ABOUT

Jaroslav Švelch is associate professor of media studies at Charles University, Prague. He has published work on history and theory of computer games, and on humor in games and social media. In his first monograph Gaming the Iron Curtain: How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed the Medium of Computer Games (MIT Press, 2018), he traces the hidden histories of home computing and gaming in the former Soviet bloc. The book has earned the Computer History Museum Prize for 2019. His most recent book Player Vs. Monster: The Making and Breaking of Video Game Monstrosity (MIT Press, 2023) offers a cultural history and a critique of monstrous antagonists in computer and video games. He is currently researching the practices and values in the contemporary Czech game industry.