Abstract:
Digital culture is presented as both seductive and pervasive, and as actively productive of identity and cultural relations. Young people (players) are positioned as uncritical consumers in a context of commodification and internationalisation of youth culture, in a set of debates that refer to broader processes of societal values and change, with computer texts seen as working along with other media and popular culture texts to mobilise specific images, discourses and positions, and to powerfully construct identity. At the same time, other debates point to a more subversive and resistant view of playing/reading. Audience work, for example, has focussed on young people's resiliance in relation to television violence and video nasties. A third set of debates explores connections between young people's in and out of school textual worlds, with a view to exploring ways in which the curriculum might both capitalise on developing skills and knowledge while also intervening in cultural production and strengthening capacities for critique.