Author Archives: David Gaertner
“How do I play these” (with your thumbs, asshole): Attending to the Indigenous structure of video games within the contexts of digitālis nullius
For me, the process of writing about Indigenous games begins with thinking about the relationship between gaming, code, and settler colonialism, as well as the ways in which I am complicit in what I call digitālis nullius, the erasure of Indigenous presence from technological spaces. As I hope to make evident as I progress through this blog post, code, narratology, and game mechanics are not abstract from larger conversations about settler colonialism and Indigenous sovereignty.
The Theatre of Regret Now Available from UBC Press
I am thrilled to announce that my first monograph, The Theatre of Regret: Art, Literature and the Politics of Reconciliation in Canada is now available from UBC Press. Hardcover and ebook are available for purchase here. Paperback available via Massy Books. A few of the chapters first found their way into the world via this […]
Representational Immersion and the Settler Gaze
Settler adaptations of Indigenous stories, for print, film, television, and video games, is a highly contested space, with a deep history of appropriation and representational violence (McCall, First Person Plural). In this post, which should be read as a work in progress, I explore how the settler gaze, defined by what David Garneau identifies as […]
Improving Online Instruction
As a final, “in-class,” assignment, the students in my knowledge dissemination course were charged with brainstorming 3 things they wished instructors would improve on in their online teaching. They were then asked to prototype a knowledge dissemination plan to best get that information to professors. They had 20 minutes. With their permission, I am […]
Job — Digital Pedagogies Facilitator (GAA)
Pay rate: $25 per hour Hours per week: 10 to 20 depending on availability Length of employment: Summer 2020 and potentially into Fall 2021 Application deadline: June 25, 2020 To apply: send your CV and cover letter to david.gaertner@ubc.ca Background: The Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies (CIS) is developing FNIS 100: Indigenous Foundations for online delivery. FNIS 100 […]
GRA to help develop a Place and Power requirement for the BA degree.
Pay rate: $27 to $32 per hour, depending on experience Hours per week: 10 to 20 depending on availability Length of employment: Summer 2020 and potentially into Fall 2021 Application deadline: May 15th,, 2020 To apply: send your CV and cover letter to david.gaertner@ubc.ca Background: The Faculty of Arts is attending to historical and institutional […]
Writing in Relation: FNIS 300—A Summary of Engagement
Dear FNIS 300, Thank you for all of your work and attention this term. FNIS 300 can be a challenging course, both for the students and for the instructor, because it aims to weave writing fundamentals (clarity, concision, summary, citation, etc.) together with theoretical approaches to writing as developed within, or alongside, Indigenous studies. We […]
#CovidCampus
Dear Colleagues, This is a short post summarizing some of the research I have done over the past few days in preparation to move my UBC classes online. I owe a debt of gratitude to all of the generous scholars who have posted materials on Twitter and elsewhere–most specifically Jacqueline Wernimont and Cathy N. Davidson […]
Recoding Relations: Dispatches from the Symposium for Indigenous New Media
David Gaertner and Melissa Haberl In June 2018, scholars, developers, artists, and community members from over twenty institutions and three continents gathered on the ancestral and unceded territory of the WSÁNEĆ, Lkwungen, and Wyomilth peoples to participate in the inaugural Symposium for Indigenous New Media (SINM). As part of the University of Victoria’s annual Digital […]
“the road to reconciliation is paved with g—dintentions”: Lack as Resistance in Joshua Whitehead’s Full-Metal Indigiqueer
Joshua Whitehead’s inaugural book of poetry, Full-Metal Indigiqueer is a series of poems told through Zoa, a trickster figure rendered through the lens of technology. Whitehead combines the figures of the singularity, virus, and hacker into a narrator that inhabits and deconstructs the Western literary cannon and popular media culture by infiltrating and re-writing the […]
