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Inter: Re-Active

Inner-city youth in Los Angeles learn to create non-violent video games.

A digital studio in the heart of LA's Echo Park neighborhood is where underprivileged high school kids have been learning to make their own video games. Because electronic games have such impact on youth culture, the Inter: Re-Active program provides an alternative to the violent video games found in public arcades, computers, and the web. The students have been working on an ambitious collaborative project, developing artistic and vocational skills, and learning to create a video game that explores the Latino immigrant experience in Los Angeles. The rigorous media literacy program is taught in partnership with UCLA's Department of Design and Media Arts and originally started with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.

For the last two years, 35 students, most of whom are migrants from Mexico, Guatemala, and El Salvador, have been learning skills like Flash animation, Photoshop, bit mapping, and sound design. By integrating an ambitious storytelling project with digital technology, the students are creating an alternative non-violent videogame that should be finished and available on the Internet and CD Rom in June. The students researched the history of the Americas, and by drawing on the immigrant experience in Los Angeles, they created a crew of 12 animated archetypal characters. The focus was on creating their own fictional stories, based on real life. They developed a background story for each one, by drawing on personal experiences such as the housing conditions faced by the students' migrant families in Los Angeles.

In the process of creating characters and story lines, and incorporating the flavors of different LA neighborhoods, the students also learned the digital technologies essential to building a video game. As part of UCLA's ArtsBridge program, students from UCLA's Department of Design and Media Arts and various artists have taught them at every phase of the project. During this hands-on process, the students have learned photography, designed sound effects, learned how to do digital video, digital editing, Flash animation, Photoshop and bit mapping.

Juan Devis, the lead artist for the project, says that the students have become very analytical and sophisticated about the digital technologies, and some have even acquired enough skills to begin working in Web design, or as production assistants in movie studios in Hollywood. He says the project's premise is that "violence" does not just mean guns and physical brutality, but also includes "cultural whitewashing," or violence against race, identity, and culture. "The technology is a tool to explore these issues, not as an end in itself. One of our goals is not to be so infatuated with the technology, but to use it to bring the content to life."

CONTACTS

Jessica Irish: Program Director for Inter:Reactive
OnRamp Arts
534 E. Edgeware Rd.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
Phone: (213) 481-2395

Juan Devis: Lead Artist for Inter:Re-active
OnRamp Arts
534 E. Edgeware Rd.
Los Angeles, CA 90026
Phone: (213) 481-2395

LINKS

This story aired on The Osgood File on the CBS Radio Network.

WCBS Newsradio 880 in New York City features an archive of transcripts of stories broadcast on The Osgood File.

OnRamp Arts features its Inter:Reactive project.

The Center for Media Literacy has resources to teach the subject to youth and adults.

Citizens for Media Literacy promotes citizenship through media literacy.

ACFnewsource provides links to sites maintained by other organizations for informational purposes only. ACFnewsource has no responsibility for the accuracy of the content of any Web site to which a link is provided. The groups included on the list do not necessarily reflect the views of ACFnewsource.

University of Oregon Museum of Art Receives a Grant From the Oregon Community Foundation

University of California, Irvine
3200 Berkeley Place, Irvine, CA 92697-5500
949.824.5119