New Faculty Fall 2024
Serious Gaming in China: Humanities Professor's Journey to the No. 1 Mecca of the Gaming Industry
Globally, digital games of all types and persuasions are big business. Industry experts report in 2023 that approximately 3.38 billion people worldwide play games. The global market for the gaming industry in 2023 was expected to reach $187.7 billion in revenue, according to Newzoo. To place this in perspective, movies worldwide generated $26 billion in revenue, and streaming services revenue was approximately $1.1 billion in 2023, according to Grand View Research. In order of their size, China, the U.S., and Japan are the top markets for the gaming industry.
“We’ve seen a growing difference between the size of the gaming and film industries,” said Patrick Jagoda, the William Rainey Harper Professor in the Departments of English Language and Literature, Cinema and Media Studies, and Obstetrics and Gynecology, and faculty director of the Weston Game Lab and the Media, Arts, and Design major at UChicago.
In November 2023, Jagoda traveled to Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and Beijing in China to deliver several lectures about game studies and game design for climate change, host a creative worldbuilding workshop with local peers, and give several interviews to the prominent Chinese news outlets.
Humanities Division to Elevate the Study of South Asian Art and Media
UChicago’s Division of the Humanities launches a new visiting professorship in South Asian Art and Media in 2025‒2026 thanks to generous funding from Dr. Shireen and Dr. Afzal Ahmad. Their $1.5 million gift will provide for a visiting professor for one quarter annually, expanding the university’s visibility and expertise in South Asian art.
“The Ahmad’s gift will bring new attention to the visual arts and media of South Asia,” said Deborah L. Nelson, Dean of the Division of the Humanities and Helen B. and Frank L. Sulzberger Professor in the Department of English Language and Literature and the College at UChicago. “Hiring a faculty member of great distinction will enhance our already top departments in South Asian Languages and Cultures, Art History, and Cinema and Media Studies and bring them into closer partnership.”
Setting the Scene
Growing up in Kankakee, Illinois, Rich Murray was a Star Wars fan—and not just a casual one. He knew the movies beginning to end. He bought the books. And he especially loved the action figures, which he collected diligently and still owns today.
But there was a problem. “Loved the figures,” says Murray, “disliked the play sets”—the plastic backdrops that accompanied the toys. To his exacting eye, they were never quite right and often didn’t function as advertised. So Murray, AB’94, took matters into his own hands, rebuilding the play sets out of cardboard so he could create the perfect scenery for Luke, Leia, and Han’s adventures.
It was, in retrospect, Murray’s very first gig in set design (unpaid, nonunion). In the years since, he’s swapped scissors and cardboard for paint and furniture, but he’s still chasing the same goal: scenery that makes a story feel real.
Prof. Jonathan Lear To Examine Gratitude in 2024 Ryerson Lecture
Prof. Jonathan Lear, a preeminent scholar of philosophy and ethics, will deliver the 2024 Nora and Edward Ryerson Lecture on April 2 at 5 p.m. in the Rubenstein Forum’s Friedman Hall.
Since 1972, University of Chicago faculty have nominated one of their peers who has made “research contributions of lasting significance” to deliver the Ryerson Lecture to the members of the UChicago community. The event is free and open to the public and will be webcast on UChicago’s digital channels.
“It is an honor to be invited to give the Ryerson Lecture,” said Lear, the John U. Nef Distinguished Service Professor in the Committee on Social Thought, the Department of Philosophy and the College. “I am delighted and very much look forward to trying out some ideas with my colleagues.”
