How a passion becomes a University of Melbourne PhD project

Life as a graduate researcher: Nellie Seale

Nellie Seale has combined her two passions – cultural institutions and games – into a unique PhD looking at how museums can use games to engage the public.

The connections might not be immediately obvious, but museums and games intersect in several ways, says PhD candidate Nellie Seale. For one thing, there is an increasing focus on collecting and exhibiting video games, and QR-code-enabled interactive experiences are becoming more popular in exhibitions.

“But we’re also seeing games as events inside the museum. I’ve been involved in a couple of projects, both through my PhD and outside of it, where we have taken an in-person roleplaying game and put it in a museum context.”

Proudly calling herself a “pragmatic researcher”, Nellie is completing a PhD (Engineering and IT) at the University of Melbourne. She is a member of the Human-Computer Interaction Group, which has a dedicated Games and Play theme.

She usually spends two days a week researching at home, then comes onto campus for three days, sitting with fellow researchers who are investigating how gameplay intersects with everything from artificial intelligence to ethics and YouTube content creators.

“It’s such a fun research group to be part of. There’s a lot of effort being put into cultivating a community, which for a PhD student is invaluable.”

Nellie’s PhD is relatively unique because she’s researching museums, but sits in a group that “doesn’t often have a lot to do with them”. She says the interdisciplinary approach strengthens her research.

Playing with culture

Nellie has had a long-standing passion for running games, and is the president and co-founder of Melbourne Megagames, which hosts day-long events that are based on board game mechanics, and involve anywhere from 30 to 200 players. “It’s the nerdiest thing I do,” she notes.

After studying art history and archaeology, Nellie realised she wanted to work in museums. Her plan was to embark on a PhD later in her career. But then the opportunity came up to work as a research assistant on a project investigating the popular roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons, which she regularly played.

“I worked with Dr Melissa Rogerson, and through that she asked me if I was interested in a PhD. I said I was, but that I really wanted to research museums.”

To Nellie’s surprise, Dr Rogerson said they could make such a project work, and the two of them drew up a proposal for a project that would investigate gameplay in museums.

“Initially I was a bit hesitant,” Nellie says. “But by the time I submitted my application, I was thinking that if I didn’t get approval, I’d be very upset! I really wanted to do it.”

Support for practical outcomes

During her time as a graduate researcher, Nellie has received a Wattle Fellowship and an Ingenium scholarship. The scholarship in particular was a “financial godsend”, she says, because it meant she didn’t have to spend as much time doing paid work outside her PhD as she otherwise would. But it has had other benefits too.

“It’s been valuable for making me feel like I’m right to be doing this research, that it’s something worth doing. I did get a bit anxious about museums and games not having that recognition,” she says.

“It has also been great for facilitating networking. It’s enabled me to travel to conferences and broaden my understanding of the field. I’ve been to so many events, almost none of which I would have attended without the help.”

Her research is already having an impact. Early in 2023, she partnered with the Hellenic Museum to run a game for visitors based on Dungeons & Dragons but tailored to the museum’s collection and inspired by ancient Greek myth. The museum loved it so much that they’re now investing in other games.

The next stage of her research is to interview museum staff and game designers from around the world, to understand the current state of gameplay in museums. Nellie also plans to produce a toolkit to support museums to run games to a high standard.

“I feel very privileged to be able to get to do this work. It’s really interesting and I really enjoy the research,” she says. “It’s like solving a puzzle with pieces that you don’t quite have yet, and getting to construct those and fit them together. It’s really rewarding.”

Learn more about a PhD in Engineering and IT