L2P N00b – the Pragmatics of Positioning
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DISSERTATION Titel der Dissertation “L2P n00b – The pragmatics of positioning in MMORPGs” Band 1 von 1 Verfasserin Mag. Birgit Kramer, BA angestrebter akademischer Grad Doktorin der Philosophie (Dr. phil.) Wien, 2014 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt: A 092 343 Dissertationsgebiet lt. Studienblatt: Dr.- Studium der Philosophie Anglistik und Amerikanistik Betreuer: Hon. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Henry G. Widdowson Acknowledgments What a long, strange trip it's been. Developing a PhD project and writing a thesis is a stony and long-winded process which could not have been done without help from others, without motivation, encouragement and support. Therefore, I want to acknowledge the effort and time which was invested in me by others. First and foremost I have to thank my supervisor Hon. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Henry George Widdowson for numerous meetings, corrected drafts and his generous way of giving me his time. Clearly, there are only few people who would supervise a thesis with a topic like mine. It is not a common PhD thesis project and even though Professor Widdowson never played a MMORPG and did not know about these games before working with me, he always supported and encouraged me whenever I suffered a draw back or doubted myself. We learned and profited from one another. I learned unbelievably much about linguistics and philosophy in general, and I, at least hope so, could teach Professor Widdowson the one or other thing about gaming. There are probably not many professors who would have dared to supervise such a thesis, and I am deeply grateful that he advised and supervised me. Further thanks goes to Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr. Barbara Seidlhofer, who supervised my MA thesis and encouraged me to write a PhD thesis as well as organized a seminar for PhD students of English linguistics. I am deeply grateful to my colleagues at this seminar, who provided me with feedback, valuable comments and encouragement during difficult phases. I want to thank in particular my Musketeers: MMag. Elisabeth Weber and Mag. Svitlana Klötzl. The meetings of the three of us were invaluable to further our research, academic career and friendship. The many hours we sat together to discuss our texts, problems and whatever came to our mind are unforgettable to me. I never met more talented, magnificent, motivating people than you. I will always cherish our friendship. To say it with the words of my favorite band ASP: “Niemals waren Freunde mir je treuer, als ihr es wart in dieser schweren Zeit. Und jeder von euch ist mir lieb und teuer, doch nun bleibt mir nur noch die Einsamkeit.” (ASP, Abschied) One for all and all for one! 1fa&af1 I could not have finished this project without the help and co-operation of gamers all over the world who participated in my online survey. I want to thank especially those who took the time to fill in the questionnaire and gave useful and detailed answers. You are the r0xx0r! Great thanks goes to Marek “Acey” Brzeziñski for not only filling in the questionnaire himself but recruiting his whole guild and friends to participate, for listening to my problems and worries, for discussing gameplay and game mechanics issues and for always cheering me up with funny videos or pictures. My dear lil bro you are amazing! I am certainly indebted to my family in particular my parents Anneliese Kramer and Peter Kramer for their generosity, patience and time during all stages of the project. They were emotional hostages of me during my stony odyssey through my education. But without their generosity and support I would not have the opportunity to study at the university at all, let alone working on a PhD project. It is thanks to my mother and father that I found the strength to complete this work. It cannot be taken for granted to have such a selfless family who gives you the chance to write a PhD thesis, especially when this involves financial support. I count myself lucky to had this opportunity and parents who do not only allow me to follow my dreams but also encourage me to do so. Special thanks also goes to my brother Martin for numerous discussions about games and language and his support during conferences. My deepest gratitude goes to my fiance, Mag. Patrick Swoboda who bore my never ending monologues about gaming and language with patience and interest, who knows so much more than I do and yet believes that I am smart. You gave me strength and hope when I lacked it. You accompanied me to every single conference and listened to my presentations with so much interest as if you heard them for the first time. You give me intellectual and emotional counsel and support in everything I do. Finally, I want to thank Blizzard Entertainment for developing a game which not only became a research object but keeps me busy for many years already. It is more than game! This thesis is dedicated to my parents and grandparents and all those who never had the chance to visit a university. Gefördert durch das Abschlussstipendium 2014 der Universität Wien Table of contents 1.Introduction........................................................................................................1 Section I: MMORPGs: the nature of the game...........................................9 2.Game and play.................................................................................................15 2.1 Defining play and game...........................................................................15 2.2 The role of play in language....................................................................27 3.Computer games.............................................................................................32 3.1 Computer games as games....................................................................32 3.2 A short history of computer games..........................................................39 3.3 Computer games as media and narration...............................................46 3.4 Computer games, media literacy and learning........................................50 3.5 Computer games as culture....................................................................55 4.MMORPGs.......................................................................................................64 4.1 What is a MMORPG................................................................................65 4.2 Time is money: More than a game..........................................................74 4.3 Role-playing, identity and socialization...................................................85 4.4 Communication setup in MMORPGs....................................................101 5.Section summary...........................................................................................112 Intersection: the survey..............................................................................116 6.The survey......................................................................................................116 6.1 Research settings and data sets...........................................................117 6.2 Data considerations...............................................................................123 6.3 Carrying out the online-survey..............................................................126 6.4 Raw data results and analysis...............................................................128 Section II: MMORPGs: playing the game...............................................144 7.MMORPGs as speech event.........................................................................145 8.The context: contextual factors......................................................................147 8.1 Conventionalized schemata: ceremonies and rituals............................147 8.2 Conversational maxims and relevance theory......................................156 8.3 Turn-taking, timing and attention...........................................................161 9.The participant: the gamer as speaker in a community.................................168 10.What is positioning?.....................................................................................176 10.1 The nature of positioning.....................................................................176 10.2 The act of positioning..........................................................................182 10.3 Positioning and politeness...................................................................190 10.3.1 Face and facework.......................................................................192 11.The channel: medium considerations..........................................................201 11.1 Coming to terms with Netspeak, CMC, EMC......................................201 11.2 Writing vs speech.................................................................................205 12.The code: message encoding......................................................................215 12.1 English as Lingua Franca ingame.......................................................216 12.2 Smileys, emoticons and ASCII art.......................................................220 12.3 Acronyms.............................................................................................229 12.4 Logograms...........................................................................................236 12.5 Leet (1337)..........................................................................................238 12.6 Neologisms..........................................................................................243