Thesis Project

—YaChia Night Market Facebook Multi-player game

—Use Taiwanese night market as the story background to discuss the issues and problems related to Taiwanese real life through narrative and quizzes with npcs. 

Goals & Features 

—Encourage players to think, to listen, to say something

—Updateable issues

—Join more than one council

—Unique outfits

—Satire and metaphor

Visual Component

Thesis Statement & Abstract

Thesis Statement:
Compared with other media, social network site (SNS) games are a powerful media for activism because of the amount of users, interpersonal networking, the use of the internet, information sharing, and high interactions.


Abstract:

       Historically, activists for social changes and political movements have leveraged the dominant media of their times, print, radio, TV, and art. In the information age this trend has not changed. Social Network sites (SNS) have already shown their effectiveness as a tool for activism.  Unlike other media, games on SNS can engage their audiences while disseminating information and can be a powerful new tool for activism.

More Avatars

Reading Summation 9 –Wo men liu zhu bu tong de xue ye by Lin, Mali.

Lin, Mali, a pathologists, international exerts in blood, and molecular anthropologists, who has been doing research in blood transfusion medicine. In recent years, she dedicated to genetic research on ethnic groups in Taiwan for Taiwanese’s roots seeking. I was very shocked when I was reading this book because it answered a lot of question I have for years, such as who I am came from and why I don’t look like Chinese people. Under the long-term brainwashing education of KMT government, most of Taiwanese loss the ability to think deep-seated problems because fake illusion can be easily find through deeply thinking. Blood vessel is a very important concept in Chinese culture, and all of Taiwanese in my age learned about “we are Chinese because the blood vessel of Taiwanese is from China.” In other words, the root of Taiwanese is China. What is Taiwanese’s root is the biggest debate issue in Taiwanese politic. Through DNA test of people in different regions, we finally know the facts.

This book shows another point of view of Taiwan sovereignty, and uses SARS as the pathological example to illustrate the track of immigrants of Taiwan. In the book, Taiwanese Minnan ancestors were Baiyue who came from Fujian. In the period of Wu Hu (3.4 to 439 AD), northern central plains moved to south for avoiding wars, and then moved back to north after the wars. In the same time, the sanitization of Baiyue affected the race cognitive of Baiyue and had considered Baiyue as Han (All Chinese has believed as Han race). The most important conclusion is: Taiwan, northern Han Chinese, and northern Asians have a considerable genetic distance. The reason of why this conclusion is so important is “race,” and it is a united front tool of Chinese and Taiwan government. Under the brainwashing education, the government wants Taiwan people believe themselves as Han, so all Taiwanese were came from China. This book breaks this stereotype!

In my personal experience, my face looks not like normal Chinese, and many people believe I was came from Philippines or I and a Hybrid. In fact, many Taiwanese’s face look not like normal Chinese. Before I read this book, I didn’t know how to explain this difference because all of us (Taiwanese and Chinese) are Han race. But now, I can say ”I am not Chinese!”

Reading Summation 8 –Jin dai Taiwan can shi dang an by Qiu, Guozhen

This book is about the tragic history in Taiwan which including about 290 cases that were happened in the past. Through these cases, the audiences can understand the absurdity of the times, how the rulers of Taiwan treated Taiwanese which give us a lot of heartbreaking reflection. Although many Taiwanese people do not care about the past, but they also ignore the significance of inherent. For me, there were some similar stories that happened on my family, but I will never know why if I have not read this book. One of the similar was happened during the White Terror in Taiwan (40s to 90s) for my grandmother. In the time of period, government officers and soldiers forcibly plundered property because the excuse for seeking bandits, so my grandmother hidden the property in the bamboo of the fences. Fortunately, no one got arrested or missing in the events, and the property was not snatched. 

In fact, many activists were vilified as rebels in the Taiwan history, and the one of the example was Cheng Nan-Jung who was a Taiwanese publisher and a pro-democracy activist. He is most known internationally for setting himself on fire in support of Taiwanese independence, and he believed the freedom of speech and died for it. Because of Cheng’s published works that were all about Taiwanese independence, Taiwanese government framed him for printing a proposal for a constitution of the Republic of Taiwan and tried to attest him. However, he committed suicide by self- immolation in his office before the riot police came, but more and more conjectures point out that he was kill by petrol bombs that used by the riot polices in 1987. I am sad that he died that the year I had fire years old.

Through this book, I reveal a scar which is about self-ignorance and the truth in history. I feel shamed because before I started my thesis, I didn’t know who Cheng Nan-Jung was, and I naive the think that under Kuomintang rule in Taiwan is a country full of freedom of speech. Of course, even in the recent days, the government party people domination and persecution still exists but change another type of form. There are still many people fight for Taiwan right, and the form of activism is changing. I hope my thesis can have some effects for it. 

Reading Summation 7 – The art of protest by Reed, T. V.

This book is an overview of social movement in the U.S started form African American civil rights to recent day. Also, Reed talks how activists use different media of art for developing the movement for global justice, and introduced the effects of different mediums for Activism. All these connections for politic, culture, and human life are encouraging people through activism. Also, The art of protest is a great text book of activists that including mobilization, organize, and how to participate. Reed points out ”Culture is always entwined with social, economic, and political forces, but they in turn are entwined with culture”(P.314) which give me a basic idea for  an argument of my thesis- “What is Taiwanese culture ?” If culture relates to social, economic, and political forces, what is the appearance and composition for a colonized country?  If protest is a way to force social changes, will it be a key element for defining a culture?

In different chapters, Reed includes different mediums and pop culture of activism, such as songs, drama, poetry, Cowboys vs Indians, rock music, graphic art, and new media. In the chapter nine: new media, Reed, describes the importance of the use of internet, and the advantage of using internet is to bring people who live in different place together. Also, the advantages of laptop computers and cell phones which are portable are the important tools of activism. Reeds believes that new media will be the links for all movements. In the book, there are some cases for using new media for activism, such as the Battle(s) in Seattle, the Anticorporate University, blockades, and the action factions and debt elimination/economic development groups. Battle(s) in Seattle is a movie that bases on the protest activity at the WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999, and the film includes some issues of WTO, such as increase hunger, promote the socio-economic gap between rich and poor, and death of people.

In my personal experience, another movie: Across the Universe which was a musical drama, is another resource of activism. Although it is not a protest activity movie, it includes many elements of movements, such as music (The Beatles) and Hippie culture in the time of Vietnam War. Also, it uses many metaphorical ways, like strawberry as the bombs. The critiques of this are averaged, but it gives me many basic ideas of American activism about race and anti-war.