OASIS hosts various talks on academic and non-academic topics. These talks are always free and open to everyone.

We try to live stream as many talks as we can and you can find new live streams on the OASIS YouTube channel, event information on the OASIS
Facebook-page and recordings of most of our previous talks on the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies YouTube channel.

Our current talk series is called OASIS Lunchtime Talks and you can find the schedule and information about the talks below.

In addition to this curated series, the page highlights other types of OASIS Talks, past and yet to come.

OASIS Lunchtime Talks is a series of lectures on current research by fascinating scholars from near and far.
The talks are usually held on Thursdays during lunch hour (12.00 - 13.00 or 12 PM to 1PM).
The lecture series was created by Olli Sotamaa and the current series of OASIS Lunchtime Talks is curated by Heikki Tyni and produced by Mikko Seppänen and Elisa Wiik.

Thursday - March 6th
12.00 - 13.00

ON TUTORIALS, STEREOTYPES, AND BODY VISIONS

Corinne Mazzoli

In her talk, Corinne Mazzoli takes you on a journey through the evolution of tutorials, the rise of counter-tutorials, and the politics of self-representation online. A tutorial is a simple and straightforward method that teaches through emulation. According to Mazzoli’s research, a counter-tutorial can be seen as a countercultural way of using the tutorial format. While counter-tutorials share the style and structure of conventional tutorials and follow the typical how-to formula of educational videos, they have decidedly different objectives and intended audiences. They function as political tools to create awareness or generate social change.

So, how do they address collective and/or political identities online? This talk will explore these and other aspects related to the diverse cultural, aesthetic, and political uses of online video tutorials. It will also demonstrate how this format has been discovered, researched, appropriated, and utilized in various artistic workshops.

Corinne Mazzoli is a visual artist and PhD student in Educational Sciences at the University of Milano-Bicocca, researching the “educational process as artistic practice” in collaboration with the MA*GA Museum, Italy. She is currently a visiting doctoral researcher at the Tampere Game Research Lab.

Watch the live stream on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/live/bwkDPAL65QE

Tuesday - March 11th
12.00 - 13.00

Contested video game development: An educational comparison between Germany and Sweden

Jonas Ferdinand

In this presentation, Jonas Ferdinand focuses on the connections between game education programs and the game industries in Germany and Sweden, two countries with increasingly interconnected and significant video game industries within the European market. In recent years, educational opportunities in game development have expanded considerably in both countries, although state university programs have progressed more slowly. Consequently, many private institutions have emerged, offering study programs alongside state university courses. Among other things, this presentation asks: how do educators in various types of institutions in Germany and Sweden interpret what constitutes video game development? And which skills are deemed essential to acquire?

A graduate of Humboldt University of Berlin, Jonas Ferdinand has worked since 2020 in the "Globalization, Work and Production" research group in various capacities, and more recently as an associate researcher in the "Work with Artificial Intelligence" group at the Weizenbaum Institute and as a fellow in the "Good Work in a Transformative World" doctoral program. His research focuses on digital capitalism, particularly the platform economy, and the transformation of work in the digitalized cultural and creative industries.

Watch the live stream on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/live/bwkDPAL65QE

Thursday - April 3rd
12.00 - 13.00

Our speaker on April 3rd will be Alina Potemska. More information about the talk will be added here soon!

Past OASIS Lunchtime talks

From Slavery to Wage Slaves in Settler-Colonialist Board Games in Anglo-America
Mikael Jakobsson (MIT Game Lab)

Video Games, Environmental Awareness and Climate Change
Xenia Zeiler (University of Helsinki)

Indie Porn Games: Contents, Ecosystems, Business Models
Petri Lankoski (Södertörn University, Sweden)

Playing Emotions: How to Bring Indie Games to the Classroom
Jorge Oceja (University of Cantabria, Santander, Spain)

Creativity: in academic research, narrative, and world-building
Ian Sturrock (Teesside University, Middlesbrough, England)

Arcade Britannia: British Arcade History, Comics, and Interactive Experiences
Alan Meades (Canterbury Christ Church University, UK)

THE RULES WE BREAK - Lessons in Play, Thinking, and Design
Eric Zimmerman (NYU Game Center, USA)

Making Games Differently
Casey O'Donnell (Tampere University, Center of Excellence for Game Culture Studies)

The Value of Toys in a Post-Digital World
Katriina Heljakka (University of Turku)

Games and Exhaustion
Rainforest Scully-Blaker (Tampere University, Center of Excellence for Game Culture Studies)

Ephemeral ecologies: player paratexts at the end of the world
Lawrence May (University of Auckland)

The “Critiqueless” Critique of Gamification
Mikko Vesa (Hanken School of Economics / University of Lapland)

Promises, Politics, and Pipelines: Implicit and Explicit Lessons from Games Higher Education
Alison Harvey (Glendon College, York University)

Game Studies without Culture? A Historical Review of Video Game Research in Korea
Tae-Jin Yoon (Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea)

Ukrainian Game Jam Scene: Creativity in Extreme Conditions
Oleksii Izvalov (Robert Elvorti Economy and Technical Institute)

Replayed: Software Preservation and Game Histories (Book Talk)
Dr. Henry Lowood (Stanford University)

The LVLup! Museum: From experimental initiative to national institution
Camille Laurelli (Educational Center at National Library of Estonia)

(Re)Playing Cultural Memory: The Why and How of Studying Nostalgia in Video Games
Diego A Mejía-Alandia (Tampere University, the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies)

In-game interaction, identities and communities – or what does it mean to play together?
Matilda Ståhl (Åbo Akademi University)

How to study Japanese video games: A reflection on my stay abroad in Japan
Joleen Blom (Tampere University, the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies)

From Research to Development - A Transit King Story
Janne Paavilainen (BON Games)

Care Tactics - Practicing Safe Storage at Gaming Events
Nick Taylor (York University)

International Solidarity Between Game Workers in the Global North and Global South – Reflections on The Challenges Posed by Labor Aristocracy
Emil Lundedal Hammar (Tampere University, the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies)

The Value of NFTs in Games
Alesha Serada (University of Vaasa)

Playing with toy soldiers? A look at miniaturing
Mikko Meriläinen (Tampere University, the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies)

Handmade Pixels: Indie Video Games and the Quest for Authenticity
Jesper Juul (Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, School of Desig)

Ask Why: Creating a Better Player Experience through Environmental Storytelling and Consistency in Escape Room Design
Scott Nicholson (Wilfrid Laurier University)

Age Appropriate Game Design
Darshana Jayemanne (Abertay University)

Zen Mode: on Buddhism, McMindfulness, and orientalism in games
Victor Navarro-Remesal (Comillas Pontifical University)

Fun Things are Fun: Exploring the Games & Life of Karl Rohnke
Pete Vigeant (ESC Games)

Thoughts on Existential, Transformative Game Design
Dr. Doris Rusch (Uppsala University)

Assemblage agency and the games that play us
Maria Ruotsalainen (University of Jyväskylä)

Ethics in theory, justice in practice: Insights into practical challenges between game research contexts
Dr. Florence Chee (Loyola University Chicago)

Digital Dreamers? Researching the Lives of Videogame Workers
Anna Ozimek (Tallinn University)

Finnish and Polish educational board games in the mid-19th century
Maria Garda (PhD) (University of Turku)

The Gamer Logic of “Selfies are Avatars”: Toxic Masculinity and James Franco’s Strategic Vulnerability
Tom Apperley

Intimate Games: Queering the Conventional Mouse Controller for Cooperative Play
Sabine Harrer

Resisting Patches & Updates: Struggles against Protocological Power in Video Games
Jan Švelch

Understanding the Australian Videogame Field through Formal, Informal, and Embedded Gamemakers
Brendan Keogh (Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane) 

Sense of Place in Videogames: Case Red Dead Redemption
Jussi Holopainen (Games Computing, University of Lincoln)

Regulatory change and cultural peculiarity - horse people and the new gambling monopoly in Finland
Pauliina Raento

MSP Challenge 2050: first results of fourth-generation simulation gaming for maritime spatial planning
Harald Warmelink (NHTV Breda University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands)

On the Possibility of a Paratelic Initiation of Organizational Wrongdoing
Mikko Vesa (Hanken School of Economics, Helsinki)

Toxic Meritocracy of Video Games: Why Gaming Culture Is the Worst
Christopher Paul (Seattle University)

Salvation, or Snake Oil, Big Data Practices in the Game Industry
Jennifer R. Whitson (University of Waterloo)

Amateur adaptations of “professional” games: Manic Miner and Flappy in 1980s Czechoslovakia
Jaroslav Švelch (University of Bergen / Charles University Prague)