[Commlist] Call for Papers - Games and persona

Games and Persona - /Persona Studies/ Journal Theme Issue

Editors: Christopher Moore and Katja Lee

Games have provided players with many opportunities to experiment with 
identity in ways that have fundamentally shaped social media platforms. 
As Apperley and Clemens (2017) have argued, networked digital media have 
embraced the avatar as the predominant form for the presentation of the 
public self online. Games also have a vibrant role in the performance of 
the self that is affectively charged. Because of this, games and persona 
interconnect beyond the virtual self of the avatar, through esports, 
cosplay, wikis, criticism and review and many other mediated forms of 
expression. The interaction between games and persona represent agency 
in the negotiation of complex personal, public and intimate selves which 
collapse the remnant distinctions between the online and off. Game 
developers, for example, from mainstream legends to ‘indie’ heroes and 
aspiring innovators, like most workers in the creative industries, must 
maintain online personas as part of their professional lives. The demand 
for such personas results in complex interactions and micro-publics 
between peers, colleagues, fans and consumers that are now routine to 
the firmament of participatory culture, with serious potential for 
success and controversy.

We are inviting authors and scholars to contribute to this themed issue 
of /Persona Studies/ on games and persona. The issue is seeking 
interdisciplinary papers that consider the conceptual and theoretical 
dimensions of games and persona and the broader phenomenological 
experiences and ontological implications of games and play for persona 
studies. The following list is a general, and non-definitive guide to 
topics that we consider would be a valuable addition to exploring the 
relations between games and persona:

  * Avatars and identity
  * Developer and designer persona
  * Participatory persona
  * Player performances: live streaming, criticism and review, esports,
    cosplay and beyond
  * Player communities and micro-publics
  * Game platforms and personas: Steam, Itch.io and others
  * Persona as celebrity/micro-celebrity
  * The persona of game franchises
  * Persona in the advertising and marketing of games
  * Emerging technologies in games and the performance of the self
  * Object/subject relations: virtual and physical personas
  * Memorabilia, merchandise, collections - presentation of a passionate
    persona
  * Affect and agency

Apperley, Thomas and Clemens, Justin. 2017. ‘Flipping out: avatars and 
identity’. Boundaries of self and reality online: implications of 
digitally constructed realities. Jayne Gackenbach and Johnathan Bown 
eds. Elsevier, London. pp.41-56, doi: 10.1016/B978-0-12-804157-4.00003-7.

Key Dates

EOI: March 29

ABSTRACTS AND/PAPERS: June 15

FULL PAPERS: September 1

PUBLICATION: November 30

Please send expressions of interest and abstracts of 150-200 words to: 
(katja.lee /at/ uwa.edu.au) <mailto:(katja.lee /at/ uwa.edu.au)>or (chrism /at/ uow.edu.au) 
<mailto:(chrism /at/ uow.edu.au)>

---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please use it responsibly and wisely.
--
To subscribe or unsubscribe, please visit http://commlist.org/
--
Before sending a posting request, please always read the guidelines at http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
URL: http://nicocarpentier.net
---------------