Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference 14-17th December 2016 Program Index

Kyle Moore
The Challenge of Locating “Culture” in Location-Based Games
As scholars such as Adrienne Shaw ask of digital gaming more broadly, “what is game culture”, this paper
poses similar questions to location-based games. Shaw’s three key inquiries of who plays, what do they play,
and how do they play, can easily be applied to location-based games and technology. These questions are
posed to ethnographic data gathered over the course of several months of playing alongside Sydney-based
Ingress players with the ultimate question of how do we understand the specificities of culture and cultural
practices that surround and shape the playing of location-based games?
Mahli-Ann Butt Retaking “Girlfriend Mode”: Women, support-roles and avatars
This paper addresses how gendered ideas of “gamer identity” influence the period of game production runs,
in turn affecting how female players are included into moments of play. My method is to use an existential
ethnographic approach and interview women about their gaming practices and experiences. The interviews
are limited to women in heterosexual relationships with male, self-identified gamers. It is important to note
that these women have not been required to identify themselves as gamers, since women are significantly
less likely to take up the “gamer” identity. By being sensitive to the unique lived experiences of these
“Gamer Girlfriends” through interviews, I wish to attempt to retake the term and reinsert the autonomy of
these women
Robbie Fordyce* & Luke van Ryn
Unhidden social media: games platforms as social media sites
Analysis of videogames often passes over the role of game sales platforms. The role of Steam, in particular,
as the only apparent viable sales platform for independent developers would indicate that these platforms
aren’t just influencing the big-budget, commercially-viable services of the major publishers, but are affecting
access to videogames from top to bottom within Anglophone gaming culture. By analysing these platforms
as both a vertical integration of player identity from their credit card to their avatar, and as a horizontal
social media platform, we can expose heretofore unrecognised aspects of gaming culture that have
previously hidden in plain sight.
9X
Food cultures and countercultures (Chair, Michelle Phillipov)
Esther Alloun
“The promised land for vegans”: identity, culture and place in the making of Israeli animal activism
Israel has been referred to as “the first vegan nation” and the “most vegan country in the world” due to the
very rapid development of animal advocacy in the country (The Times of Israel; Haaretz). The paper
investigates the rise of veganism within a contested settler colonial context. Excerpts from the documentary
film Life according to Ohad (Elrich 2014), which follows the life of an Israeli vegan activist, are introduced to
frame an engagement with the interplay between identity, culture and place that has shaped the
movement’s growing popularity. In particular, Ohad’s use of aggressive and confrontational direct action
tactics somewhat echoes Israeli approaches to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This lends support to the
argument that veganism cannot be assessed as separate from the Israeli-Palestinian context. This paper
therefore also seeks to explore what role place plays: how it informs, shapes and reinforces vegan activism
and identities in Israel as a settler colonial state.
Christopher Mayes
White Spaces of Alternative Food
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