoretical and creative media practice with investments in global social and environmental justice. She is also a founding co-editor of the UC Press open-access journal, Media+Environment. Chang’s work has been published in numerous journals, among them electronic book review, Feminist Media Histories, Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, Qui Parle and Resilience.


Event Sponsor
EH@UH / CALL / School of Cinematic Arts, Mānoa Campus

More Information
Christina Gerhardt, (808) 956-4182, cg2020@hawaii.edu

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