(co)Curating game jams for community and communitas A 48hr game making challenge retrospective

Abstract

In this position paper, we discuss the curation of an annual 48-hour game jam in terms of community building and fostering communitas or the unstructured non-hierarchical community phenomenon that is sometimes seen as the result of a dramatic or acute community event. The jam (the 48hr game making challenge) was part of a wider practice of public program curation. It ran for a decade between 2007 and 2016. The discussion and reflection on the jam over the decade that it ran, leads us to reflect on the nature of game jams as community events which have the potential for creation of communitas.