KU Eichstätt-Ingolstadt
Am Marktplatz 2
85072 Eichstätt
MWischert-Zielke@ku.de
Moritz Wischert-Zielke studied English, sociology, and psychology at the Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg, the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, and the University of Birmingham. He holds an interdisciplinary M.A. in English and sociology, an interdisciplinary B.A. in English and psychology, and a B.Sc. in psychology.
His previous research interests in the humanities span from British theatre of the 20th century and philosophy (particularly Nietzsche, Foucault, Marx, and Deleuze) to (Deleuzian) film studies, disability studies, and conceptions of evil, horror, and the monstrous. In the field of psychology, he is primarily interested in clinical psychology as well as ethical aspects of automated driving.
Moritz is preparing his dissertation on the topic Practicing Virtual Places – Capitalism and Utopia in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
Playing Place – A Phenomenology of Practicing Place with Digital Games
The places which we live (in) are mediated places. To investigate our experience of place, it is crucial to look at the various forms of mediations and their biases which underlie it. Playing Place explores the phenomena of place and placement in the context of digital games. It approaches “play” as a multifaceted but particular cultural form of embodied understanding. Starting neither from a perspective focusing on narration nor ludology alone, it employs a practice-theory approach to digital games which attempts to always think place, space, and practices (of play and gaming) together. When looking at such practices as “farming”, “dwelling”, “portalling” or “map-making”, the project is especially interested in the backdrop of (explicit but also implicit) epistemic configurations against which these practices “take place”, make sense, and are embodied; sedimented knowledges of “perceiving”, “living”, “feeling”, “thinking”, and “doing” place. Working from various practices to their particular sites, sights, and forms, Playing Place thus attempts a phenomenology of practicing place with digital games. It focuses primarily but not exclusively on the “game for the coronavirus moment”, Animal Crossing: New Horizons and aims to describe, compare, and relate various cases to work out an analysis of place and placement in contemporary forms of play, gaming, and game cultures.