Staging, Activation, Design - the changing face of textual encounters

This project would seek to build upon existing research (including that already carried out by the candidate), examining the shifting relationship between the user and the text via emergent technological frameworks of engagement, and to explore how we read, view, navigate, understand, and learn within new digital environments. This is not a study of technology per se, but of how it can be used and understood to negotiate and transcend traditional textual landscapes. This project is a multidisciplinary study, incorporating elements of adaptation theory, media convergence, fan/online community studies, game theory and the use of such theories and technological extentions within educational/learning contexts. The three key terms around which this critical interrogation hinges: staging, activation and design, will form a three-tiered methodology to be used in application to the textual areas outlined above. Overall, the thesis aims to examine interactive fictions in appliction to: nascent theoretical approaches, emergent industries, application to educational outputs. Necessarily multi-disciplinary in nature, this wide-ranging discussion would be of value to educators, theorists and practitioners across a wide variety of subject areas. As such, once completed, this project will make a valuable and original contribution to a growing and significant field of research.