Mark your calendars – the annual Women in Games Conference is set to take place virtually on Friday October 11th, the Day of the Girl, and celebrates 20 years since the first took place in 2004.
It’s a long day of content, taking in three time zones and running from 7am GMT to 9pm GMT, but all delegates have the opportunity to catch up on sessions they may have missed via the RingCentral online platform’s ‘Replay’ function.
The theme of the day will be PLAY GROUNDED – an exploration of Play Landscapes: “We are providing an arena for discussion of the functions of play across multiple strands, from concept to publication – the makers and the players – the pleasures [of playing] and the pain [of toxic spaces].”
Delivering the keynote will be Dr Aphra Kerr, Professor of Information and Communication Studies, University College Dublin, Principal Investigator SFI ADAPT Centre, Ireland, and author of milestone texts and research on digital games.
Initial sessions and confirmed speakers include contributions from Women in Games Asia Chapter members, and the Geena Davis Institute, as well as:
Misogyny: Poison in the Play Space
- Dr Elizabeth Kilmer – Qualitative Researcher, Take This
- Emily Thompson – Senior Associate Director, Research Department, Simon Wiesenthal Center
- Laura Higgins – Senior Director of Community Safety & Civility, Roblox
- Lori Meakin – Author and Founder, The Others and Me
- Dr Rachel Kowert – Researcher on the uses and effects of digital games, award winning author, and founder of Psychgeist®, a multimedia content production studio for the science of games and pop culture.
Games as Culture: The Role of Museums in Encouraging girls’ and women’s involvement in games
- Cat Powell – Co-CEO and Director of Visitor Experience National Video Game Museum, Sheffield
- Eva Sturlese – Deputy Director at VIGAMUS, Rome
- Helen W Kennedy – Professor of Creative and Cultural Industries at the University of Nottingham
- Marco Accordi-Rickards – Executive Director and Founder of VIGAMUS group, and Leader of VIGAMUS Museum and Academy, Rome
The Power of the Podcast
- Lauren Kaye – Founder, She Plays Games
- Rosie Taylor – Content & Community Manager, Safe In Our World
- Dr Sharon Coleclough – Senior Lecturer, Staffordshire University
More speakers and sessions will be announced shortly.
To find out more about the Conference and to purchase tickets, visit https://events.ringcentral.com/events/the-2024-global-women-in-games-20th-anniversary-conference/registration
