I was a college art professor, but I felt alone in my conviction that
art had moved from the solitude of the painting studio to the
multi-faceted movie studios. Movies, I believe, are the art of the 20th
Century by any measure.
That belief positioned me to Teach, Research and Practice—what I call the TRP principle of academic life—outside
the prescribed curriculum. But I had my eye on a star that had not yet risen.
Stardom wasn't my goal, however. I taught my art classes—from basic
drawing and design through my primary subject area of printmaking up to
graduate seminars—with a gleaming of technology. I never missed an
opportunity to sneak video and computers into the work of the day, no
matter what the course description read.
I got in trouble in school for my outlandish ideas, but
outside the lands of ivory towers I was rewarded. People came from around the world
to visit Seattle or the UW, and when they asked about new technology and
art, they were often pointed in my direction.
It was motivating, on one hand, to view the emerging new art form
(elementally comprised of new information and telecommunications
technology) and have facilities and grant money on campus to try them out.
On the other hand, it was depressing to face resistance from above. The
Dean laughed about the idea I had that video connected with fine arts. The
art school chairman and advisers offices worked against including new
technologies in the school’s curriculum.
Despite my provocations, I was
promoted to full professor and given tenure after which I resigned. Why
engage in battles for integrity that TRP clearly indicated when those
principles were already of proven worth and would lead to victory for any
teacher who acted on them?
There’s one more cornerstone of for building a professor's
life besides teaching,
research and practice and that’s the Service aspect. Thus Teaching,
Research, Practice and Service make up the four points of academic
life. I resigned from the UW Art School so I could experience all four,
honestly, deeply and permanently.
By cutting my ties with the dead weight
of that school I've been able to shoot ahead to the now, and I’m
in a position to sort out the best of what passed for art
education in the past and test it in the present.
A new art form is
emerging that blends the fine arts and the movies into a convergence whose
sum is greater and more dynamic than its parts. I knew it was coming; I
knew it in my heart and in my head. I had a feeling it would be in a game
form, but I could not imagine--at the time--how that game would work.
Today I see that inventing and
developing Emeralda: Stamps ‘N Stories is partly a community
service project, the Service aspect. It's part of my effort to see what aspects of digital
gaming promotes learning the four principles of the successful
contemporary artist – teaching, research, practice and service to the
community.
How do I play Emeralda,
you might wonder. Emeralda’s an unpublished game at the time of this
writing, but that doesn’t stop me from playing, every day, in the
“solitaire” version. As an example of routine play, I subscribe to one
paper-based newspaper a year – The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Odd as it may sound, this is analogous to a stack of paper cards in a
deck. When I draw a "lucky issue" (and this always arrives by e-mail even if
I don’t get the paper), I can learn something about my game.
The excerpt
below is today’s example (and it inspired this essay). You
read it in the column called “A Glance at…”. Today its at the 2003
issue of "Higher Education Exchange" titled Renewing higher
education's civic mission.
Higher education needs to do more to foster the civic engagement
that underpins democratic society, argues Barry Checkoway, a professor
of social work and urban planning at the University of Michigan at Ann
Arbor. Contributions to their disciplines aside, today's faculty members
"do not view their work as civic, although they may yearn for a
civic expression that has been frustrated by their training and
conditioning," he writes.
Affirming the civic mission of the university requires changing the
dominant culture of higher education, he suggests. Graduate training too
often ignores a civic content, and gatekeepers to academe discourage
professors-in-training from spending time in community projects.
Researchers, as a result, value "dispassionate" methodologies,
he says. And yet, he writes, "studies show that faculty members who
consult with community agencies are more likely to have funded research
projects, publications in peer-reviewed journals, and positive student
evaluations of their teaching, than those who do not."
Re-conceptualizing the prevailing research paradigm to emphasize
"the welfare of civil society," Mr. Checkoway suggests, will
require leaders who champion civic values, praise civic accomplishments,
and implement supportive policies and structures, such as management
training, awareness campaigns, and campus wide coalitions. One proven,
but too-little-used approach, he says, is to involve community members
in defining research problems, collecting data, and using findings.
Faculty members can also prepare students for democratic participation
by involving them as research partners, or awarding course credit for
participation in community projects. Administrators, he says, can
organize distinguished lectures and workshops on civic involvement, or
introduce incentives in the promotion and tenure process.
Even small gestures can help, such as
organizing brown-bag lunches, afternoon coffees, and dinners, he writes,
because "social support is not usually considered part of the
reward structure, but faculty members who receive it find it greatly
rewarding."
By inventing and developing Emeralda: Stamps ‘N Stories, I
believe I’m doing a public service because our society needs an art
education system that’s close to our times and uses the educational
opportunities of technology. Other disciplines, such as math, science,
reading and so on, have incorporated technology (and, yes, games
too!) to help students learn.
My independent research and development of an art education system for
helping people learn the history of art and technology and how it applies
to games will be recognized as the S in the TRPS principle.
Now all I need is a real school! Until this is realized, I’ll be
happy with a Hogwarts kind of school of my own dreams—and I've
named it Emeralda
Communiversity.
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Bill H. Ritchie, Jr. is an Itinerate Professor based in Seattle. He
taught college (UW) and after promotion to full professor of printmaking
and media arts, he resigned at 43. He then launched several teaching,
research and practice companies. In 1992 he discovered Emeralda, a fantasy
region accessible only by computer. He invented the rules-of-play and
created an operating system for online interactivity for himself.
He writes for the benefit of discipline, using a PDA when he's
wandering around and a desktop PC to organize his essays. He has a
thousand or more saved, which you can see listed on the ten
"islands" on the Web. An example is www.seanet.com/~ritchie/oszine.html,
on the island of O'Studios in the Emeralda Region.
For
further information contact Bill H Ritchie via e-mail at ritchie@seanet.com,
or visit his virtual art gallery at www.myartpatron.com.
His professional Web site is at www.seanet.com/~ritchie
and his first portal for Emeralda is www.artsport.com.
The company name is Emeralda Works, 500 Aloha, Seattle, WA 98109. He can
be reached by telephone at (206) 285-0658. Statistics: 1202 Words. 6230 Characters. 3 Pages. ios30626
Putting the S in TRPS. ©2003 Bill H Ritchie, Jr.
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