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Well, not really stupid, more of narrow minded actually.
During the start of the semester, she asked us to introduce ourselves and share one thing that we are really interested in, nevertheless, I proudly said that I was into pro-gaming. Actually, the major thing that we will do for this semester is to write an argumentative research paper on our topic, and writing for pro-gaming to be accepted as a sport is really easy. Anyway, one time, our prof asked us to go to the library and look for 10 books for our topic. Fuck. It's not that our library is bad or anything (the school decided to create another library building, wonder what they'll put in there), but I know that there are no fucking books there on pro-gaming or anything that is related to gaming. Well I gave it a shot, the opac gave me books on marketing, finance, and programming. Fuck it. Well, maybe periodical entries can help me. Daebak, I found a whole lot of articles from locally published newspapers about gaming here in our country. So I happily took down those entries so I can go check on them on the microfilm section or something later. I got myself back to the classroom and asked my prof if she'd allow newspaper entries, she said she'd still require me to use books as the major references. What the flying fuck. I understand that I need books for a paper like this, but on a topic so great, ever changing, and greatly overlooked by a country like ours? There's no single book on pro-gaming on this country, because it's not that big of a thing yet for people here to write about it (hell, no one's even published even the history of pro-gaming, well at least in our country I can say that for sure). Well, back to the classroom, I was pretty much pissed for two things, the first being the fact that my professor has a narrow mind, and the second, me, for not being able to speak up at that moment.
So I planned to drop by the department so I can argue with my professor and hopefully, she'll let me use internet resources and periodicals because this greatness called pro-gaming has not yet made its presence felt in our country. Well I have a good number of arguing points and quotes, and most of them were stated above. Actually, the absence of evidence is not the evidence for absence. I think that goes to say that if you can't see books for pro-gaming, it doesn't really go to show that there are no books for it, I'm just looking at the wrong place. And I think that the books that a place holds reflects the things they give a damn about. It's like how language was formed, a certain language would tend to have a whole fuckton of words for a certain aspect of life, well I can give our language as a good example. Plus, its not like that our library has everything....~_~ + Show Spoiler + So I walked into the department, I have lots of free time, fuck it, I'm not setting an appointment with her consultation hours because I have classes and I don't want to cut/late those classes just because of a 10 minute argument with a narrow minded english professor (who ironically is a full time researcher for a publication of some sort). Then ninjas, hundreds, no, fucking thousands of them. My prof wanted to do this the hard way, well no, I haven't really talked to my prof yet, planning to do that on Monday.
   
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16974 Posts
...why don't you pick a different topic?
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Snet
United States3573 Posts
Just pick a normal topic, it will be a hell of a lot easier.
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Yeah I couldn't imagine writing about progaming in an English class- yow.
I hate professors who are obsessed with book sources for these kinds of papers, times have changed, many online publications are just as credible and legit.
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16974 Posts
Scholarly journals, yes, but locally published newspapers?
Professors will accept actual journals (even online, from, say, PubMed, or JSTOR), but I don't know a single professor who will accept local newspapers as major sources for a research paper.
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I have had to encounter a similar event, it also in my English class. I took a topic she was not to happy about but I stuck to my guns and it was really satisfying when she was forced to give me a good grade.
In the end its all down to you but it is very satisfying to stick with the topic.
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Germany2896 Posts
why do people always pick these topics -_-
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It's hard to write about something I'm barely interested on..
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Snet
United States3573 Posts
On July 17 2009 23:48 SilverSkyLark wrote:It's hard to write about something I'm barely interested on.. 
It's actually really easy if you just pick a topic with endless amounts of sources. If you want to write about things you're interested in switch to an English major and become an author. Otherwise you're in school, you always write about boring shit.
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16974 Posts
You're literally interested in nothing but pro-gaming?
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On July 17 2009 23:53 Empyrean wrote: You're literally interested in nothing but pro-gaming? Well, not really....
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Hmmm, can't you use Boxers biography it details a lot about early pro-gaming. There are probably publications about MLG and how that got started also. It isn't as daunting as you might imagine.
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On July 17 2009 23:52 Snet wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2009 23:48 SilverSkyLark wrote:It's hard to write about something I'm barely interested on..  It's actually really easy if you just pick a topic with endless amounts of sources. If you want to write about things you're interested in switch to an English major and become an author. Otherwise you're in school, you always write about boring shit. so true......
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Ask your librarian if you can print out Liquipedia and possibly a portion of TLPD and get it bound and put it into a certain appropriate section of the library and then use that.
Make sure to stress the date on the front cover as Liquipedia is obviously evolving every week but I would guarantee you wouldn't be the last one to use the book.
If your teacher isn't a complete fucking moron she will probably see your passion and resourcefulness and also if she spends 5 seconds even looking at how immense Liquipedia isshe may be convinced of the validity of the topic.
Don't listen to these guys saying to choose another topic IMO.
book (bk) n.
1. A set of written, printed, or blank pages fastened along one side and encased between protective covers.
Unless she said a published book she can't say shit and if you do a good job she can't give you a bad grade.
(gogo be a martyr)
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Apparently you're missing the point of being in school: to learn. If you're just going to use crappy unreliable sources there's not a lot of point in your assignment. Just pick another subject that you can do decent research on.
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16974 Posts
Of course professors mean published book by a reputable professional or university press.
Trying to slip by a technicality would probably amuse her for a few seconds before she gives you a failing grade.
Honestly. Choose a new topic :/
EDIT: Actually, what's the scope of this paper? What are limits on its length, sources, instructions, etc.? And what school is it for? It's over the summer...are you taking summer classes or something?
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On July 18 2009 00:02 Frits wrote: Apparently you're missing the point of being in school: to learn. If you're just going to use crappy unreliable sources there's not a lot of point in your assignment. Just pick another subject that you can do decent research on.
You can learn English writing about absolutely anything..
Above all the point of being in school is to learn how to learn, far more important than any specific subject.
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If my argument fails, then I'm switching topics....:|
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Honestly I wouldn't even recommend arguing.
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Pick something that's good for learning English and getting good grades.
You can pick tons of subjects your schoolmates may be interested in that are less obscure and are about just as recent/new or obscure and that generally just as bad.
Anyway, only thing she might have done wrong is not make clear what the subject is going to be used for. If she said 'introduce us to you fascinating but obscure hobby' then some people aren't going to find 10 books or 10 scholarly articles, obviously. But I bet she didn't. I mean, if she really is a professor.
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5673 Posts
Stick to the topic man, stick to the topic. Part of learning to be an academic is learning to find scholars and critics who say what you want them to say. People might disagree with this, but that's pretty much how I see the field. There is a PhD out there who has said pretty much everything (within reason, although some well outside it) there is to say. Your job is finding out what you think and then supporting it with famous people quotes/ideas.
So, take a step back from the topic. Progaming, hmmm, how would you break that down? Sports? Sporting culture? Mass movements, social movements, social motivation, social trends. Psychology, perhaps? Winning, losing, mentality. Finances, marketing?
Your topic, is fine. You just need an angle. Think about what exactly you want to say, and then come up with a thesis statement. In finding your angle, however, ah, this is where you will need to do some, and preferably a lot of preliminary reading.
To sum up - plenty of people have said things that you can apply to progaming. You just need to find out what you want to say, and then find the sources to back you up.
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If he wants to attempt that he has to be sending emails all over Korean universities if maybe there is someone there doing a PhD on esports.
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Whine about it to the other filipinos @ GArena, maybe they'll have an idea.
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8748 Posts
Like riptide said, you are just looking for the wrong books. Find histories of other sports. Find books written about competitive board games (chess, etc). Find a book on the psychology of sports fans. Find a book on what gets people to watch things. So with your major references, you can build a very inclusive characterization of sport, and then argue that progaming has the ability to fulfill that characterization.
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5673 Posts
My point is that he doesn't need someone who is doing a PhD on ESPORTS to write an essay on ESPORTS. Read my post, please.
Then read this post as well -
On July 18 2009 00:21 Liquid`NonY wrote: Like riptide said, you are just looking for the wrong books. Find histories of other sports. Find books written about competitive board games (chess, etc). Find a book on the psychology of sports fans. Find a book on what gets people to watch things. So with your major references, you can build a very inclusive characterization of sport, and then argue that progaming has the ability to fulfill that characterization.
Edit - If I understand the assignment correctly, your teacher just wants to see if you guys can research and put together a decent paper. I don't think the topic matters nearly as much how good the paper is, in terms of argument, structure and form in general.
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On July 18 2009 00:21 riptide wrote:My point is that he doesn't need someone who is doing a PhD on ESPORTS to write an essay on ESPORTS. Read my post, please. Then read this post as well - Show nested quote +On July 18 2009 00:21 Liquid`NonY wrote: Like riptide said, you are just looking for the wrong books. Find histories of other sports. Find books written about competitive board games (chess, etc). Find a book on the psychology of sports fans. Find a book on what gets people to watch things. So with your major references, you can build a very inclusive characterization of sport, and then argue that progaming has the ability to fulfill that characterization. Edit - If I understand the assignment correctly, your teacher just wants to see if you guys can research and put together a decent paper. I don't think the topic matters nearly as much how good the paper is, in terms of argument, structure and form in general. Hmm, yeah, I need to find a new angle on it...thanks a lot for the encouragement..:D
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With Obama's plans to put everyone in college, e-sports will soon gain acceptance as a respectable academic discipline. You'll see.
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16974 Posts
On July 18 2009 00:29 MoltkeWarding wrote: With Obama's plans to put everyone in college, e-sports will soon gain acceptance as a respectable academic discipline. You'll see.
I think that's an absolutely horrid idea. Not everyone needs a college education :/
Also I'm going to lunch now XD
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On July 17 2009 23:54 SilverSkyLark wrote:Show nested quote +On July 17 2009 23:53 Empyrean wrote: You're literally interested in nothing but pro-gaming? Well, not really....
Oh the irony. LoLz.
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On July 18 2009 00:20 Naib wrote: Whine about it to the other filipinos @ GArena, maybe they'll have an idea.

Anyways, to OP, I wouldn't recommend continuing your assignment using progaming. Sure; you may be interested in it and I'm pretty sure you have a lot to say and talk about, however there are a few things you should consider (as many people have mentioned in this thread):
-It's better to choose a topic you are still interested in and is easy to find research material on (in my case, I may choose stuff like religion or philosophy).
-Since you are in school, and grades are important, it's better to work on something you are more confident in getting a better score in (not necessarily something boring).
I just finished the IB Diploma program. For those of you don't who know it, part of the program is a 4000 word essay (Extended Essay). Me and a friend of mine did our EEs in English A1 (highest level of English offered). His topic was "Family." My topic was "Religion." He didn't like his topic so much because he didn't think it was bold enough. He therefore changed his topic to "Sex." Note that we had around 7 months or so to work on this essay. My friend worked hard from the beginning and finished his essay on "Family" at around December (3 months before deadline). He then decided to change his topic to "Sex." Obviously he was discouraged by everyone (including the teacher who said that his original essay was pretty good). He ignored everyone's warnings (saying that everyone else wasn't as open-minded as he was) and worked on his new topic anyways. He finished it pretty quickly and handed in several drafts to the teacher to look through over and over again. I, on the other hand, got pretty lazy and began working on my essay a week before the deadline. It was moderated overseas though. I got a full letter grade higher than my friend. Anyways my point with this story is that it's not always the best choice to work on a topic that you really really want to stick to (ironic that you're calling your teacher closed minded isn't it ). Anyways, just my 2 cents
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does boxers biography count as a book source?
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Good luck man. Actually if you do end up completing this paper... I would definitely like to take a read lol.
Just out of curiosity... what level of education is this? High school? College?
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On July 18 2009 01:03 rally_point wrote: Good luck man. Actually if you do end up completing this paper... I would definitely like to take a read lol.
Just out of curiosity... what level of education is this? High school? College? College..:D
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It's school...just do it and get that shit over with ;p
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United States24648 Posts
I can recommend some books on the topic of progaming... for example: this book.
More seriously, you can take riptide/nony's advice or change topic (I recommend the latter unless you really want to do the former).
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is awesome32274 Posts
I was going to post something but NonY already explained it :p
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your topic doesn't fit the requirements of the assignment, which is find 10 books. pick a new topic imo. it sucks tho cuz i agree its much easier to write about something your interested in.
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BOXER BOOK DUH.
But obviously you can't just write about Starleague and Korea off the top of your head citing internet forums. It's university bitch, not grade 10 english class
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Other than the Boxer autobiography, there is the WCG documentary from National Geographic (the one following Xellos) if you need to source some facts about progaming. I'm not sure how credible/preferred documentaries are as sources, but they've got to be at least marginal (way above Internet, above local newspaper, above encyclopedia?).
Of course the majority of the sources are going to be the books and reputable journal articles on sports/gaming psychology, culture, and/or business.
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On July 18 2009 02:20 MiniRoman wrote: BOXER BOOK DUH.
But obviously you can't just write about Starleague and Korea off the top of your head citing internet forums. It's university bitch, not grade 10 english class
thats what i was going to say, 9 more books to find, gl
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On July 17 2009 23:56 Aegraen wrote: Hmmm, can't you use Boxers biography it details a lot about early pro-gaming. There are probably publications about MLG and how that got started also. It isn't as daunting as you might imagine. This
Boxer's biography has been translated to English, and you can read it somewhere on the internet. I had it bookmarked I think...
There's probably other books or articles about progaming, try to find ones that are translated or maybe even try to have someone (from TL ) help translate them for you.
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How is this an English topic? Isn't this Sociology?
I wrote a paper about why E-Sports has succeeded in Korea but did not reach the same success outside of Korea. It's pretty hard to find good sources, but I think I got two or three that weren't newspaper. The class was pretty much a joke tho, so it didn't matter.
+ Show Spoiler +Borland, John, Kanellos, Michael. (2004) “South Korea leads the way.” CNET News Accessed October 27th 2008 <http://news.cnet.com/South-Korea-leads-the- way/2009-1034_3-5261393.html> [Cable Television Channel Official Channel] Accessed: Oct. 27, 2008 <http://www.ongamenet.com/> [Cable Television Channel Official Channel] Accessed: Oct. 27, 2008 <http://www.mbcgame.co.kr/> DreamHack. (2008) “What is DreamHack?” Accessed: November 24th 2008 <http://www.dreamhack.se/dhw08/facts.php?id=8> Hwan, Lim Yo. (2004) Crazy As Me Accessed: November 24th 2008 <http://boxerbiography.blogspot.com/2006/11/table-of-contents.html> Lee, Daniel. (2008) “Sep 24, 2008 Nony vs. Dinot.” [English Commentated Game Featuring ex-eStro Coach, Daniel Lee] Accessed: November 24th 2008 <http://scforall.com/sctv/sc_tv01.asp?mNum=s01> under “Tournament” Marchetti, Nino. (2007) Gaming for Dollars: The Fatal1ty Interview Digital Trends Accessed: Oct. 27, 2008 <http://news.digitaltrends.com/feature/75/gaming-for- dollars-the-fatal1ty-interview> Patry, Guillaume. (2004) “Living the Dream: Life as a Professional Gamer” Geartest Accessed October 27th 2008 <http://geartest.com/sections/games/professional_gamer.html> Plott, Nick. (2008) “Jaedong vs Flash - Game 1 [Final Round].” [English Commentary From South Korea by Professional Caster, Nick Plott] Accessed November 24th 2008 <http://www.gomtv.net/videos/249> Purcell, Craig. (1988) Video-Game Mania: Passing Phase or Permanent Addiction? The New York Times Accessed: October 27th 2008 <http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE6DA103DF932A25751C 1A96E948260> Schiesel, Seth. (2007) Courts Block Laws on Video Game Violence The New York Times Accessed: October 27th 2008 <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/21/arts/television/21vide.html> SKSports. (N.D.) “Players.” [Rooster for a Professional eSports Team] Accessed: November 24th 2008 <http://www.sksports.net/T1/Players/T1Players.asp> Weemee. (2008) “Once upon a time in America, Some people developed the Wild West. Nowadays, Some people carve out a fortune in the E-sporting world.” Accessed: November 24th 2008 <http://weemee.com/weemee/issue/2>
Your best bet is trying to find interviews. Or do you own interviews, if you can get Tasteless/Artosis to give you some of his time.
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On July 17 2009 23:43 LuckyFool wrote: Yeah I couldn't imagine writing about progaming in an English class- yow.
I hate professors who are obsessed with book sources for these kinds of papers, times have changed, many online publications are just as credible and legit.
cause its easy. I wrote one about SC and esports got an A on it. granted My proff was kick ass and did not care to much about book scources..
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There is nothing wrong with your english Professor. Your prof gave you an assignment and expects you to complete it following his/her guidelines. If your topic does not satisfy the requirements then it doesnt mean your prof is narrow minded.
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Write 9 more books by yourself and publish them to finish the assignment.
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Well if she wasn't too damn strict about the sources...~_~ Well I think I can talk her to making me use boxers autobiography and the nat geo feature as my main sources..
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Go with "Crazy like Me" by Lim
There is also that national geographic doc and stuff idk. Google is your friend
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its easier to write about boring stuff with many resources than interesting stuff with few resources, even though interest in the topic definitely makes the work seem less stressful.
feigning interest for this paper might be good practice for bullshitting later on.
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On July 18 2009 09:51 SilverSkyLark wrote: Well if she wasn't too damn strict about the sources...~_~ Well I think I can talk her to making me use boxers autobiography and the nat geo feature as my main sources..
its college, sources are important... get use to it. she probably wont change her mind if you cant find 10 books/scholarly journals/(whatever she requires)
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Remember that you don't have to get books exactly about pro-gaming to make them work as sources. I recently wrote a paper on intercollegiate eSports in the context of a cultural performance, and was able to use other areas like psychology and linguistics in my argument. There were also a lot of books on sports themselves -- I recommend using those and comparing it to the state of eSports. I was able to compare the beginnings of intercollegiate sports and of intercollegiate eSports, so it was pretty cool.
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I agree with riptide and liquid nony. If you do decide you want to use the NGC docu as a source and you want the script, or if you want to know how we verify our claims to see if it qualifies as a good source, drop me a PM.
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Even though it's about CS, you could use the book Game Boys as a reference
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On July 21 2009 17:48 hazelynut wrote: Remember that you don't have to get books exactly about pro-gaming to make them work as sources. I recently wrote a paper on intercollegiate eSports in the context of a cultural performance, and was able to use other areas like psychology and linguistics in my argument. There were also a lot of books on sports themselves -- I recommend using those and comparing it to the state of eSports. I was able to compare the beginnings of intercollegiate sports and of intercollegiate eSports, so it was pretty cool. thanks for reminding me about the CSL.:D Can't believe I missed that one..~_~
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