Mod Culture

Thanks to some divine intervention in the form of a reading for Dr. Elliott's Historical Tourism seminar, I think I have a new approach for my thesis. Thanks to my 1:00 PM PE Class, I only have 15 minutes to list the outline I made last night - but I am going to be coming back to this list and fleshing out each point in more detail, and also doing some reorganization. Also, I'll be explaining my motivations for working on this and how it relates to my earlier idea of examining non-local versus local online communities (basically, gaming narrows the focus on both and I've got a great deal of unique, personal experience working in these communities)

I've assembled a prospective list of chapters (seriously, now that's organized) that are only in the vaguest of orders, but they highlight some of the most important and most interesting elements of mod culture.

1. Introduction - This Is Where The Thesis Goes
   
2. Why Modify?
3. Multiplayer Gaming, Online and Offline
4. Theory about Collaborative Communities and Community Formation
5. Creative Communities: Language Creation, Worldbuilding, Storytelling
6. Probably A Big Chapter on World Building Because It's So Goddamn Rich
7. Local and Non-Local Gaming Communities
8. Community Breakup :(
9. Something Resembling a Conclusion
   

I've got a good deal of IRC chatlogs and forum archives ready to be pillaged, and I believe those things were all recorded in public spaces so the IRB shant have a problem with them, but I should probably get going on IRB certification, especially because I still want to do interviews with forum members, modders, and gamers. The online element of this is easy - local gaming communities may end up being more of a sidenote, but they're still pretty crucial in at least establishing a sort of chronology for how this subculture all built up.

Now, establishing a tie to American Studies and America specifically? That might be difficult. :X