Make Believe: LARP, Learning, and the Imagination Part 2

Understanding Media is a pre-requisite for understanding 21st century civilization, and for navigating our way through the “Metaverse”…but how do we accomplish that?

When we want to understand how different forms of media create different realities, can we find our way despite the self- reflexive nature of such explorations? It has been said that we see ourselves only in a rear view mirror, or perhaps as the shadows thrown on the cave wall as Plato would have it.

The take-away is that perception turned upon itself is problematic, but that’s the nature of the human predicament. We are always “using some form of media” to perceive, or to merely be. Even a Zen monk deep in a zazen session where “everything has dropped away”…is not somehow perceiving unmediated reality, as that doesn’t exist. Emptiness is only form; Form is only emptiness…as the Zen Master might reflect.

But that doesn’t stop us from reveling in our ability to mediate experience, as evidenced by the popularity of LARP as noted in this recent New Yorker article from May30 issue by Neima Jahromi.

LARP is already used in classrooms, when teachers ask students to take on historical roles, such as Lincoln or Douglas at their famous debates, or even as Astronauts on a trip to the moon.

Las Cruces Public Schools has a simulated space launch control room where students can “play” at being NASA tech, or Astronauts on a rocket launch.

A richly imagined, and richly created environment, and roles for participants within it, is one way to activate the whole student in a learning experience. Needless to say, most students find such LARP very exciting/ fun, and learn while doing as well.

LARP via video game play is another form of media, where the whole person can get involved, regardless of their physical location. IOW, the imagination, and our ability to activate it, and immerse ourselves in “unreal” locations and worlds…is a powerful way to learn.