{"id":229,"date":"2019-03-20T15:16:12","date_gmt":"2019-03-20T15:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/?p=229"},"modified":"2019-03-20T15:16:12","modified_gmt":"2019-03-20T15:16:12","slug":"videogames-glitches-and-the-narrative-of-malfunction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/2019\/03\/20\/videogames-glitches-and-the-narrative-of-malfunction\/","title":{"rendered":"Videogames, Glitches, and the Narrative of Malfunction"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
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Greetings all,<\/p>\n

Join us on\u00a0Tuesday March 26 at 12:30 pm\u00a0<\/strong>at MITH for Andrew Ferguson’s talk in our Spring 2019 Digital Dialogue series.<\/p>\n

Andrew Ferguson
\nVisiting Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Maryland<\/h2>\n

Videogames, Glitches, and the Narrative of Malfunction<\/a><\/h1>\n

Tuesday March 26\u00a02019\u00a0at 12:30 pm<\/strong>
\nMITH Conference Room, 0301 Hornbake Library North
\nor via livestream:\u00a0https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IZEQG0HnqGI<\/a><\/p>\n

The word \u201cglitch,\u201d meaning a small voltage variance that can short out a circuit, entered the English language through radio hobbyists and was popularized by astronauts, for whom a glitch could mean the difference between life and death. But while the word \u201cglitch\u201d is often still used to connote catastrophic failure, videogamers have come to view glitches opportunistically, as chances to intervene in game texts in ways unforeseen (and often unforeseeable) by their developers. The results range from the ability to walk through walls, to new strategies for survival in unfavorable conditions, all the way to the discovery of entirely new navigable spaces outside the game\u2019s imposed boundaries.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My presentation draws on a variety of game glitches and the alternate modes of textual navigation they enable to demonstrate how the glitch forces us to rethink even such basic concepts as plot, character, temporality, and point of view, ultimately showing how the resulting \u201cnarrative of malfunction\u201d blends and reshapes digital studies, narratology, and queer\/disability theory to establish brokenness, error, and failure as baseline states within which narrative \u201cfunction\u201d is at best temporary and often actively to be avoided. All texts are thus potentially glitched, and much can be learned and accomplished within them by reading for the glitches.<\/p>\n

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Andrew Ferguson is a visiting assistant professor of digital studies in the Department of English at UMD. He works at the intersection of media-textual studies, cultural theory, and popular culture, which results in him doing things like willingly signing up to write an article that will require watching The Star Wars Holiday Special several times. Other ongoing projects include a study on editorial labor and style in science fiction, essays on born-digital horror and the writings of Dr. Chuck Tingle, and the manuscript on glitches and narrative theory from which this talk is taken.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Greetings all, Join us on\u00a0Tuesday March 26 at 12:30 pm\u00a0at MITH for Andrew Ferguson’s talk in our Spring 2019 Digital Dialogue series. Andrew Ferguson Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Maryland Videogames, Glitches, and the Narrative of Malfunction Tuesday March 26\u00a02019\u00a0at 12:30 pm MITH Conference Room, 0301 Hornbake Library North or via livestream:\u00a0https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IZEQG0HnqGI … <\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8605,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wds_primary_category":0},"categories":[1],"tags":[4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8605"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":230,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions\/230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.wp.odu.edu\/prototype2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}