Sarah Lynne Bowman

Sarah Lynne Bowman, Ph.D. is a Senior Lecturer for the Department of Game Design. She is a founding member of the Transformative Play Initiative, which studies role-playing games as vehicles for personal and social change. The author of The Functions of Role-playing Games: How Participants Create Community, Solve Problems, and Explore Identity, Bowman also serves as a co-editor for the International Journal of Role-Playing (2015-) and Nordiclarp.org (2015-). http://www.sarahlynnebowman.com/

Sarah Lynne Bowman is a scholar, game designer, and event organizer. She is currently a Senior Lecturer for the Department of Game Design. She received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Texas at Austin in Radio-TV-Film, as well as her Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Dallas in Arts and Humanities. In addition to Game Design, Bowman has taught in the Humanities, English, and Communication. She was also Program Coordinator for Peace & Conflict Studies in the Interdisciplinary Studies department at Austin Community College from 2020-2022. At the Department of Game Design, Bowman is a founding member of the Transformative Play Initiative research group, which investigates the design and practice of role-playing games as vehicles for personal and social change.

Bowman publishes regularly in scholarly and popular media about the transformative power of role-playing. McFarland Press published her dissertation in 2010 as The Functions of Role-playing Games: How Participants Create Community, Solve Problems, and Explore Identity. She has served as an editor for the peer-reviewed journal the International Journal of Role-Playing (2015-), the peer-reviewed Wyrd Con Companion Book (2012-2015), and the popular science magazine Nordiclarp.org. More information at www.sarahlynnebowman.com.

Bowman's current research interests include:

• Leisure, educational, and therapeutic role-playing games designed for transformative impacts, including best practices of design and measuring effects;
• Safety, community building, and conflict transformation;
• The phenomenon of bleed in role-playing game studies;
• Application of psychoanalytic and social psychological theories of identity to role-playing;
• Ritual theory, depth psychology, and role-playing, including shadow work, individuation, and archetypal enactment;
• Spirituality and consciousness in games;
• Intimacy and relationship dynamics in play.