The Mobile Story: Narrative Practices with Locative Technologies - Hardcover

"The Mobile Story is a cutting-edge collection of essays for the designer or scholar of locative media in the present moment. It moves the field forward from what has felt, for several years, like a period of stagnation. But it also broadens the horizons of what mobile games can be." ―Lauren Burr, First Person Scholar

"The Mobile Story will no doubt stand as the definitive account of the expressive potential of mobile and locative media. This remarkably well-designed collection of essays clearly outlines mobile storytelling as a now-established creative practice and provides the critical vocabulary we need to understand its generic forms and cultural significance. We are often told that reading is at risk, but the authors here demonstrate that storytelling is all around us―we might just need a map and a mobile device to perceive it. An essential text for understanding the future of narrative and the complexity of our contemporary medial environments."--Rita Raley, University of California, Santa Barbara

"Mobile communication is no longer just a functional gadget that helps us through our daily rounds. It helps us weave our tales and spin our stories into a web of sociation. This is the welcome focus of the volume. Through the work of Farman and his colleagues, we learn of mobile intermediality, "checking in," and enabling stories. There are mobile storygames, non-linear storytelling, spatial narratives and narrative engagements. Flâneurs and keitai shôsetsu give us an international perspective just as as mobile voices, cognitive maps, spatial dissonance, geocaching, connections with strangers and acts of memorialization illuminate other dimensions of mobile communication. Dig into this feast of ideas. There is something for every taste."--Rich Ling, IT University of Copenhagen

What happens when stories meet mobile media? In this cutting-edge collection, contributors explore digital storytelling in ways that look beyond the desktop to consider how stories can be told through mobile, locative, and pervasive technologies. This book offers dynamic insights about the new nature of narrative in the age of mobile media, studying digital stories that are site-specific, context-aware, and involve the reader in fascinating ways. Addressing important topics for scholars, students, and designers alike, this collection investigates the crucial questions for this emerging area of storytelling and electronic literature. Topics covered include the histories of site-specific narratives, issues in design and practice, space and mapping, mobile games, narrative interfaces, and the interplay between memory, history, and community.