RCP Initiative
Led by Professor Owen Gottlieb, the MAGIC Center Initiative cultivates new research and design, focused on games, religious literacy, the acquisition of cultural practices, and the implications for policy.
How can game systems and interactive media provide insight into religious studies, learning, and cultural production? And how can the study of religion and culture illuminate game design and the learning sciences? How might discoveries gained in the pursuit of these questions help to promote religious literacy, improved dialogue, discourse, and policy? The initiative seeks to unlock answers to these questions through original design and field research in games and simulations as well as through scholarly gatherings, discussions, and publications.
About the Initiative
The Initiative in Religion, Culture & Policy was established in January of 2015 and is managed by Owen Gottlieb, Ph.D., affiliate of the MAGIC Center and Associate Professor of Interactive Games & Media. Gottlieb’s scholarship in digital media and games for learning crosses the fields of the learning sciences, religious studies, educational technology, Jewish studies and education, cultural anthropology, communication studies, and social studies education.
He is the founder and director of ConverJent: Jewish Games for Learning (www.converjent.org). The Lost & Found team which he founded and leads has had their award-winning games featured at the Smithsonian American Museum of Art Arcade, Indiecade 2019, Now Play This London, the International Meaningful Play Conference, Serious Play, and numerous other festivals, conferences, and events. His mobile augmented reality game Jewish Time Jump: NY was nominated for Most Innovative Game at the 2013 Games for Change Festival and has been featured in The Atlantic, The Village Voice, and Kill Screen.
Gottlieb is an ordained Reform rabbi (HUC-JIR) with industry experience in software project management for large corporate and non-profit clients. He has written screen and teleplays for Paramount and Universal, and worked for over twelve years as a director’s liaison for the Telluride Film Festival. He is a member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis; the Writers Guild of America, West; and the International Game Developers Association.
RCP@MAGIC Projects
Lost & Found: A Series of Games teaching Medieval Religious Legal Systems
Lost & Found is a strategy card-to-mobile game system (currently, there are three games in publication through MAGIC Spell Studios) that teaches medieval religious legal systems with attention to period accuracy and cultural and historical context. The game emphasizes the pro-social aspects of religious legal systems including collaboration and cooperation.
The purpose of the Lost & Found project is to expand the discourse around religious legal systems, to enrich public conversations in a variety of communities, and to promote greater understanding of the religious traditions that build the fabric of the United States. Comparative religious literacy can build bridges between and within communities and prepare learners to be responsible citizens in our pluralist democracy.
In the strategy games (Lost & Found, and the Islamic Law module Lost & Found: New Harvest), players take on the role of villagers who must balance family needs with communal needs. They must balance cooperative actions even while addressing individual needs.
Set in Fustat (Old Cairo) in the 12th Century, a crossroads of religions, the initial game teaches elements of Mishneh Torah, the Jewish legal code written by Moses Maimonides. Maimonides was influenced by Islamic legal scholars and philosophers such as Averroes and Al Ghazahli; he also influenced Islamic scholars. The upcoming Islamic Law module, Lost & Found: New Harvest draws from Averroes’ (Ibn Rushd) The Distinguished Jurist’s Primer and Al-Hidayah by Burhan al-Din al-Marghinani. New harvest allows players to learn about the shared relationship between Jewish and Islamic legal systems.
Lost & Found: Order in the Court - the Party game teaches legal reasoning from Maimonides' Mishneh Torah using fast paced story building mechanics.
Generous Support for RCP Design and Research
The Lost & Found card game has been graciously supported by seed funding from the B. Thomas Golisano College of Computing & Information Sciences, the Office of the Vice President for Research, RIT, and matching funds from MAGIC.
The digital prototype based on the first card game is funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this paper do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Collaborating Scholars
A diverse group of scholars in religion, games, culture, and policy consult and collaborate as a part of the RPC@MAGIC initiative. They include:
Phillip Ackerman Lieberman
Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt Law School Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies and Law Assistant Professor of Religious Studies Affiliated Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies and History
Diane L. Moore
Harvard University
Senior Lecturer on Religious Studies and Education
Senior Fellow at the Center for the Study of World Religions
Muhammad Shafiq
Executive Director in Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue
Professor in Religious Studies
Nazareth College
Karen Schrier
Marist College
Assistant Professor, Media Arts
Rachel Wagner
Ithaca College
Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy and Religion
Faculty, School of Humanities and Sciences
Tarek Elgawhary
Selected Publications
- Ackerman-Lieberman, P. (2014). The Business of Identity: Jews, Muslims, and Economic Life in Medieval Egypt. Stanford University Press.
- Dawson, E. & Gottlieb O. (2014, December 29). Connections: What Will 2015 Bring for Regional Innovation and Improvement? Featuring Dr. Rabbi Owen Gottlieb. Connections. Retrieved from http://wxxinews.org/post/connections-what-will-2015-bring-regional-innovation-and-improvement[begins at 33min 46 seconds]
- Dawson, E & Mack M. (2018, April 9). Connections: Can games be effective tools for learning and education? Featuring Rabbi Dr. Owen Gottlieb. Retrieved from https://www.wxxinews.org/post/connections-can-games-be-effective-tools-learning-and-education
- Gottlieb, O. (2018). Re‐playing Maimonides' codes: Designing games to teach religious legal systems. Teaching Theology & Religion, 21 (4). 246-259.
- Gottlieb, O., Mathews, J., Schrier, K., & Sly, J. (2014). Mobile History Games: Challenges, Frameworks, and Design Principles. Proceedings GLS 10 Games + Learning + Society Conference. Madison, WI: ETC, 14–16.
- Gottlieb, O. & Schreiber, I. (2020). Acts of Meaning, Resource Diagrams, and Essential Learning Behaviors: The Design Evolution of Lost & Found. Journal of Designs for Learning. 11 (1).
- Gottlieb, O. & Schreiber, I. (2020). Designing Analog Learning Games: Genre Affordances, Limitations and Multi-Game Approaches. Chapter in Rerolling Boardgames: Essays on Themes, Systems, Experiences, and Ideologies. McFarland & Company, Inc. 195-211
- Moore, D. L. (2014). Overcoming Religious Illiteracy: Expanding the Boundaries of Religious Education. Religious Education, 109(4), 379–389. doi:10.1080/00344087.2014.924765
- Schrier, K. (2014). Ethical Thinking and Sustainability in Role-Play Participants A Preliminary Study. Simulation & Gaming, 1046878114556145. doi:10.1177/1046878114556145
- Shafiq, M., & Abu-Nimer, M. (2007). Interfaith Dialogue: A Guide for Muslims. IIIT.
- Wagner, R. (2013). God in the Game: Cosmopolitanism and Religious Conflict in Videogames. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 81(1), 249–261. doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfs102
Students and Alumni
Graduate Students and Alumni
- Lakshminarayanan Vijayaraghavan
- Shashwat Sinha
- Mrinal Jain
- Alex Lobl
- Bruno Rocha
- Sachit Puri
- Zach Whitman
- Lucas Vasconsuelos
- Karan Sahu
- Reuben Brenner-Adams
- J.D. Kelly
- Manjunath Shivana
- Daniel Fliegel
(ConverJent/Hebrew Union College) - Satchit Puri
- Saurabh Buttan
- Jason Rose
Undergraduate Students and Alumni
- Dakota Herold
- Mandy Ryll
- Edward Amidon
- Mimi Ace
- Tori Bonagura
- Annie Wong
- Angela Muscariello
- Noah Parker
- Matthew Fasman
- Ryan Muskopf
- Jeffrey Karger
- Han Soo Lee
- Preston Meeks
- Marina Bacino
- Katarina Tesmer
- Mark Schafer
- Israel Anthony
- Niko Bazos
- Max de George
- Ryan Spencer
- Justin Neft
- Stephen Edwards
- Jake Alaimo
- Colin Friday
- Sophia Lynch
- Patrick Hosman
- Calise Jin
- Christopher Brown
- Julian Januszka
- Ian Davis
- Gary Stack
Train a Doctor - a Communal Responsibility Card in Lost & Found