Dissertation preview

What better way to begin the New Year, than with a dissertation teaser?

Here it is.

Title: Online games as a medium of cultural communication: An ethnographic study of sociotechnical transformation

• Introduction
• Methodology and Rationale
• The Rise of Korean Gaming
• Gaming: from Subculture to Mainstream
• Conclusion and Moving Forward

Abstract:

This dissertation explores the place and meaning of online games in everyday life. In South Korea, online games are a prominent part of popular culture and this medium has come under public criticism for various societal ills, such as addiction. Humanistic accounts of Information-Communication Technology (ICT) usage are still a minority body of research. All too often, the explanations for engagement with technology are reductionist to the most basic variables and the social aspects omitted in the name of science. An ethnographic approach is employed in order to understand the place of games as a communication medium.

Exactly how has it come to pass, that online games have come to occupy such a prominent place in the media ecology in South Korea, and yet not been replicated in other national contexts? First, I outline the discourse on addiction as it pertains to online games and suggest some scholarly support for the viewpoint that the rhetoric surrounding a biomedical interpretation of online game addiction may not be the most appropriate way to address problems that have been typically laid at the feet of online gaming (or any other new form of media). Second, I transition into discussing my rationale for approaching South Korea as a fieldsite, the ethnographic methodology employed, and how this examination of online games is a particularly illustrative case of the profound role played by culture, social structure, infrastructure, and policy in audience reception. Third, I delve into the foundational aspects of Korean social history and culture that I assert, set the stage for the present new media scene in South Korea. Fourth, I explore what games mean in the lives of Korean youth according to the ethnographic data I have been collecting during research stays in 2004, 2008/2009 and 2010.

Overall, this dissertation examines the contextual factors of which a medium of communication in the sociotechnical transformation of South Korea can begin to be understood within the porous boundaries of its national circumstances.

Keywords: Games; Ethnography; Korea; Addiction; Sociotechnical; Media; Anthropology; Communication; Culture; Social Structure; Infrastructure; Policy;

What to ask your ethnographer

I wanted to share an article Ethan Whitehill recently posted on the Ethnography Forum via LinkedIn, answering some questions many in the business world have been asking:

1) How do you know if ethnography is the right approach for your research?
2) How do you know whether you have the right ethnographer?

I thought you might find the featured article in this months Alert! Magazine interesting and wanted to pass it along. In “Ethnography: How to know if it’s right for your study...” Two West Inc.’s Chief Anthropologist Gavin Johnston and Melinda Rea-Holloway address the issues many market researchers face when deciding whether ethnography is the best approach to solve a business problem.
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In the same article by Johnston et al, I found this succinct list of 9 questions/answers to ask an Ethnographer if you're looking to bring one onto a project. Indeed, ethnography is very much about one's training/practice/judgment and having the package to make good research decisions based on such.

Nine Questions (and Answers) to Ask an Ethnographer

The following are a number of questions every ethnographer should be able to answer.

1. Is my project a good fit for ethnography?
Your ethnographic provider should be able to determine whether ethnography is a good fit based on your business objectives, timeline and budget.

2. What methods are utilized during ethnographic fieldwork?
Ethnographers utilize a combination of multiple methodologies, but should always mention participant observation and inductive interviews.

3. How long do ethnographic projects take to complete?
It depends on the scope of your project, but a really fast ethnography will take a few months. If a provider tells you otherwise, they aren’t doing ethnography.

4. Do ethnographers have a discussion guide like focus group moderators?
Yes, however each ethnographer has a different style of inquiry, and will not repeat verbatim what is in the field guide.

5. What is the ethnographic analysis process?
Ethnographers should be able to explain their analytical process and this description should include a reference to social and cultural theory.

6. What is the difference between videography and ethnography?
Videography is story-telling through video. Videography may capture the moment, but lacks the rigor of structured research.

7. What qualifications should ethnographic fieldworkers have?
They should have an advanced degree in a social science discipline, such as anthropology or sociology. They should also have a wide range of field experiences.

8. How do ethnographers learn ethnography?
They learn the basics of ethnography in graduate school and through hands-on experiences in the field. To become a practitioner requires understanding of social science theory, research methods and research design.

9. How can I be sure I can use the results from ethnographic research?
A good ethnographer will work with you to plan a research project that is designed around your business objective. Therefore, sampling, data collection and data analysis will all be guided by the end goal. A good ethnographer understands the difference between interesting and actionable findings.

Gavin Johnston is the chief anthropologist of Two West Discovery & Design
Melinda Rea-Holloway is the CEO and founder of Ethnographic Research, Inc.

Top 100 Anthropology Blogs

Online Universities.com has posted a list of their "top 100 Anthropology Blogs," with a brief run-down of what they're about.

On the whole, it's a reasonable list of blogs, many of which I myself already keep up on )like Savage Minds, This Blog Sits at the, INCITE... or guested on, as with the case of Terra Nova), and some that are new and interesting.

I just don't know why #39 is on there... (cough)...blimey. heh

Thanks for the props.

Why learning the language is preferable to 'translation'

I am very much looking forward to using my Korean on a daily basis again in its native environment next week, as there is nothing like full immersion. It is important to know both the langue and parole of the culture under one's ethnographic investigation. Human translators are great, but that is of course a layer of mediation that one would preferably strip away if possible. Time and money play a key role in what one is able to do by oneself, like transcription (an absolute pain to do, would rather escape the chore by paying someone else to do it, but there is some removal of data from the interpreter/researcher/writer).

While it's perfectly good and fair to not fully master a language in which one is doing ethnography (and many would argue not necessary at all), it is still good to at least try. Invoking the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis here, it postulates that a particular language's nature influences the habitual thought of its speakers....

So, to understand a culture more, it makes sense to understand the language.. what was important enough to 'make it' into the local vocabulary, etc.

Anyway, this post was more of an excuse to post some funnies with the translator widget on my dashboard. I initially started with a simple phrase,"What are you doing today?" and "translated" it to Korean. Then what I generally like to do is translate the Korean it spits out into English, and hilarity ensues.

What are you doing today?
너는 무엇을 오늘 하고 있는가?
(which translates to...)

It spreads out what today?
오늘 무엇 그것은 밖으로 퍼진다?
(which becomes...)

What it spreads out today at the outside?
그것은 무엇 외부에 밖으로 오늘 퍼지는가?
(and then...)

Does it outside what spread out today at the outside?
밖으로 오늘 퍼지는 것이이상으로 외부에 그것은?
(and..)

Spreading out today at the outside at above outside it?
밖으로 오늘 퍼지는가 그것이상으로 상기에 외부에?
(and...)

It spreads out today at the outside above it in minute description outside?
그것은 작은 묘사안에 그것의 위 외부에 밖으로 오늘 밖에 퍼진다?

It inside small depicting outside up of it spreads out only today at the outside?
그것은 외부에 그것의 안 작은 묘사 밖에 위로 밖으로 단 오늘 퍼진다?
(Last one...)

It outside it only small depiction spreads out only today at the comfort outside?
그것 밖에 에 의하여 안락에 단 작은 묘사 밖으로 단 오늘 밖에 퍼지는?

Lost in translation, indeed. Is this why Asians seem so stereotypically 'mysterious'? It all sounds like a haiku...

I know some of you in the field of translation might have something to say about this!

Almost there: Pre-fieldwork particulars

It's been a hectic little while...

In less than 3 weeks, I'll be heading to South Korea for 6 months of ethnographic fieldwork on the intergenerational use of information communication technologies (games, wireless, etc), and the changing social dynamics in the nation amidst the impacts of transnationality.

The Department of Communication at Seoul National University has invited me to commence a stay with them as a Visiting Researcher during that time. I'll be working with Professor Myungkoo Kang, who is a leading authority on the concept of East Asian Modernity and the study of media and culture.

In addition to the scholastic rigours that come with such an endeavour, I've also been distracted (to put it mildly) with the bureaucratic rigours as well. More than usual. It wouldn't be a blog entry without some inanity, so the laundry list of the last 3 weeks includes:

• Phone calls with governmental organizations, with paperwork follow-up
• Health exams: chest x-rays, vaccinations, blood, (and yes everything else!). I'm in "excellent" health, by the way--the paper says so now.
• Administration: ordering documentation, booking flights, accomodation, registration, scanning, emailing... unsubscribing to this, subscribing to that, it's all stuff that needs to be done.
• Purchasing research materials--books, equipment, favourite face cream. (ok, that's not research... or is it...:)

The problem, as many know... is that many of these things rely upon the schedule of others. So if there's not enough time to crank the wheels, there's simply nothing one can do. Wait in the cue. Have a good book. Get really practiced at saying, "it's alright" to people at the counter just doing their jobs.

Fieldwork is a full-bodied effort. It's the virtue and vice of being an ethnographer. You have to be 'there,' and take everything that comes with getting there, being there, and leaving there. In addition to that, there's the administration that comes with being here, leaving here, and coming back here..... nevermind securing the funding and support to carry those plans out.

So, I've been yammering about this trip for four years since my last fieldwork stint in Korea four years ago, applying for this and that grant, asking for reference letters, signatures, coffee talk, sanity checks. The time has finally come, and I bet everyone else is relieved along with me. Fortunately, I've encountered very helpful, kind, and positive people who are on my side when it comes to getting these things done (in all stages of the aforementioned tasks). There has also been some great news regarding getting this research funded, for which I'm just waiting on the official announcement of before letting the cat out of the bag here.

On being "Korean Enough"

Through his blog "Koreanish," writer Alexander Chee links to an essay published in Guernica titled, "Korean Enough: Alexander Chee on New Korean American Fiction." I highly recommend it, for anyone interested in the complexity of ethnic identity as it spans geography, generations, and even measures of authenticity.

I was interested in the article from the start, but by the second paragraph the article was thoroughly resonating with what I have found in my own experience and seek to convey as time (and my research) goes on:

My father’s family in Korea keeps traditions they brought with them from China in the 15th Century that the Chinese no longer keep; they use an archaic Chinese script in the keeping of our family’s records. They perform, inside the confines of my family, these rituals of this lost homeland—even as they tell me they fear I’m “not Korean enough,” with no sense of irony whatsoever.

Even this short paragraph is so packed with nuance: a) Korea's proximity to a dominant and large nation (China); b) How narratives are transmitted in a literate and oral context; c) The performance of ritual as a way to ensure continuity and affirmation of an all-too-fragile sense of identity; and d) The tenuousness of authenticity and representation.

I have to say that it hit me on a personal level of course--anyone who's ever been singled out as visibly different in their primary context of operation may relate to the feeling of being an 'alien' or of feeling "yes I belong" and at the very same time "how could I ever really belong."

As an ethnographer, or, "Professional Stranger," (as Michael Agar has written), the feeling of being an Angel, Ghost (as Grant McCracken has talked about), or Alien in the context one is studying--is part and parcel with the ability to see things as if one doesn't belong. And yet, we have the need to function (or sometimes not) within that context. When it's your job, culture shock is not shock anymore per se, but rather a constant state of orange/red alert that is physically and emotionally taxing and also par for the course.

In her address to the class of 2008 at the Berkeley School of Information last month, Genevieve Bell from Intel recounts her emotional experience with a Korean shaman and tells those in the audience that if one is not in tears at least once in the field in that manner, then one is not really embracing the experience.

Me thinks to self: Yep.

In my fieldwork experiences, my authenticity has been tested implicitly and explicitly many a time. We do this in many ways. Even as gamers, there is the said and unsaid about whether or not someone is "hardcore" enough--and almost a destructive culture of intensity where one's authenticity and social status hangs in the balance. Pain of (virtual?) death should one not prove worthy. I've written about this as it pertained to a particular raid in World of Warcraft.

Culture is shared knowledge in a system of meaning. In the Korean context, I was often told, "Once you know x, you will be truly Korean." x, at times equated with the ability to eat spicy food, knowing when to pay for the bill, knowing Seoul's expansive subway system, or how/why Tim Horton's to Canadian national identity can't hold a candle to the affinity Koreans feel for Kimchi and it's pervasive role in society, life, and death.

Alexander Chee's article was an excellent piece--driving home just how very much a state of mind authenticity is, and just how true (and necessary) the myths and fictions we create for ourselves often are. Have a read.

Start off the New Year right...

...with some reading from Games and Culture: A Journal of Interactive Media, published by SAGE.

Dal Yong Jin and I have an article published in the latest issue of Games and Culture (2008, Vol.3 Issue 1, pp. 38-58) titled, "Age of New Media Empires: A Critical Interpretation of the Korean Online Game Industry."

The table of contents along with access to the text can be found here at the Sage Journals Online website: http://gac.sagepub.com/content/vol3/issue1/

Alongside articles that take up games in the Asia-Pacific, our paper is a combination of political economy and ethnography from our research on Korean online games.

Abstract: In this article, the authors attempt to ascertain the factors involved in the swift growth of online games in the context of broader sociocultural elements. Through political economy and ethnographic analysis, they show that online games, like other forms of technology, are sociocultural products that have been historically constituted by certain forms of knowledge and social practice. First, they map out the forces driving their development by examining government policies and competition among online games companies in Korea. They then explore capital flow to investigate the major players in the market. Finally, they explore the sociocultural elements contributing to the diffusion of online games in the cultural milieu specific to Korea.

Key Words: ethnography • Korea • online games • policy • political economy

Happy New Year all, and happy reading! All accusations of geeking out apply.

Harvard Business Review: The Next Big Thing

Some reading from the Harvard Business Review about "The Rise of Corporate Anthropology," by Tom Davenport.

Davenport holds the President’s Chair in Information Technology and Management at Babson College, where he also leads the Process Management and Working Knowledge Research Centers. His books and articles on business process reengineering, knowledge management, attention management, knowledge worker productivity, and analytical competition helped to establish each of those business ideas. Having him tout this type of socio-cultural anthropology and highlight observation as the "Next Big Thing" in business, to me, reaches out to an audience that is just beginning to recognize (again) that ethnographers have much to offer design and technology because artefacts are products of culture. Culture, being the key word here.

"I have been predicting for years that anthropologists would soon be in demand in the workplace, and now this is finally coming to pass. Anthropologists are social scientists who study human behavior through systematic observation. There are a variety of types of anthropologists --physical, archeological, and medical. I am primarily focused here on social and cultural anthropologists, some fraction of which are interested in social relationships in the contemporary workplace. I also believe that sociologists (my own background), social psychologists, and even some behaviorally-oriented economists will be of increasing use in corporate life, but I am particularly bullish on anthropology because of its emphasis on observation.

What’s so good about systematic observation? It’s the key to knowing what’s working and what isn’t, how people are using technology and other tools in the course of the workday, how workers extract meaning (or don’t) from their work, and so forth. We all make sweeping generalizations about these and many other topics, but we don’t really know. Corporate anthropology provides the possibility of actually knowing what’s happening and why in organizations."

more in the article>>

Shout outs to Martin B. for the heads up on this article!

Digital Voice Recorders - Recommendations for an ethnographer?

My digital voice recorder has died, and I am glad for it. It unfortunately used a proprietary format for recording,and while it created a high-quality, memory-efficient recording--it was ultimately AGONY waiting for it to convert its files to a WAV file (of all things). That, and the software (once you lose the 3 year old CD... come on, we've all done it) is difficult to find online, and once you find it, it -might- be available for a price. Sound familiar? It's lame, and the forums agree... with many users ditching recorders that do such short-sighted, ill-advised things. It's enough to drive me back to mini tapes. Well, maybe not quite.

Having learned from previous frustrations with the now dead recorder, this is what I would want my next recorder to have:

1. Good background noise filtering (probably in the form of different speech settings)
2. NOT proprietary format that requires special software in order to play recording on a computer or anywhere else.
3. Preferably records in MP3 format
4. Memory-efficient
5. Feedback on successful recording (flickring LCD bar, or LED will do).

So far, my experiences with consumer reviews and forums do not adequately address these specific concerns, nor are they targeted to my particular needs. They are also not the most up to date.

Anyway, it's time to move on and move up. So I am looking around and researching what to get as my faithful fieldwork companion. I'm soliciting recommendations from people who regularly do field interviews (ethnographers, journalists,and others of similar ilk) who are familiar with the conditions in which such interviews are conducted, and later processed. If you're like me, that processing will take place on a laptop, in a tiny room, in unfamiliar conditions.

There's got to be a better option than just using 'record' on my MP3 player... or is there?

Comments?

Ethnography and mobile design

I wanted to share an informative article from the BBC that interviewed Jan Chipchase, principal researcher at Nokia Design on how he has used ethnographic insights to inform the design of mobiles. His work includes bringing research teams into the actual cultural contexts of use in order to make better business decisions for Nokia.

Read the rest of my post at mobilemuse.ca>>

Where would I fit in the games development cycle?

Last week, there were several lectures and panels that I found interesting. One in particular at the OGDC stood out because it's near and dear to me: User Research.

In this panel, they talked about the interaction between User Researchers and the Users, but also the internal dynamics of the group,which includes ethnographers, social psychologists, and usability engineers. I really enjoy hearing about this type of interdisciplinary collaboration, as it closely resembles what I experienced through a "social science research cluster" interacting with other clusters while working at the New Media Innovation Centre (NewMIC) before I started graduate school. However, like many beautiful utopian creatures born out of the dotcom boom, that creature went bust--but I've been looking for places which encourage that spirit of collaboration ever since. It's encouraging to see tech companies like Microsoft see the pragmatic value in ethnographic praxis. Along with Intel and IBM, they sponsor conferences like EPIC.

The expression of an ethnographer's utility in the games development cycle was interesting to me because I have expressed similar principles in my own industry work. Reminds me of SAD (Systems Analysis and Design) projects I did way back when...

The development cycle can be thought of like this:

1. Concept
2. Prototyping
3. Production
4. Polish (Beta)
5. Post-release

Typically, ethnographers like myself have been consulted (if at all) during the last stage (Post-release) and given insights that may be incorporated into future designs.
The trend that some teams are going towards though, is bringing in ethnography to inspire at the first concept stage... and increasingly at even the fourth polishing beta stage. Involving cultural insights through ethnographic narrative at more stages of the process stands to benefit the company a LOT. I mean, bottom line kind of stuff. Imagine making a million (or more) dollar mistake, all to find it could have been avoided if someone had been on the ground. It's happened before.

Anthropologists have been studying games and play for a long time... before the world became flat, before it became digitized. While there are certain universals, game play is something that is so culturally subjective and interesting--using an ethnographer just makes cultural (and financial!) sense.

Terra Nova post: Coming of Age in World of WarCraft

You know, I wouldn'€™t call myself one of those evil academics^TM who €˜studies€™ World of WarCraft (WoW). Far from it, I play WoW, and the anthropologist in me can't help but analyze what makes that play culture tick. And that would include a little more than a passing academic interest in WoW. So, maybe I am evil after all and I suppose that's why I typically play Horde. kek.

Read the rest at Terra Nova>>