10 years ago, I started working professionally with edu-larp. It turned out that a lot of things I had envisioned from a career as an edu-larp pedagogue did not match reality. I also found out that some of the things that I – as a larper – thought of as truisms are actually part of a skewed conception. In this talk I will share some of the main take-aways from my career so far.
Josefin Westborg is one of the world’s leading designers in edu-larps. She has a background in game design and pedagogy and is one of the founders of Lajvbyrån (previous LajvVerkstaden Väst). She now works as a research assistant as part of the Transformative Play Initiative with focus on analogue games at Uppsala University at the Department of Game Design. Throughout her career she has met thousands of students of all ages, and run and designed larps for them.
She has also been a teacher in game design at both Chalmers University of technology and the University of Gothenburg. She is passionate about designing for interaction, storytelling and learning. When she is not involved with games you will probably find her at the dance studio doing ballroom dancing. ”Though she be but little, she is fierce.”
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This talk was recorded at the international larp conference Knutepunkt 2021.