Frans Mäyrä, PhD, is the Professor of Information Studies and Interactive Media, with specialization in digital culture and game studies in Tampere University, Finland. Since 2002, he has been heading the Tampere University Game Research Lab, having taught and studied digital culture and games from the early 1990s. He is widely consulted as an expert in socio-cultural issues relating to games, play and playfulness, and has served as the founder and first President of DiGRA – Digital Games Research Association. His research interests range from game cultures, meaning making through playful interaction and online social play, to borderlines, identity, as well as transmedial fantasy and science fiction. He is also the director of the Academy of Finland funded Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies.
Selected publications:
Mäyrä, Frans (2021) “Game Culture Studies and the Politics of Scholarship: The Opposites and the Dialectic”. G|A|M|E Journal (09/2020). https://www.gamejournal.it/game-culture/
Mäyrä, Frans (2020) “The Hybrid Agency of Hybrid Play”. In: Adriana de Souza e Silva & Ragan Glover-Rijkse (eds.) Hybrid Play: Crossing Boundaries in Game Design, Player Identities and Play Spaces. London & New York: Routledge.
Mäyrä, Frans & Heikki Tyni (2019) “Transmedial Playthings: Games, Toys and Playful Engagement in Storyworlds” In: Coelsch-Foisner,
Sabine, and Christopher Herzog, eds. Transmedialisierung: Wissenschaft und Kunst. Kulturelle Dynamiken / Cultural Dynamics. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2019, pp. 413-430.
Mäyrä, Frans (2017) “Teaching Game Studies: Experiences and Lessons from Tampere”. In: Clash of Realities 2015/16: On the Art, Technology and Theory of Digital Games. Proceedings of the 6th and 7th
Conference. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag, 2017, p. 235-241. http://www.transcript-verlag.de/en!/978-3-8376-4031-1/clash-of-realities-2015/16?c=1371
Mäyrä, Frans (2008) An Introduction to Game Studies: Games in Culture. London & New York: Sage Publications.