Victoria

Part 1: Pick 3 objects
a) Something significant from your childhood, something important to you - a toy, a talisman a (don't think too hard, just pick something)
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
b) An inspiration - a quote, a song, a book, a lyric, a piece of art, an experience, a philosopher, a scientist, just ONE.
The Japanese Book series Juuni Kokki.
c) Something you've done or pursued on your own initiative (scholarly or otherwise) that is deeply interesting/satisfying to you.
Hockey Websites
Part 2: Questions (Zelda)
a) Why this item is interesting/meaningful/important to you (or universally)?
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was really the start of my interest in game developing. I had played games before when I was younger on earlier game systems but the Legend of Zelda was the first game that really drew me into the world and the experience.
b) What are the issues, concerns, principles, processes or attributes that surround this item?
c) How is each item relevant: socially, technically, politically, phenomenologically?
The game was longer and broader in gameplay than many of the games at the time, set in a huge world with different laws and beliefs than our own. The graphics were beautiful for the time and the game was hugely story oriented, which is what drew me into the game.
d) What do you not know about the item, and would like to investigate?
I would like to know more about the concept and development phase for the game and how it was, if at all, different from other games produced at the time.

Part 2: Questions (Juuni Kokki)
a) Why this item is interesting/meaningful/important to you (or universally)?
The Japanese Book series Juuni Kokki has been an inspiration to me on many levels. I have read the book translations that fans have posted on the internet, and seen the anime that they created about the book, although it was cut short. I think that the author, Fuyumi Ono, has done an amazing job creating her own world and fiction. Everything is so eloquently thought out, from the political systems to religious systems to the relationships in between worlds. I’m a fan of the fantasy genre and I love learning about the worlds that other authors create in their minds.
b) What are the issues, concerns, principles, processes or attributes that surround this item?
c) How is each item relevant: socially, technically, politically, phenomenologically?
This book helped me a lot in my world building assignment for last semester; I tried to use it as an example. I thought of all the questions I could potentially have about the Juuni Kokki world—how the political system functions, how people interact, how they deal with language, how they obtain money, how they view religion, etc. I then tried to apply those questions to my world and tried to answer every question the way the Juuni Kokki author did. I think the books give a great evaluation of human morality and a reader can learn from the main character’s personal growth as she accepts her place in the world. The political and religious systems seem a lot simpler than ours, but I think there’s much to learn from, as they just reflect basic human social systems.
d) What do you not know about the item, and would like to investigate?
There are some of the books that were never translated that I never got to read/experience. I would like to be able to read all of the books to fill in more of the puzzle of the world and answer questions that I was unable to answer previously.
Part 2: Questions (Websites)
a) Why this item is interesting/meaningful/important to you (or universally)?
I used to work on a lot of websites, both personal and public, about and for hockey players. It was a fun time in my life because I taught myself html and it gave me a chance to get involved in a pro sports team/league as a 15 year old.
b) What are the issues, concerns, principles, processes or attributes that surround this item?
c) How is each item relevant: socially, technically, politically, phenomenologically?
I think that it shows what a technological era we live in. I grew up living with computers and working and playing on computers, because my dad works at Apple computer. I taught myself HTML just by doing and experimenting and seeing what tags had what effects on the page, and it felt really rewarding to put pages up that people enjoyed. I had a rich online social network of people who were interested in the same things as me, and it was a whole new world of social interaction at the time.
d) What do you not know about the item, and would like to investigate?
Not so much that I don’t know about the sites, but I’ve fallen out of practice and technology has advanced so I’m no longer as experienced in page building as I once used to be. Just goes to show you that if you don’t keep up with a skill or learned ability, you can lose it.

Part 3) Step Back
a) Look at your three items as a whole and see if you can discover similarities (literal or abstract), are there intersections?
All of the items help me touch worlds that otherwise don’t exist or aren’t accessible to me, whether the fantasy worlds of games or books, or the world of professional sports. I love exploring worlds and I like to imagine that there are worlds other than ours, some created by us, some not, and these worlds aren’t accessible to us for some reason. The website is slightly different than the book and game in that it is a real part of our world as opposed to fiction.
b) Does your analysis suggest an area of interest, or (series of) questions?
I think my area of interest between these, and in general, is really world intersections, whether real or imaginary. I’d like to explore the idea of everything being a world that coexists with our world in some parallel.