Well, this blog sure hasn’t been updated very often lately, but I hope you’ll forgive me — it’s been quite the busy past few months with a number of exciting new developments in my life.

Two weeks ago, I started my position as the C. Michael Armstrong Professor in Interactive Media Studies, as an Assistant Professor in Miami University’s School of Education, Health, and Society and Armstrong Institute for Interactive Media Studies. A bit of a mouthful, but a fun one! I’m still wondering how all of that will fit on my business card, to be honest, but thrilled to be here and starting a new chapter in my career. The folks at Miami have been supportive and excellent colleagues so far, and I’m looking forward to working with my fellow faculty in the Armstrong Institute for Interactive Media Studies.

That means, yes, I finished the dissertation, defended successfully on December 7th, followed shortly afterwards by my graduation. The defense meeting went swimmingly; the comments of my committee were greatly appreciated and helped to shape the final document that I deposited in the University of Wisconsin’s grad college the following week. I feel honored to have worked with all of them (Constance Steinkuehler, Kurt Squire, Dawnene Hassett, Erica Halverson, and James Paul Gee). Their guidance has profoundly shaped what I hope will be a productive academic career.

On top of that, Betty Hayes (at Arizona State University) and I recently signed a book contract with Peter Lang for a book we’re editing entitled Videogames, Affinity Spaces, and New Media Literacies, to appear in Peter Lang’s excellent New Literacies and Digital Epistemologies series. The book will focus on the productive learning and literacy practices that occur in the spaces around games (if you’ve browsed the rest of this site, you’ll see this has been an emphasis of mine for the last few years). We’ve got a great line-up of cutting edge education research to present in the book, and are very excited! More on this as it develops.

In my online life, I’m still around. I remind readers that I’m on Twitter much more often than I’m posting to this blog. I just started as a contributing writer for a great new media and culture blog based out of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, called Antenna. And, like many online, I’ve recently started a photo-a-day photoblog. Check any and all out whenever you’d like to see what I’m up to!

And, oh yeah, one more thing: Liz and I are now engaged. I proposed on New Year’s Day morning, and she said yes! We’re planning on nuptuals in summer of 2011. I’m a lucky, lucky guy.

In the next few months, expect a redesign of this site — a new job and a new state deserves at least a visual update — plus, hopefully, a more regular posting schedule. I’ve promised that in the past, I know, but I mean it this time!