July 14-July 31: Come see Kasimir and Jadyn's homes rezzed! /  by Tom Boellstorff

From July 14 until July 31 (with a possible extension, we'll see!) Ethnographia Island is proud to temporarily display two beautiful homes designed and built by Kasimir Deimatov and our own fabulous Jadyn Firehawk!

These homes have not been rezzed in Second Life for many years, so it is a real treat to be able to see and experience them. As explained in this article, these homes were designed back in 2010 for a building competition. Kasimir (who is no longer active in Second Life) is a quadriplegic, but together with Jadyn was able to design these amazing homes and win the competition!

Now, as a temporary exhibit both houses have been rezzed on Ethnographia Island. You can walk through them, read the history behind them, and get inspired to do some building of your own!

Thanks to Jadyn for setting up the installation, and to Kasimir for permission to share this wonderful work. Enjoy!

Sharing a Culture of Possibility /  by Donna Davis

Members of the Ethnographia community had a busy June! They collaborated to build an amazing display at Second Life’s 13th birthday celebration (SL13B). The SL13B Ethnographia exhibit showcased the works of 20 capability-diverse participants in the community. The focus of the project was on the ways in which being in a virtual world has influenced the lives of the participants as people with disabilities.

On Ethnographia Island, our community members are building individually and collaboratively in a range of ways to share their experiences. For the exhibit, they worked together to create a story of their experiences of disability, and specifically the new possibilities virtual worlds can provide for disabled persons.

For 2016, the birthday celebration theme was "the shared adventure." The Ethnographia Island reflected that theme, including opportunities Second Life might provide for disabled persons. In addition, the exhibit was built collaboratively, as a "shared" experience for members of our community. SL13B opened on June 18th and concluded July 3rd. We were located on the "Beguile" sim at SL13B. It was a great place to be, right next to a Welcome Area with a giant ship in the sky! Our neighbors included "Bhutan on the Border," some wonderful SL photographers (photos by TheaDee and KL Photography), the "City of Adventure" exhibit by the Bay City Alliance, and even an alien spaceship (Area 54 ¾)! It really was a testament to the incredibly diverse creativity in Second Life.

We even had a "meet and greet" at the exhibit one day, and several folks walking by dropped in to join our conversation!

Hanging out at the meet & greet during SL13B!

A very cool thing is that at the close of the celebration, we were able to move our entire build to Ethnographia Island! Please stop by the island to learn more. As you wander through, be sure to click on the information icons to learn about the amazing individuals who have so much to teach us about ability. If you’re not able to get by, we’ll be sharing more of their stories with you here each week.

Thanks for sharing the adventure with us!

Exploring viewer development /  by Donna Davis

After a series of serendipitous events, we may have an opportunity to work with Crista Lopes, the creator of OpenSim and Tom's colleague at UC Irvine, on what we're calling "The Dream Viewer." A “viewer” is the program your computer uses to interact with Second Life. Linden Lab (the company that owns Second Life) makes a viewer, and there are many other viewers out there (the best-known is probably the “Firestorm” viewer). Unfortunately, these viewers are not always easy to use for disabled folks. The “Radegast” viewer is another example that has been used by some disabled persons, particularly those with visual impairments, but it is no longer being developed.

To best understand what a "dream viewer" would look like, we've hosted a series of focus groups in Second Life. The theme for the focus groups was: imagine that someone gave you a million dollars to design the ultimate Second Life viewer for disabled folks. What would it look like (or sound like, or feel like, anything)? What are the most frustrating or limiting features of the current viewers that it would not do? What *would* it do? What are the most important things a viewer could do for specific disabilities (visual impairment, auditory impairment, difficulty using a keyboard or mouse, special needs for social interaction, issues around bright textures or loud sounds, anything)?

The feedback was wonderful and the prospects are exciting. While we don't have a million dollars to develop such a viewer, we at least are beginning to understand what it would look like and are now exploring funding options. More soon!

New neighbors! /  by Donna Davis

As the new island (Ethnographia II or more affectionately referred to as E2) is up and running, we want to remind and invite you to stop by the new area and meet the new neighbors. There are a number of new builds from new members of the community as well as our first collaborative build underway! The incredibly creative minds of Daisy Gator, Kath McGill and Jadyn Firehawk are working together to bring Daisy's literary work to life! Take a stroll through space as you've never seen it before! We also have our first builds "behind the magic curtain." If moving textures and bright colors are not a problem for you, you may want to take the time to journey through the experience Kath has built and bear witness to the latest SL creation by famed DB Baily.

Also on the new land are offices for Tom and Tredi. We'll be hosting more regular office hours as our class schedules slow down a bit in the very near future. Look for more information soon and please feel free to stop by and chat with us! 

Thank you to all our wonderful community members who are making this such a great experience. See you around the sim!

A new island! /  by Donna Davis

After just five short months we discovered it was already time to expand our space. We have added Ethnographia II to the land we have in Second Life for a number of reasons. 

First, this means more people can participate. Our original community of 20 parcels filled up very quickly and we started a waiting list. Those people will now be joining us.

It also means we can have three areas on the island! They are: 
- A “standard build” area that will have some basic guidelines on what is visible from the outside of a structure at ground level. In this area skyboxes will still be fine, and anything goes inside a structure within certain limits. Most of the builds already fit these guidelines. This will be a "safe" place for anyone to enjoy without visual elements that can sometimes create sensory overload for individuals with certain disabilities.

- A “behind the magic curtain” area where anything goes even at ground level (still within SL terms for a moderate environment). It’s the chance to offer people the opportunity to “enter the land of Oz” where colors, lights and animations will not be restricted.

- A “collaborative area” with parcels around four times the normal ones, where our residents can build collaboratively! We hope this is an exciting opportunity for so many of our creative builders! More details will be sent to the group shortly.

As always, we invite anyone already in Second Life (SL) to stop by Ethnographia and wander through a land full of extraordinary stories. If you're not in SL and want to learn more, please feel free to email Donna (dzdavis@uoregon.edu) or Tom (tboellst@uci.edu) and we'll be happy to give you a hand!

Looking forward to 2016 /  by Donna Davis

We're so pleased to report that 2015 got Ethnographia off to an extraordinary start! The sim is now in full swing with a sandbox, a few cozy places for meetings or casual conversation and most important, 20 residents from all around the world! We created 20 parcels and invited people living with disabilities to use these places to express their experiences of living both in the physical world and the virtual world in whatever fashion they chose. Already, the results are breathtaking! Please feel free to come visit the sim in Second Life and wander through the often uplifting, poignant and enlightening builds!  

Likewise, we invite our residents to post stories or images here! We welcome our community and those interested in following our community to visit the sim or this blog often to see the stories unfold. 

With that, we wish you a Happy New Year!

Tredi and Tom

Welcome to Ethnographia! /  by Donna Davis

We have a home! Ethnographia is our official sim in Second Life. While the sim is currently nothing more than a lot of sand and water, we are working on plans to build a space to showcase the creations of people involved in this project, to create a safe space to hang out and share experiences of digital lives, and to call home for the next three years.  Over the next few weeks and months we'll be exploring ways to use the space that fit the needs of our community. 

We'll be sharing a landmark soon so that folks who want to come by for a visit or to learn more about Ethnographia and the project in general can wander through. In Second Life, we are known as Tom Bukowski (Tom) and Tredi Felisimo (Donna). We can be reached via IM in SL or leave us a note here and we'll be sure to get back to you.