| This dissertation examines the production, distribution, and consumption of children's software as socially distributed and culturally heterogeneous processes. A diverse and multi-sited ethnographic corpus of data is foundational to this work: fieldnotes and videotapes of children's play in a network of after school computer clubs, interviews with game developers, and literature and advertising from the children's software industry. Drawing from this material, this study describes “learning through play” with interactive media. What is the nature of the highly mediated communication and interaction between software designer and child-player? What are the historical, economic, social, and cultural conditions that created children's software, and conversely, how has children's software altered the American social, cultural, and economic landscape? What are the social distinctions and cultural categories that are materialized in children's software, and how do they play out in the activity of children and adults?; Between the early eighties to the beginning of the 2000s, a new children's software industry was established through distributed interactions between children, technology, designers, programmers, marketers, parents, entertainers, and educators. These actors are all active agents within a shifting network of relationships, analyzed as “multimedia genres,” materializations of technology, aesthetic quality, and institutionalized relations. The genre of “edutainment” was founded by progressive educational reformers pursuing equity in learning, but has gradually been overtaken by more competitive and achievement idioms in its commercialization. The genre of “entertainment” is dominated by visual culture, produced by entertainment industries in alliance with children's peer culture. The genre of “authoring” grows out of a constructivist approach to learning and hacker subcultures, and becomes a tool for children to create their own virtual worlds and challenge the authority of adults. This dissertation describes the “micropolitics of representation” as children mobilize technologies in relation to adults at moments of play. In addition, these genres are related to a “cyborg habitus” of technology use, and categories of age, class, and gender. Together the three genres define a dynamic field of negotiation and cultural conflict that characterizes contemporary contestations in the US over children's culture, education, and technology. |
