Rachel Kowert

Research Psychologist
Founder, Psychgeist
Author

Dr. Kowert's keynote is titled Loud Misogyny, Silent Support: The lasting influence of #GamerGate on gaming cultures

Rachel Kowert, Ph.D, is a research psychologist, Research Director of Take This , visiting professor at the University of York (UK), and founder of Psychgeist , a multimedia content production studio for the science of games and pop culture. She is a world-renowned researcher on the uses and effects of digital games, including their impact on physical, social, and psychological well-being. In her current work, she serves as one of the primary investigators on the first grant-funded project from the Department of Homeland Security about games and extremism. She has spoken about her work to thousands of people across the globe, including the United States Congress, United Nations, and Department of Homeland Security. An award-winning author, she has published a variety of books and scientific articles relating to the psychology of games and, more recently, the relationship between games and mental health specifically. She also serves as the editor of the Routledge Debates in Media Studies series and the series from ETC Press, The Psychgeist of Pop Culture . In 2021, Dr. Kowert was chosen as a member of The Game Awards Future Class, representing the best and brightest of the future of video games. Dr. Kowert has been featured in various media outlets, including NPR , the Washington Post , the Wall Street Journal , the Atlantic , New York Times , and Wired Magazine. To learn more about Rachel and her work, visit www.rkowert.com

Kishonna L. Gray

Professor of Racial Justice and Technology, School of Information, University of Michigan
Director, Intersectional Tech Lab, School of Information, University of Michigan
Faculty Associate, Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society, Harvard University

Dr. Kishonna L. Gray (@kishonnagray) is a Professor in the School of Information at the University of Michigan. She is an interdisciplinary, intersectional, digital media scholar whose areas of research include identity, performance and online environments, embodied deviance, cultural production, video games, and Black Cyberfeminism. Dr. Gray is the author of Intersectional Tech: Black Users in Digital Gaming (LSU Press, 2020). She is also the author of Race, Gender, & Deviance in Xbox Live (Routledge, 2014), and the co-editor of two volumes on culture and gaming: Feminism in Play (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2018) and Woke Gaming (University of Washington Press, 2018). Dr. Gray has published in a variety of outlets across disciplines and has also featured in public outlets such as The Guardian, The Telegraph , and The New York Times .

Anita Sarkeesian

Media Critic
Creator,  Tropes vs. Women in Video Games

Anita Sarkessian is the creator of the award-winning  Tropes vs. Women in Video Games , a critically acclaimed video series exploring the history of women's representation in gaming that has garnered nearly 14 million views on YouTube alone. Her work as a media critic, public speaker, and filmmaker who thrives at the intersection of digital culture, accessibility, and social justice helped create a new lexicon and sparked a paradigm-shifting conversation about improving the representations of magrinalized people in video games. She has been featured in The New Yorker , on Good Morning America , and The Colbert Report as well as being named one of TIME's 100 Most Influental People .