Emma Westecott
ewestecott@ocadu.ca
Associate Professor, Tenured
Faculty of Arts & Science
Faculty of Arts & Science
feminist game studies
feminist game design
art games
game performance
Dr Emma Westecott is a feminist game studies scholar. Emma is Associate Professor in Game Design, and Co-Director of the game:play Lab (with Cindy Poremba). She has worked in the game industry for over 25 years - in development, research and the academy. She originally achieved international recognition for working closely with Douglas Adams as producer for the best-selling CD-ROM Adventure Game, Starship Titanic (1998, Simon & Schuster). Since then, Emma has built up a worldwide reputation for developing original as well as popular game initiatives, including running an applied game research lab in Sweden and a regional student game event in Toronto called Level Up Showcase. Emma’s funded research connects the aesthetic, expressive, and political potential of digital game form to a longer tradition of critically informed research creation practice. She has been invited to present internationally and has been published in edited collections and journals such as DiGRA, Loading and Eludamos. Emma co-chaired the Game Design Track at DiGRA 2020 and sits on PhD committees for students at both The Norwegian Film School and the University of Toronto.
Combatting Toxicity: Early Designs of an Intelligent In-Game Intervention System for Verbal Harassment
Published: December 31st 2025
Connections: An intergenerational feminist game art timeline
Proceedings of DiGRA 2023
Published: May 15th 2023
Bodies in Play Zine
DIY Methods 2022 Conference Proceedings
Published: May 15th 2022
As the past years have proven, the methods for conducting and distributing research that we’ve inherited from our disciplinary traditions can be remarkably brittle in the face of rapidly changing social and mobility norms. The ways we work and the ways we meet are questions newly opened for practical and theoretical inquiry; we both need to solve real problems in our daily lives and account for the constitutive effects of these solutions on the character of the knowledge we produce. Methods are not neutral tools, and nor are they fixed ones. As such, the work of inventing, repairing, and hacking methods is a necessary, if often underexplored, part of the wider research process. This conference aims to better interrogate and celebrate such experiments with method. Borrowing from the spirit and circuits of exchange in earlier DIY cultures, it takes the form of a zine ring distributed via postal mail. Participants will craft zines describing methodological experiments and/or how-to guides, which the conference organisers will subsequently mail out to all participants. Feedback on conference proceedings will also proceed through the mail, as well as via an optional Twitter hashtag. The conference itself is thus an experiment with different temporalities and medialities of research exchange. As a practical benefit, this format guarantees that the experience will be free of Zoom fatigue, timezone difficulties, travel expenses, and visa headaches. More generatively, it may also afford slower thinking, richer aesthetic possibilities, more diverse forms of circulation, and perhaps even some amount of delight. The conference format itself is part of the DIY experiment.
Textile game controllers: Exploring affordances of e-textile techniques as applied to alternative game controllers
Proceedings of the Fifteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction
Published: December 31st 2021
Game sketching: Exploring approaches to research-creation for games
Virtual Creativity
Published: December 31st 2020
In Situ: Researching corporate diversity initiatives with game developers
DiGRA '19 - Proceedings of the 2019 DiGRA International Conference: Game, Play and the Emerging Ludo-Mix DiGRA, August, 2019
Published: December 15th 2019
Playing with Gender: Promoting Representational Diversity with Dress-Up, Cross-Dressing and Drag in Games
Diversifying Barbie and Mortal Combat: Intersectional Perspectives and Inclusive Designs in Gaming
Published: May 15th 2016
Feminist art game praxis
DiGRA 2013: DeFragging Game Studies
Published: December 31st 2013
Independent game development as craft
Loading… The Journal of the Canadian Game Studies Association
Published: May 15th 2013
Crafting play: Little big planet
Loading… The Journal of the Canadian Game Studies Association
Published: May 15th 2011
The player character as performing object
Breaking New Ground: Innovation in Games, Play, Practice and Theory. Proceedings of DiGRA 2009
Published: December 31st 2009
PhD
Type: School of Media, Faculty of Creative Industries
University of South Wales
Associate Professor, Game Design
Type: Digital Futures
OCAD University
Bodies In Play
Type: Grant
Bodies in Play is a three-year collaboration between OCAD University’s game:play Lab and Social Body Lab and Dames Making Games (DMG), aiming to revolutionize creative technology by prioritizing inclusive and innovative design practices. Through game jams and a residency program, we’re bridging the gap between creative, technical, and conceptual work in wearable technology and extended reality (XR). We believe in the power of bodies in tech, a concept often overlooked in mainstream discourse. Our focus is on embodied experiences, especially within interaction design. How can wearable tech redefine play, and how does XR support us to reconsider player bodies? These are the questions we’re tackling to create alternative and more inclusive forms of playful interactions. Our approach, informed by Feminist Action Research, design justice principles, and critical making, is all about making a tangible impact. We’ve successfully hosted Bodies in Wearable (BiW), Bodies in VR (BiVR), Bodies in X (BiX) and an artist residency (BiR) events, with engaging online and in-person participation. These series explored the expressive potential of wearable electronics and VR through forms of workshops and game jams. We’re excited to continue pushing boundaries, fostering a multi-sectoral participatory network, and championing sustained access to computational literacy for marginalized groups. Join us in growing creative, innovative, and equitable approaches to computational design.
Director
Level Up Showcase Inc
President
Hand Eye Society