グローバル教養科目（Writing About Gaming: Game Studies as Social Practice）

Topics covered may include: -Gaming history, genres, and concepts -Experiential, affective, and interpersonal vocabulary of gaming (e.g. saving, lives, crafting, leveling up, grinding, bosses, speedrunning, lore, NPCs, & gaming-centered forms of anxiety, acquisitiveness, fear, and curiosity) -Social aspects of gaming (communities, relations, performances and self-performances, wikis and walkthroughs, modding, franchises) -Ontology (what objects, beings, and types of action populate the game?), phenomenology (what kinds of embodiment, movement, and sensory processing and feedback does it make possible?), and epistemology (how is knowledge produced, withheld, awarded, used) -“Poetics of space” (what sensations, experiences, actions are possible within which locations)? Types of spatial experience and organization (dungeons, “secret areas,” levels) -Gameplay and game praxis (movement systems, physics, point of view, controls, puzzle-solving, combat systems, structures of reward) -Gaming as present and future of the humanities

Mini-lectures; collective inquiry, discussion, gaming, and occasionally game-making; writing (e.g., in-class on Google Docs)

Students will be evaluated on the basis of contributions to in-class writing, gaming, and discussion (and therefore, attendance); assignments posted on Google Classroom; and a Final Portfolio of work. Please check the grading scale that applies to this course. If the Course Code ends without “-P/F,” this is a course with a letter grade (A+, A, B, C, F). If the Course Code ends with “-P/F,” this is a Pass/Fail course.

All required readings will be provided by the instructor via Google Classroom. If students do not wish to purchase assigned games (when these are not available for free), alternatives will be offered.

Students should bring a laptop to class, and/or a tablet set up for note-taking and writing. In some cases, it may be useful to have one “research device” (e.g. a laptop) and one “gaming device” (e.g. tablet, phone, Switch, SteamDeck, etc.)

【If the number of students enrolling in this course exceeds the number determined by the instructor, there may be a selection process. Instructions for the selection process will be given in the first class, so if you are interested in taking this course, please be sure to attend the first class.】 The course will be conducted in English. Although I endorse language-mixing and the use and/or leveraging of native languages in/for class, I will communicate, in principle, in English. Those with the ability to participate in class and group discussions, follow lectures, and read academic and other materials in English will get the most out of the course. However, all levels of English competency are welcome. A prior interest in computer/console/ mobile gaming is welcome but not essential, and you are not required to own or use any particular console or platform.

If the number of students enrolling in this course exceeds the number determined by the instructor, there may be a selection process. Instructions for the selection process will be given in the first class, so if you are interested in taking this course, please be sure to attend the first class. First class will be held online. All subsequent classes will be held in-person on campus. Instructions for participation in the first online class and joining our Google Classroom page will be found on UTOL.