J. TUOMAS HARVIAINEN Systemic Perspectives on Information in Physically Performed Role-play ACADEMIC DISSERTATION To be presented, with the permission of the board of the School of Information Sciences of the University of Tampere, for public discussion in the Auditorium Pinni B 1097, Kanslerinrinne 1, Tampere, on October 18th, 2012, at 12 o’clock. UNIVERSITY OF TAMPERE ACADEMIC DISSERTATION University of Tampere School of Information Sciences Finland Copyright ©2012 Tampere University Press and the author Distribution Tel. +358 40 190 9800 Bookshop TAJU Fax +358 3 3551 7685 P.O. Box 617
[email protected] 33014 University of Tampere www.uta.fi/taju Finland http://granum.uta.fi Cover design by Mikko Reinikka Acta Universitatis Tamperensis 1764 Acta Electronica Universitatis Tamperensis 1237 ISBN 978-951-44-8913-6 (print) ISBN 978-951-44-8914-3 (pdf ) ISSN-L 1455-1616 ISSN 1456-954X ISSN 1455-1616 http://acta.uta.fi Tampereen Yliopistopaino Oy – Juvenes Print Tampere 2012 KEYWORDS: information behavior; information environments; larp; learning games; liminality; role-play; second-hand knowledge; serious games; simulation; social information systems. SUMMARY This dissertation examines information phenomena that take place in, and related to, physically performed pretence play. The most obvious of such is live-action role-playing (larp), but other forms also exist. The emphasis is on one hand the play experience and the elements constituting it, but underneath that all exist information processes which essentially define the perimeters of what can be done and during play and how. Being primarily a metatheoretical work, the dissertation draws on the empirics of earlier researchers and practitioners, further supporting with the author’s own experiments and field observations.