Monday April 13 is the kick-off seminar organised by Center for the Study of Digital Games and Play (GAP). It is the first out of three seminars organised by GAP this academic year, the aim is to create a new regular meet-up for game scholars and excellent students to present research, to provide room for game-related discussions, and to expand our academic and professional network. The first meeting will be held April 13 from 10:00 until 12:00 at Muntstraat 2a Utrecht University.

The programme:

– Zowi Vermeire (RMA Media and Performance Studies) is going to present her thesis: ‘Good’ Men vs. ‘Bad’ Men: Problematic Masculinities Playing Call of Duty: Black Ops 2

– Alex Gekker (PhD candidate Charting the Digital), Zowi Vermeire & Stephanie de Smale (RMA Media and Performance Studies) are going to share their field work experience of the project Go Go Gozo: Interdisciplinary Playful Mapping Methodologies.

Our colleagues within the department of Media & Culture Studies at Utrecht University will host the second conference by the International Society of Intermedial Studies called Play/Perform/Participate between 16 and 18 April. From the conference website:
 
In today’s mediatized culture and society, we use media for playing, performing, and participating in artistic practices and also in larger processes of cultural reproduction, social integration and socialization. The aim of the conference Play / Perform / Participate is to discuss the intermedial valences of play, performance, and participation as increasingly intersecting practices. Spread out over three days, with around 50 panels, the second conference by the International Society of Intermedial Studies will take place at Utrecht University in the Netherlands from the 16th till the 18th of April 2015. The panels address the most important themes and topics in contemporary media cultures in an interdisciplinary way: changing processes of participation and co-creation in politics and culture, the complexity of representations and interactions in a media-saturated environment, and the influence of all kinds of mediators on our interpretation of experiences, our sense of presence and affect.
 
View and download the conference program here (pdf) or visit the Play/Perform/Participate website here.