Why Gamers Are Not Performers

I argue that even if video games are interactive artworks, typical video games are not works for performance and players of video games do not perform these games in the sense in which a musician performs a musical composition (or actors a play, dancers a ballet, and so on). Even expert playings of video games for an audience fail to qualify as performances of those works. Some exemplary playings may qualify as independent “performance‐works,” but this tells us nothing about the ontology of video games or playings of them. The argument proceeds by clarifying the concepts of interactivity and work‐performance, drawing particularly on recent work by Dominic Lopes, Berys Gaut, and David Davies.     

"You" and "I" need to talk about "us": Linguistic patterns in marital interactions

Links between pronoun use, relationship satisfaction, and observed behavior were examined during 2 problem-solving interactions in which 134 distressed and 48 nondistressed couples participated. Results supported hypotheses that distressed and nondistressed couples would use pronouns at significantly different rates, and that rates would also differ for partners depending on whose topic was being discussed. Actor–partner interdependence models (APIMs; D. A. Kenny, 1996 ) revealed actor and partner effects of pronoun use on satisfaction and observed positivity and negativity. Interestingly, I-focus pronouns were found to be linked with satisfaction in distressed partners and dis satisfaction in nondistressed partners. The pattern of findings was otherwise largely consistent across topics and levels of distress. These findings have implications for both future research and clinical interventions.     

VOCABULARY: NEEDED IF MORE CHILDREN ARE TO READ WELL

Vocabulary has long been recognized as a strong determinant of reading success. Despite the importance of vocabulary knowledge, very little information is available about effective strategies for vocabulary instruction in elementary grades and there is a paucity of data on the relative merits of the different programs that are designed to promote vocabulary growth in elementary children. Available information indicates that, until they reach about grade three, children’s vocabulary knowledge is largely determined by informal factors such as parental interaction and other incidental sources such as the TV. In this article, I will address the following topics: (a) individual differences in vocabulary acquisition, (b) the amount of vocabulary needed for successful learning, (c) the predictable sequence of vocabulary acquisition, (d) the need for direct instruction for vocabulary growth, and (e) promising methods for promoting vocabulary knowledge.     

THE RECEPTION OF DIONYSIUS IN THE BYZANTINE WORLD: MAXIMUS TO PALAMAS

The first major theologian to engage the CD in the Byzantine world is Maximus the Confessor. His is a highly individual engagement, but without any of the embarrassment alleged by many modern scholars. Dionysian influence in Byzantium seems to have been mostly confined to the monastic tradition, and is traced here, in outline, from Symeon the New Theologian to Gregory Palamas. Various issues recur: the distinction between apophatic and kataphatic theology, the notion of hierarchy (often understood in a much cruder way than in Dionysius himself), the nature and importance of angelic mediation, and the central place of the sacramental liturgy.