Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • Videos
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Library
    • Research
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Arts & Culture
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • |
  • Alumni
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • |
  • Alumni
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • Videos
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Library
    • Research
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
Arts & Culture

Symposium Explores Use of Digital Games by Human Rights Activists

Thursday, October 3, 2013, By News Staff
Share
College of Visual and Performing Artsspeakers
soweto.interface

Hamilton College Professor Angel David Nieves created an interactive digital project called the Soweto Historical GIS Project. He will discuss his work at the upcoming Digital Witness Symposium.

The Central New York Humanities Corridor, supported by an award from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, presents the annual Digital Witness Symposium on Thursday, Oct. 10, at 7 p.m. in the Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium in Newhouse 3.

Now in its fourth year, the Digital Witness Symposium has grown into a regional event. This year the symposium has been organized through a collaboration with Hamilton College. “We’re delighted to be able to continue to host the symposium on multiple campuses, and are excited to be partnering with Hamilton College, which has a strong commitment to digital humanities through its Mellon-funded Digital Humanities Initiative,” notes Tula Goenka, associate professor of television, radio and film in the Newhouse School and co-organizer of the symposium.

The Digital Witness Symposium invites cutting-edge mediamakers, programmers and scholars to discuss how the changing digital ecology is opening up new opportunities and challenges for human rights media. This year’s symposium explores how human rights activism is increasingly turning to digital games and interactive media as a strategy for engaging new audiences.

“Games have tended not be thought of in terms of the political and social purpose associated with human rights activism,” notes Roger Hallas, associate professor of English in The College of Arts and Sciences and co-organizer of the symposium. “That has now changed with the emergence of the ‘serious games movement,’ which is designing and developing games that permit new ways of understanding, and engaging with, our most pressing human crises.”

Angel David Nieves, associate professor and director of American studies at Hamilton College, will discuss the interactive digital projects he has co-developed about South Africa, including “Soweto ’76 3D” and “Soweto Historical GIS Project.” Susana Ruiz, Ph.D. candidate at the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts and co-founder of Take Action Games, will talk about the human-rights themed digital games she has co-created, including the award-winning “Darfur is Dying” and “Finding Zoe.”

Angel David Nieves

Angel David Nieves

Nieves is currently co-directing Hamilton’s Digital Humanities Initiative (DHi), a $950,000 Mellon Foundation grant-funded project. For almost a decade, he has been working on a series of digital projects (“The Soweto ’76 Archive,” “The Soweto HGIS Project” and most recently “Digital Townships”) on the spatial history of Soweto, Johannesburg.

In 2007-08, while at the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH), he developed a prototype archive and 3D gaming platform, “Soweto ’76 3D,” based on the anti-apartheid student uprisings that occurred in South Africa. Nieves’ scholarly work and community-based activism critically engages with issues of race and the built environment in cities across the Global South.

Susana Ruiz

Susana Ruiz

Ruiz is a media artist, designer and scholar whose work traverses the intersections of art, design, activism, ethics and documentary. She co-founded Take Action Games (TAG) in 2006 with the launch of the collaborative and multiple award-winning project “Darfur is Dying.” TAG’s portfolio is situated at the confluence of game design, participatory and social justice culture, nonfiction storytelling and transmedia practices.

The symposium is free and open to the public. American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation and Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) will be provided. Public parking will be available for $5 at University Avenue Garage (Harrison Street between Walnut Place and University Avenue).

Co-sponsors are the Syracuse University Humanities Center; the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications; the departments of Transmedia, African American Studies and Communication and Rhetorical Studies; the Everson Museum; and the Digital Humanities Initiative at Hamilton College.

  • Author

News Staff

  • Recent
  • University Hosts Syracuse Fire Department Graduation Ceremony
    Tuesday, May 24, 2022, By News Staff
  • Architecture Student Named Honors Thesis Prize Award Recipient
    Tuesday, May 24, 2022, By Julie Sharkey
  • Vice Admiral responds to Biden’s trip to Asia
    Tuesday, May 24, 2022, By Vanessa Marquette
  • Rockell Brown Burton Joins Newhouse School as Associate Dean of Inclusivity, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility
    Monday, May 23, 2022, By Wendy S. Loughlin
  • Corinne Sartori Joins Libraries as Accessibility Specialist
    Monday, May 23, 2022, By Cristina Hatem

More In Arts & Culture

Syracuse University Art Museum Piloting Object-Based Teaching and Research Faculty Fellows Program

Faculty from all disciplines are invited to apply for a pilot Faculty Fellows Program being hosted this summer by the Syracuse University Art Museum. The program focuses on object-based teaching and research. It is both a way for the art…

Innovator Lorrie Vogel ’88 to Deliver 2022 VPA Convocation Address

Innovator Lorrie Vogel ’88 will deliver the 2022 convocation address to bachelor’s and master’s degree candidates of the College of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) at the college’s convocation ceremony on Saturday, May 14, at 7:30 p.m. in the stadium….

M.F.A. Exhibition ‘Steady/Retcon’ to be Exhibited on New York City’s Governors Island

  Master of fine arts (M.F.A.) candidates in the College of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) are presenting the thesis exhibition “Steady/Retcon” over two weekends in May at the Syracuse University Governors Island House, 407A Colonels Row, Governors Island, New…

Department of Drama Presents ‘As You Like It’

The Department of Drama presents the final show of the 2021/2022 season with “As You Like It,” a ravishing new musical adaptation of Shakespeare’s classic story by Shaina Taub and Laurie Woolery. The production, directed by Rodney Hudson, will perform…

Movie Based on SU Press Book ‘Harry Haft: Survivor of Auschwitz, Challenger of Rocky Marciano’ Debuts

“The Survivor,” a movie based on the Alan Scott Haft book, “Harry Haft: Survivor of Auschwitz, Challenger of Rocky Marciano,” debuted on HBO and HBO Max on Wednesday, April 27. It is being released on Holocaust Remembrance Day, commemorating the…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • @SUCampus
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2022 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.