The Tampere University Game Research Lab and the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies are very happy to announce the appointments of three new postdoctoral research fellows, starting in their new roles later this year:

Dr Laura op de Beke

PhD dissertation on “Anthropocene temporalities” in video games (University of Oslo, 2023). The study aims to understand a new structure of feeling particular to these times, characterized by a sense of protracted crisis, anxiety over the future, apocalypticism as well as techno-futuristic hope.

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Dr Rainforest Scully-Blaker

Dr Scully-Blaker has a PhD in Informatics from the (University of California, Irvine, 2022), with a thesis focused on systemic ‘exhaustion’ and how video games enable and may yet operate against the oppressive stasis of neoliberal, late capitalism. His research is concerned with critical approaches to the study of games and those who play them, and he is interested in exploring how play can both uphold and dismantle hegemony.

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Dr Matilda Ståhl

Dr Ståhl has a PhD (Åbo Akademi, 2021) with doctoral thesis centred around youth identity (co)construction in video games and social media and how this is affected by and situated in online/offline communities. She has explored how identity work is carried out within and across online and offline contexts, and how these activities are shaped by societal norms and communities but also by the technologies themselves.

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Very warm welcome to the new CoE-GameCult members!