Thursday, November 8
5-7 p.m.
Bartos Theater, MIT Media Lab
A generation of scholars, critics and political leaders has denounced videogames as at best a distraction and at worst a negative influence on society. Yet for a growing generation of activists and researchers, games may also represent a resource for engaging young people with the political process and heightening their awareness of social issues. In what ways do young people use the online societies constructed in multiplayer games to rehearse and refine skills at citizenship? Can we imagine games as a medium that encourages public awareness and citizenship? And what might it mean to empower young people to create their own games to reflect their perceptions of the world around them?
This is the second lecture in a continuing series from the new MIT Center for Future Civic Media.
Speakers
Mario Armstrong is a technology correspondent for National Public Radio (for Morning Edition and News and Notes) and hosts talk shows about technology and culture on XM radio and public radio stations WYPR and WEAA in the Baltimore area.
Ian Bogost is an assistant professor in the School of Literature, Communication, and Culture at Georgia Tech and co-founder of Persuasive Games. He is the author of Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames.
Moderator: Eric Klopfer is director of the Teacher Education Program, co-director of The Education Arcade and associate professor in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT.
Free and open to the public.
See http://web.mit.edu/comm-forum
Co-sponsors: MIT Comparative Media Studies, MIT Media Lab
