susana ruiz
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Data Bodies Qareen

Data Bodies - Qareen

“Data Bodies - Qareen is an Arab-futuristic single-player narrative videogame set in 2211. The location is the Middle, a sanctuary for global refugees in the Arab world. You play as a Palestinian archivist uncovering histories of liberation of her people. While humans in the Middle are constrained by the Layer, the techno-social condition that limits what is visible and knowable, you acquire glitch powers to break through the Layer. With your sidekick bot, you are on the quest to see and learn the truth about uprisings, rebellions, and liberation struggles.”

Data Bodies - Qareen will be the first of its kind as an Arabfuturistic game that is, on the one hand, a future fantasy and, on the other hand, historically grounded in issues affecting the world today, including Palestine and the rest of the Middle East.

The project is a creative and methodological experiment that centers the Arab world as a site for social and political revolution. We utilize a project by Sakr called R-Shief – a vast archive of billions of social media posts related to social movements since 2008 and in many languages.

CREDITS

Directed and Produced by Laila Shereen Sakr and Susana Ruiz

TEAM

Joshua Bevan, Haetham Alhaddad, Amina Mahmoud Ali Nada Ebada, Naiyra Alkady, Dai Ashraf, Jenn Leung, Adel Abdella, II, DJ Saliah, Yulia Gilich, Rana Zaky, DJ Duncan, Mustapha Bouchaqour, Alessia Cecchet, and Sai Siddartha Maram.

We thank the the American Council of Learned Societies Digital Extension Grant, the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) Arts Research Institute, and the UCSC Committee on Research for their generous support.