Associate Professor, Game Design and Undergraduate Program Chair, Digital Futures
OCAD University
Bodies in Play
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Dr. Emma Westecott is a feminist game studies scholar with over 25 years experience in development, research and the academy. She has built up a worldwide reputation for developing original as well as popular game initiatives, including the Level Up Showcase (https://levelupshowcase.com/). In recent years, Dr. Westecott has led two high profile funded research initiatives: the SSHRC Partnership Development Grant Bodies in Play: Inclusive Co-Creation for Wearable Technology and Virtual Reality (with Cindy Poremba and Kate Hartman, in partnership with DMG (Dames Making Games) Toronto); and Hand Made VR, a research creation project exploring processes, data, and VR game sketches to inform future tool development, funded by eCampus Ontario, in partnership with MasterpieceVR. Both these projects provided significant, highly skilled training for both participants, and for OCAD University graduate students. Dr. Westecott serves as Co-Director for the game:play Lab (http://www.gameplaylab.ca/), a hub for games and play research-creation at OCAD University, and an essential resource that allows active research in digital and analog games, mixed-reality, and interactive play to inform OCADU’s numerous courses (at both an undergrad and graduate level) in games.