About

I am Professor of English, Cinema and Media Studies, and Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Chicago. I specialize in media theory, game studies and design, and twentieth and twenty-first century American literature and culture. Alongside youth this position, I am the co-founder of the Game Changer Chicago Design Lab and the Transmedia Story Lab that work with BIPOC students on projects linked to game design and STEM fields. I also serve as Executive Editor of the interdisciplinary journal Critical Inquiry. I am faculty director of the Weston Game Lab, co-founder of the Fourcast Lab, and the Media Arts and Design program at the University of Chicago. I have helped develop game studies and game design at the University of Chicago.

I was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2020. My digital media and game projects have been featured in news publications including Wired, The New Republic, Fast Company, Pacific Standard, The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, Hyperallergic, Chicago Tribune, and The Chronicle of Higher Education. I co-directed and co-designed Terrarium — an alternate reality game that received the 2020 IndieCade award for the best Location Based and Live Play Design.

I am the author of Transmedia Stories: Narrative Methods for Public Health and Social Justice (Stanford University Press, 2022), Experimental Games: Critique, Play, and Design in the Age of Gamification (University of Chicago Press, 2020), Network Aesthetics (University of Chicago Press, 2016), and co-author with Michael Maizels of The Game Worlds of Jason Rohrer (MIT Press, 2016). Along with these books, I have edited several books and special issues; published over fifty essays in humanistic journals such as American Journal of Play, American Literary History, American Literature, boundary 2, Critical Inquiry, differences, Modern Philology, PMLA, and Social Text; multimedia journals such as Audiovisual Thinking, hyperrhiz, Kairos, and Thresholds; and scientific journals such as Journal of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, Journal of STEM Education, and Sex Education. I have co-directed a number of board, card, video, and alternate reality game projects.

I completed my PhD in the Department of English at Duke University in 2010, along with a graduate certificate in Information Science and Information Studies. I was born to Polish parents in Austria, raised in Australia, and immigrated and lived most of my life around the United States.

This portfolio includes my scholarly writing, digital media and game projects, and teaching.