Feminists in Games (FiG) Workshop Vancouver

**Note new deadline extended to February 28, 2013 for presenters and March 31st, 2013 for observers.

Open Call:
We are inviting submissions for participation in the 2nd Annual “Feminists in Games” workshop to be held in at the Centre for Digital Media in Vancouver, B.C. from May 31- June 2, 2013.

Participation and attendance at the conference is free. There is a limited amount of money allotted to assist presenters with their travel costs. If you wish to apply for this funding please include a short statement (no more than 100 words) with your abstract describing your financial need.
1) New Participants

We invite young and up-and-coming scholars and aspiring game designers as well as established practitioners in the field (including researchers, educators and industry professionals) to submit a presentation abstract of no more than 1000 words addressing the challenge of advancing gender equity in relation to the following areas:
- game design and development;

- game content;

- socio-cultural constructions of “gamers”;

- player communities and online play; and

- the games industry

- critiques of media treatment of girls/women/gamers
Proposals will be peer-reviewed, and applicants whose submissions are accepted will have the opportunity to bring their work into conversation with established feminist scholars and activists during a two-day invitational workshop.
2) Past Participants

We invite participants of FiG 2012 who received seed funding from FiG to present the findings/outcomes of their projects in a paper (maximum 3000 words) and/or multimedia presentation.

3) Observers

We invite members from the general public, the games industry and academia to attend keynotes and workshop roundtable sessions, and to lend their voices, perspectives and experiences to conversations and emerging initiatives that support feminist purposes and processes in games education, research, design and development. Although not required to submit/present formal papers, each observer is requested to participate in a ‘lightening round’ observer panel and will have five minutes in which to describe their an interest/challenge/question/project/game, that specifically engages with FiG’s mandate, the advancement, through all possible means, of feminists in games.

4) Other/s

The conference will include an opportunity to participate in a roundtable session aimed at generating a collaborative research project between scholars and industry professionals. Those interested in presenting may send abstracts of no more than 1000 words, outlining their research question(s), project/s and approach, to Rachel Muehrer (feministsingames@gmail.com) or Jennifer Jenson (jjjenson@gmail.com) by February 28, 2013. Those wishing to attend as ‘observers’ (this includes the industry round table) are invited to reply by March 31, 2013 with a description of your ‘lightning round’submission short statement about how attending might be of benefit to you (250 words).