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November 01, 2004
women-friendly conferences about online gaming?
This question comes from: Ann Bartow - bartow [at] law.law.sc.edu
Research suggests more women than men play online games (see e.g. this or this) so you might think a conference about online gaming would reflect this somehow. Think again! Here is the speakers' roster from The State of Play II, a conference about gaming co-sponsored by the Yale and New York Law Schools.I submitted a conference proposal to the first iteration of this conference (The State of Play I) on gender issues, and big surprise, it got turned down. Didn't submit one this year (didn't even see a call for papers, come to think of it), but it doesn't look like the organizers' interest in women speakers or issues has increased much, so doing so would likely have been a wasted effort anyway.
For the second consecutive year I sent probably tactless (and not exactly career enhancing!) e-mails to the organizers about the dearth of women participating. Last year a couple of women got added late (coincidence? who knows?), this year it looks like at least one did, but still...
Can anyone recommend more women-friendly conferences about online gaming?
Posted by zephoria at 03:52 PM in Gaming | Permalink
Comments
The two links provided as evidence that "more women than men play online games" are very poor choices for complaining about the lack of female speakers at State of Play II, because the type of online gaming is significant.
The State of Play conference "explores the next frontier in the evolution of cyberspace: virtual worlds." State of Play II includes topics such as "Should we import copyright and trademark into virtual spaces?"
But the first story is about a site that offers Mahjongg and other "skill-based games such as checkers, chess and backgammon".
And the second story, about women over 40, says that they prefer:
- 49% word and puzzle games
- 27% casino
- 16% arcade
- 7% trivia
- 1% sports
which leaves about 0% for virtual worlds.
I know that there are women playing in virtual worlds, but those two citations actually testify against the premise.
Posted by: Doug at Nov 1, 2004 5:09:13 PM
Oh for goodness sake, the two citations don't "testify" at all, they were two quick examples illustrating that women game online in large numbers. The "premise" of my posting is that there weren't a lot of female speakers at either State of Play Conference, despite the fact that there are (e.g.) plenty of women who know a fair amount about copyrights and trademarks, who also participate in online games.
If women are playing different games then men, that might be of interest to participants at a conference about gaming. That is the kind of conference I'm looking for, one that potentially takes an interest in gender differences.
Posted by: Ann Bartow at Nov 1, 2004 5:50:55 PM
To answer your immediate question, there is a conference on multiplayer gaming at the IT University, Copenhagen this December ("Other Players" which has a broader distribution of women participants. There is also the DiGRA (Digital Game Research Association) conference next June ("Changing Views: Worlds in Play". Both of these conferences are double-blind peer reviewed, so there should be no risk of selecting participants on the basis of gender. It's too late for the Other Players conference, but not the DiGRA conference, at which gender is explicitly included in the RFP ("Identity in Gaming: Roles and role-playing, and re-definitions of 'self' in and through digital games, including especially, issues related to ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality and 'the Other.'"). In addition, there was a more industry-focused Womens Game Conference in Austin earlier this year, which will be repeated in 2005.
About State of Play: it's worth noting that the organizer of that conference, Beth Noveck, is a woman. In addition, I think of that conference as dealing with issues of law, property, and economics in virtual worlds almost exclusively. That's not to praise or blame the distribution of speakers, but it might be why the organizers didn't put gender issues explicitly in play, so to speak. I don't know how reviews for SOP I or II were facilitated (invited speakers, blind reviews, etc.).
Finally, I have I agree with Doug's comment that there is a fundamental difference between types of online games and their players. Your original comments imply (maybe I'm reading incorrectly) that you're specifically interested in virtual worlds or MMOG's (since those are the subject of the State of Play conference). I don't disagree with the spirit of your rejoinder, but as someone interested in discussing gender issues in games I think you'd agree that the type of game and its context makes a significant difference in analysis.
Posted by: Ian Bogost at Nov 3, 2004 8:21:30 AM
Right, right, "issues of law, property, and economics," nothing silly girls would care about :>)
Posted by: Ann Bartow at Nov 3, 2004 8:04:22 PM
Whatever. I was trying to be helpful. I'll think twice next time I decide to comment on this blog.
Posted by: Ian Bogost at Nov 3, 2004 10:57:40 PM
Aleks Krotoski has written a lovely paper on the topic: http://www.elspa.com/about/pr/elspawhitepaper3.pdf
Stats off the top of my head: 18/20% of EverQuest players are female, and a large proportion
are guild leaders too.. approx. 77% of all teenage girls in the UK play games, according to
the TGI Youth Survey of 2004. I doubt they play different games from boys - not much choice
to be had there! But they do play *differently*, preferring non-lethal consequences and social elements of play.
Lizzie Haines (amongst others) did a great paper too for the UK Women and Games conference that happened this year in June: http://www.tech.port.ac.uk/staffweb/eylesm/wig-website/conf-2004/schedule.html. I think you'll find that one pretty female-friendly ;)
Alice.
Posted by: Alice at Nov 5, 2004 8:57:35 AM
What an ass Ian is. Not being a woman I may not "get it" but patronizing defensiveness isn't helpful I don't think. And when a woman rejects her own kind it doesn't make things "right".
Posted by: Edward Jin at Nov 6, 2004 10:11:27 PM
As I see it there are two issues: The lack on interest in gender issues (and therefore lack of speakers, male or female, on this topic) and the essentially unrelated issue of a dearth of women speakers on any issue that was of interest, such as law, economics of gaming, intellectual property concerns etc.
Posted by: Deepa Prakash at Nov 7, 2004 5:22:41 PM
Deepa -- but I'm not convinced that there is a lack of interest in gender issues n games, that was precisely my point. I've pointed to several examples of conferences where gender issues are very much in play. There have also been several books on the subject, and I personally know at least a half-dozen researchers working on this topic directly (both men and women).
Edward -- Patronizing defensiveness is precisely how I read Ann Bartow's response to my completely legitimate attempt to answer her fundamental question about opportunities to present research on gender in games. If any effort to shed light on the situation here will be met with a cynical cold shoulder then I suppose all we can do is confront the meta-discourse about writing about the problem. How appropriately bloggish.
Posted by: Ian Bogost at Nov 8, 2004 10:44:09 AM
My question, and here I quote myself fairly exactly, was, "Can anyone recommend more women-friendly conferences about online gaming?" You answered this question very nicely and helpfully in the first paragraph of your response. It was the later implication that it was because the substantive thrust of the State of Play II conference was "issues of law, property, and economics" that there were so few women speakers, as if women would or could not be expected to address these weighty topics, that generated my rejoinder. Your responses speak for themselves. I've no interest in having a pissing contest with you, I'm a female and therefore at a biological disadvantage with respect to aim and distance.
Posted by: Ann Bartow at Nov 8, 2004 11:45:46 AM
I'm not a gamer or in the gaming industry, but if it's any consoliation, Jaron Lanier and Will Wright asked "Yeah, where are the women?" at the audience members at the recent Accelerating Change Conference (you'll be happy to know the opening keynote was a woman). They claim they ask this question to many gaming conferences.
Posted by: Evelyn Rodriguez at Nov 10, 2004 3:02:40 AM
It was the later implication that it was because the substantive thrust of the State of Play II conference was "issues of law, property, and economics" that there were so few women speakers, as if women would or could not be expected to address these weighty topics, that generated my rejoinder.
Nothing of the sort Ann! I suggested that issues of gender studies were perhaps not explicitly on the agenda at SOP. I never said anything about the appropriateness or inappropriateness of this (entirely hypothetical) suggestion. You'd have to ask the organizers if you want to get into a pissing contest.
Posted by: Ian Bogost at Nov 10, 2004 9:14:08 PM
Ian, you seemed to be making excuses for the organizers not selecting more women to speak. Now I assume I can expect you to attack me.
Posted by: Deepa at Nov 11, 2004 8:50:58 AM
While it completely depends on the angle of your paper, a conference intrinsically "woman-friendly" is the "International Conference for Women Engineers and Scientists".
http://www.icwes13.org/
I would almost reccomend submitting a few abstract angles.
Off topic, a publication I would particularly like to see is a "Where to start" for a girl interested in gaming. I enjoy gaming, but with all the systems and games out there I'm unsure where to commit my finances =\
Posted by: Kail Ceannai at Nov 12, 2004 11:54:10 PM
