Todd Harper, PhD
I'm Todd Harper, currently an assistant professor at the University of Baltimore's program in Simulation and Digital Entertainment. In summer of 2014, I finished a position as a postdoctoral researcher at the MIT Game Lab, which is part of the program in Comparative Media Studies and Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I began at the lab in 2010 shortly after finishing my doctorate in Media Studies at Ohio University's School of Media Arts and Studies.
My academic background is in media and cultural studies, with a particular interest in game studies. Methodologically, my work is primarily qualitative in nature. In the area of game studies, I focus on their place in culture and how games work as mediated communication. I also have a strong secondary interest in both e-sports/competitive cultures and representations of gender and sexuality in games and gaming culture.
Some of the broad questions my research addresses include:
- How do cultures of play develop around games and gameplay?
- How do games reflect and contribute to cultural discourse?
- In what ways can the diversity of representation in games be improved?
- How can the unique qualities of games be leveraged to represent queer lives?
For more detailed information on my work and background, refer to my curriculum vitae [Last updated: September 2014].
Books:
The Culture of Digital Fighting Games: Performance and Practice
Routledge, December 2013
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles:
Rules, rhetoric, and genre: procedural rhetoric in Persona 3
Games and Culture 6 (5): Analysis of the role-playing game Persona 3 using Ian Bogost's procedural rhetoric framework.
Digital pitchforks and virtual torches: Fan responses to the Mass Effect news debacle
Convergence 17 (3) -- Co-authored with Mia Consalvo and Nathan Dutton. Examines fan responses to sensationalist Fox News story about sexual content in the Bioware title Mass Effect.
Queer tales of morality: the press, same-sex marriage, and hegemonic framing
Journal of Communication 59 (4) -- Co-authored with Carol Liebler and Joseph Schwartz. Mixed-method analysis of how stakeholder groups define and discursively use terms for same-sex marriage in the news.
Invited Talks/Lectures:
"Let's Fight Like Gentlemen: the Culture of Fighting Games"
Comparative Media Studies/Writing Colloquium, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 10/31/13
"Creating Culture in Virtual Worlds"
MIT Museum Talkback 360 series, 3/31/14 (with Prof. Fox Harrell, MIT)
Selected Peer-Reviewed Conference Presentations:
[For a full list, please refer to my curriculum vitae]
"Straight-for-pay: performativity and sexuality on SeanCody.com"
Winner, Top Student Paper, LGBT Studies Division
Assoc. for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication annual conference, August 2009
Analysis of specific gay pornography site and how its content packages and performs hegemonic masculinity for its target audience.
"Gay-for-play: addressing the challenge of relevant gay game content."
Association of Internet Researchers annual conference, October 2011
Ethnographic study of a small student game design team and their process in creating a video game explicitly designed to include queer-relevant content. (See also "A Closed World" below)
"Dragon Gay-ge? Same-sex romance options in Bioware games"
Popular Culture Association annual conference, April 2012
Examination of same-sex romantic content in role-playing games by Bioware, specifically the gameplay mechanics exhibited by major titles in the Mass Effect and Dragon Age series.
"Punish or pardon: community values in player-sourced e-sports moderation"
Digital Games Research Association annual conference, September 2013
Interview study looking at how players of League of Legends use the game's "Tribunal" community moderation tool; specifically, why and how users come to decisions on whether to pardon or punish reported negative behavior.
Research Games:
During my time at the MIT Game Lab (and before it, the Singapore-MIT GAMBIT Game Lab) I led two student design teams tasked with creating games to support my research.
A Closed World
Flash-based browser game by Team Fabulous. Research project examined the challenges faced and strategies used by a student team designing a game explicitly intended to include queer-relevant content.
Read More:Games for Change on ACW
Interview w/Gamasutra's Leigh Alexander about ACW
Fugue
Text adventure game by Team Backhand. Focus of research project was to develop a game that faciliated study of if and how a player's self-identification impacted their playstyle and game choices.
Current teaching: University of Baltimore:
Game Studies and Design --
COSC 150: Intro to Game Design
COSC 320: Game Concept and Design
COSC 402: Interactive Narrative
COSC 407: Social Media and Games
COSC 408: History of Video Games
COSC 497: Topics in Computer Science -- Games and Identity (Special topics course)
COSC 469: Game Development Project I (Capstone course)
Technology and Computing --
COSC 155: Internet Technologies: Mastering the Basics
Massachusetts Institute of Technology:
Game Studies and Design --
CMS 300: Introduction to Game Studies
CMS 607: Theory and Practice of Player Research
CMS S.60: Game Design for Expression (Special topics course)
Media Studies --
CMS 100: Introduction to Media Studies
Ohio University:
Media Studies --
MDIA 105: Intro to Mass Communication
MDIA 279: History of Media
MDIA 380: Media and Identity
MDIA 486A: Age/Race/Class/Gender and the Media
Game Studies and Design --
MDIA 486: Digital Gamea and Representation
Blogging:
Included here are a few selected posts; you can read my blog in full here.
"Day in the Sun" -- reflection on Will O'Neill's game Actual Sunlight
"She's Got the Look" -- discussion of games and stereotyped characters, particularly in fighting games
"Saintsception" -- on the Saints Row franchise and the pleasurable submission of play
"The Subtle Knife" -- analysis of approaches to "background" queer characters in games
"Take the Risk" -- piece on necessary mindsets for adding diversity to games, written for the MIT Game Lab blog and reposted as a Gamasutra featured blog.
Freelance Games Writing:
The following articles were written for online game publications.
"EA Discusses a Full Spectrum of Diversity" -- article for Paste Magazine on the EA Full Spectrum event about LGBTQ issues in gaming culture.
"Different Games Conference Comes to NYC" -- preview for Paste Magazine of the 2013 Different Games Conference.
"Erasing your audience isn't 'fun': the false choice between diversity and enjoyment" -- opinion piece for gaming outlet Polygon exploring how the gaming industry often falsely casts "fun" and diverse content as mutually exclusive goals.
"GaymerX2: For Everybody" -- summary and review of LGBTQ gaming convention GaymerX2 for Paste Magazine.
The Good Boys of 'Final Fantasy XV' Aren't Always Good --This article, written for Vice's gaming imprint Waypoint, examines how one of Final Fantasy XV's main characters, Gladiolus, reflects a very well-worn and damaging vision of hegemonic masculinity in game character design.
Non-Academic Conferences/Talks:
These are talks given at venues outside academic conferences and settings.
"How to Subversively Queer Your Work" -- I arranged this panel for the 2014 Game Developer's Conference, along with Samantha Allen, Zoe Quinn, Christine Love, and Mattie Brice. The panel discusses various small but important ways in which game designers can add queer diversity to their work.
Portrayals and Pitfalls of Fatness in Games -- This GDC 2015 talk in the Advocacy track focused on how games portray fat characters, looking at common tropes and stereotypes and suggestions for how devs can do better in this area.
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