Jack Fennimore

Bio

John J. Fennimore is an award-winning writer and scholar. He is intrigued by the commercial aspects of video games, the psychology of players, the infrastructure of virtual worlds, and the power dynamic between players and video game corporations. He is a member of the NC State chapter of the Rhetoric Society of America and created the virtual reality social space for Carolina Rhetoric Conference 2022. He also contributes to the Mobile Gaming Research Lab’s database of retro mobile games with Dr. Adriana de Souza e Silva. He was born and raised in Milwaukee and is a graduate of the Media Studies master’s program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His master’s thesis explores the impact of cosmetic items on the gameplay and game design of Fortnite. Before coming to NC State, he worked as a contributor for the gaming, entertainment, and news sections of real-time information platform Heavy.com. His over four-year career at Heavy was one of the longest in the company’s program and he contributed over 1,000 articles and gained over 11 million pageviews. He’s presented at the Midwest Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference 2020 & 2021, the DePaul University Pop Culture Conference 2019 & 2021, and Global Fusion 2019 where he won third place in the student paper competition. He published an article on the representation of hacker culture and hacktivism in Watch Dogs 2 in the Czech Republic’s Mediální studia. When he has spare time, he likes to ride bikes, walk among the trees, play video games, watch YouTube videos, and cook (he makes a mean aglio e olio). His favorite games are Hades, Bloodborne, Bayonetta 2, Nioh 2, Undertale, and Yoshi’s Island.

Publications

Fennimore, J. J. (2021). “Who watches the watch dogs? How Watch Dogs 2 represents hacker culture and hacktivism.” Mediální studia 15(1), 43-61. ISSN 2464-4846. https://www.medialnistudia.fsv.cuni.cz/.

Fennimore, J. J. (2019). “How a Disney Film Becomes a Video Game.” In A Celebration of Disney, edited by Emily Goldstein & Paul Booth, 52-61. San Francisco: Blurb.

Presentations

2021. Fennimore, John. “Who Watches the Watch Dogs? An Analysis of Watch Dogs 2’s Representation of Hacker Culture & Hacktivism,” Midwest Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI

2020. Fennimore, John. “Understanding Hypnospace Outlaw: What a Video Game about the Internet of 1999 Says About the Real-Life Internet of Today,” Midwest Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI

2020. Fennimore, John. “The American Dream World of Disneyland: The American Values of Disneyland and How They’re Used to Appeal to its Audience,” Urban Spaces, Creative Places: A Blueprint for the Humanities in the City, Marquette University Center for the Advancement of the Humanities, Milwaukee, WI

2019. Fennimore, John. “How Disneyland Went to the Land of the Rising Sun: A Historiography of Tokyo Disneyland,” Global Fusion, The University of Texas at Austin Department of Radio-Television-Film, Austin, TX

2019. Fennimore, John. “How a Disney Movie Becomes a Video Game” & “The Legacy of Shrek & Its Impact on Disney,” DePaul Pop Culture Conference: A Celebration of Disney, DePaul University, Chicago, IL