Exploration 3 - Narrative Inquiry

 

Exploration 4 – Layered Analysis

Layer 1: Code to Disassemble and Reassemble

Layer 2: Inquiry Prose

            My journal writings and notes in Layer 1 focused on dialogism and self-making through the avatars I am embodying in the video games I play. In looking at my gameplay with them, I documented some screenshots and I also looked at random gameplay YouTube videos about the video games I was playing. I chose to focus on three video games and three avatars. As a matter of fact, one of the avatars I have chosen to focus on is one that I have not played with, at least yet. The video game’s name is Celeste, and I learned about it from a gamer friend. I became fascinated with the story and the music; I played the game for a bit but did not want to continue playing because it seemed too hard. However, I did not stop engaging with it – I watched gameplay videos and reviews on YouTube and became obsessed with its soundtrack. So, a question popped in my mind; Can I embody an avatar without playing the game?

            In looking at my experiences with these avatars, I specifically focused on Bakhtinian terms. While playing and modifying quotes from articles related to Bakhtinian terms, I thought about exploring dialogism and inner speech through these avatars I embody. When I look at my notes in Layer 1, I also see repetitive terms and keywords such as self-making, art-making and new materialism. I see glimpses of some of these terms in the screenshots I collected; I took them following my intuition and not for my research – some scenes in them already became parts of me and effected my artmaking.

Layer 3: Reflexivity and Encompassing Metaphors

            In Layer 2, I tried composing and decomposing my initial data process in Layer 1. I tried finding a theoretical framework for what I want to investigate. My thinking process in these layers led me to think about other researchers who have explored similar, overlapping areas. Christine Liao and Ryan Patton were the main researchers that I thought of.

            In terms of reflexivity in thinking about my avatared self-making journeys, I was drawn to autoethnography as an inquiry method as well. I specifically looked at Christine Liao’s My Metamorphic Avatar Journey (2008) and other related articles such as Chronotopes and Social Types in South Korean Digital Gaming (2012) by Stephen C. Rea. In this layer of my exploration, I am interested in using an autoethnographic approach to my self-making journey – supported not only with writing but with artmaking as well. Thinking of other ways of phrasing this leads me towards multimodal inquiry, in which I can compose my drawings with my writings.

Layer 4: Seeing Patterns as Major Themes

            In this layer, I am thinking about my gaming experience within the first three layers. In other words, I am trying to compose my gaming process with the research questions I posed in Layer 1 and within the Bakhtinian framework – kind of. Asking my research question again: “What does it mean to be in dialogue with the avatars I embody in my gaming process?” An answer to this question might lead me to an auto ethnographical journey – in which I try to connect Bakhtin’s the author and the hero to a bigger concept. The quote from Bakhtin below speaks to my gaming process in terms of dialogism and author and hero:

            Everything that pertains to me enters my consciousness, beginning with my name, from          the external world through the mouths of others (my mother, and so forth), with their                     intonation, in their emotional value assigning tonality. I realize myself initially through          others: from them I perceive words, forms, and tonalities for the formation of the initial idea of myself ... Just as the body is formed initially in the mother’s womb (body), a             person’s consciousness awakens wrapped in another’s consciousness. (Bakhtin, 1986, p.      138)

            I can see a few distinct headings for my final writing at the end of these layers. Just as the self and the other is interconnected or wrapped in each other’s consciousness as Bakhtin mentions, the avatars I embody give me ideas of myself. I take these ideas and apply them to my artmaking, which can be considered as extensions of my gaming process. It is all an unfinalized self-making journey which I can narrate through using autoethnography – which would also help me see this process from a bigger picture and help me critically engage in this journey, tying it to issues that need to be addressed in or embodied through avatars and video game worldings. Some of the headings might be; The author and the hero in gaming; The eventness of self-making through video games.

Bakhtin, M. M. (1986). Speech genres and other late essays. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press