Dr Jack Denham

Teaching

I teach across many foundation year, undergraduate and postgraduate modules. I convene our undergraduate and postgraduate qualitative methods modules and a specialist third year option module called ‘Death’.

Research

As co-lead of the investigate.games research group, my work focuses on the sociology of video gaming. This includes how violence is consumed in play, how social interaction is lived in virtual spaces, and how social inequalities are reproduced or addressed in virtual media. Recent publications have included work on accessing educational value in mainstream video games, and how games are used to manage mental health. In partnership with Aesthetica Magazine and Aesthetica Short Film Festival, I run York’s annual (November) Games Lab.

Professional activities

Organising conferences and academic events

2020       Death and Culture III (at York St John)

2018       Death and Culture Conference 

2016       Death and Culture (three-day international conference)

2015       Marginal Death Research in the Social Sciences 

2010       The National Deviancy Conference (three-day international conference)

Memberships

I am a member of the British Society of Criminology, the Centre for URBan Research (CURB) and the Death and Culture Network.  I am also a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA).

Publications

Peer reviewed journal articles

Veal, C., Coward-Gibbs, M., Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2024). ‘You feel like you’ve found a place where you belong’: Symbolic Interactionism and Online Social Video Games in the Age of COVID-19. Games and Culture.

Spokes, M., Denham, J., Coward-Gibbs, M. & Veal, C. (2024). ‘I wasn’t me, grieving in my room. I was Spiderman’: Gaming, Loss and Self-Care following COVID-19. Mortality.

Mitman, T. & Denham, J. (2024). Into the Meme Stream: The Value and Spectacle of Internet Memes. New Media & Society.

Denham, J., Spokes, M., Coward-Gibbs, M. & Veal, C. (2023). Personal, Pedagogic Play: A Dialogic Model for Video Game Learning. Pedagogy, Culture & Society.

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2022). Little Data: Negotiating the New Normal with Idiosyncratic and Incomplete Datasets. International Journal of Social Research Methodology.

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2020). The Right to the Virtual City: Rural Retreatism in Open-World Video Games. New Media & Society 23:6 pp1567-1583.

Denham, J. Hirschler, S. & Spokes, M. (2019). The Reification of Structural Violence in Video Games. Crime, Media, Culture 17:1 pp85-103.

Denham, J. (2019). Collecting the Dead: Art, Antique and ‘Aura’ in Personal Collections of Murderabilia. Mortality. 25:3 pp332-347

Spokes, M. & Denham, J. (2019). Developing Interactive Elicitation: Social Desirability Bias and Capturing Play. The Qualitative Report. 24:4 pp781-794.

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2018). Thinking Outside the Murder Box. Virtual Violence and Pro-Social Action in Video Games. British Journal of Criminology. 39:3 pp737-755.

Denham, J. (2016). The Commodification of the Criminal Corpse: ‘Selective Memory’ in Posthumous Representations of Criminal. Mortality. 21:3 pp229-245.

Books

Spokes, M. Denham, J. & Lehmann, B. (2018). Death, Memorialization and Deviant Spaces. Bingley: Emerald.

Book chapters

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2023). Il diritto alla città virtuale: la regressione rurale nei videogiochi. In Bittanti, M. (ed). Reset: Politica e videogiochi. Milano: Mimesis Edizioni

Denham, J. (2023). The Staycation. The Sofa, Home. In Lynes, A., Kelly, C., & Treadwell, J. (eds). (2023). 50 Dark Destinations: Crime and Contemporary Tourism. Bristol: Policy Press

Denham, J. (2020). The commodification of the criminal corpse: ‘selective memory’ in posthumous representations of criminal. In Schrift, M. (ed). Criminal Bodies in the West: Iconography and Life after Death. Abingdon: Routledge.

Other

Denham, J. Spokes, M. & Hirschler, S. (2019). Video game violence is not the problem – the real world that inspires it is. The Conversation.

Denham, J. (2017). Dark Authenticities: Criminal Memorabilia and Consumer Culture. PhD Thesis, University of York.

Denham, J. (2016). A Book Review of William Corder and the Red Barn Murder: Journeys of the Criminal Body. Crime, Media, Culture. 13:3 pp385-387.

Denham, J. (2014). A Book Review of Digital Culture Industry: A History of Digital Distribution. Information, Communication, Society. 17:8 pp1055-1057.

Conference papers

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2020). The Right to the Virtual City: Rural Retreatism in Open-World Video Games. Spelunking, 22 July, York (online).

Denham, J. Hirschler, S. & Spokes, M. (2019). The Reification of Systemic Violence in Video Games. DiGRA, 6-10 August, Kyoto.

Spokes, M. Denham, J. & Lehmann, B. (2018). Death, Memorialization and Deviant Spaces. Death & Culture II, 6-7 September, York.

Denham, J. & Spokes, M. (2018). Thinking Outside the Murder Box. Virtual Violence and Pro-Social Action in Video Games. Playing Dead, 17 May, York.

Denham, J. (2016). The Commodification of the Corpse: ‘Selective Memory’ and a Lack of Authenticity in Posthumous Representations of the Criminal. Celebrity Studies Conference, 28-30 June, Amsterdam.

Denham, J. (2015). Doing Research at Crime Museums in the UK and USA. Museums Showoff, 3 Feb, London.

Denham, J. (2014). Murderabilia Museums: Bringing Death to Life through Exhibitions of Violent Crime. Museums Alive, 4-5 Nov, Leicester.