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Staff Profile

Dr Nick Rush-Cooper

Lecturer in Digital Approaches to Media, Heritage and Cultural Studies

  • Telephone: 0191 208 3428
  • Address: School of Arts and Cultures
    Media, Culture, Heritage
    Armstrong Building
    Room 2.72
    Newcastle University
    Newcastle upon Tyne
    NE1 7RU
Background

Background

I am Degree Programme Director for Digital Cultures & Media (BA Hons)

I research and teach in the areas of digital cultures. My current research examines video games and landscapes, drawing from ethnographic, phenomenological, feminist and practice-based approaches.


Qualifications

PhD, University of Durham

  • Rush-Cooper, N. (2013) Exposures: Exploring Selves and Landscapes in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. Doctoral thesis, Durham University. Available at: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/8490/

MA, University of Durham

BA(hons), University of Leeds


Postgraduate research / PhD supervision

I am keen to hear from students interested in undertaking research in the areas of digital interactive media, digital games, popular digital culture, phenomenological approaches, STS and feminist epistemologies as well as ethnographic and digital approaches to tourism.


Research

Research Interests:

I research digital cultures, with a focus on digital games. My work draws from phenomenological and feminist theory, particularly the work of Merleau-Ponty and Irigaray, and utilises ethnographic and practice-based approaches.


  • Digital games & interactive digital media
  • Theories and cultures of landscape
  • Phenomenology & Post-phenomenology
  • Feminist theories & epistemologies
  • Ethnography
  • Tourism & travel in spaces of disaster.



Current projects:

Post-apocalyptic landscapes in popular media in the Anthorpocene

Examining post-apocalyptic landscapes in popular media (film, video games, television) in the context of the politics of the Anthropocene through eco critical and trans corporeal approaches.


#virtual photography:

Building from the premise that video games are landscapes (and not just representations of landscapes), and can be methodologically treated as such, this research project adapts the 'go along' / walking interview for virtual spaces and examine the creative practice of virtual photography in video game worlds in the context of broader landscape cultures and theory.


University students and the use of large language models:

This research examines conversations on the social media platform Reddit to investigate how students are collectively navigating and negotiating the use of machine learning (AI) for the purposes of study and assessment in higher education.




Past projects:

Chernobyl

I worked as a tour guide for the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone for nine months as the basis of my PhD Exposures: Exploring Selves and Landscapes in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone 

Teaching

Degree Programme Director

Digital Cultures & Media (BA Hons)


Undergraduate 

MCH1001 - Introduction to Digital Cultures - Module Leader

MCH2090 - Critical Making and Digital Skills- Module Leader

MCH1025 - Critical Skills - Contributor

MCH1026 - Social and Cultural Studies - Contributor

MCH3006 - Digital Cultures Research Practice Project - Module leader and supervisor

MCH3075 - Research dissertation - Supervisor

DSC8011- Data in the Humanities: Acquisition, Management, Interpretation - Contributor


Previous Teaching

MCH2069 - Research Methods - Module Leader

Publications