Living in a culturally diverse society, it is increasingly necessary for people to appreciate cultural diversity, respect cultural difference, and value equality (“Teaching Tolerance – Diversity, Equity and Justice,” n.d.). However, many schools basing on the traditional formal schooling system often face limitations in delivering effective social justice education (Apple, 2011; Spring, 2014). Fortunately, many informal learning institutions or organizations try to highlight their commitment to value cultural diversity and raise people’s awareness of social justice. For instance, in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, exhibition design factors, encompassing authentic historical objects, simulated environments, sounds, lights, multimedia, …show more content…
Although Darfur Is Dying is no longer available after conducting the research, the findings from the study might still be valuable to indicate the effectiveness of addressing social issues through using other similar digital games and suggestions for the further studies. For example, according to participants’ responses from the questionnaires and during the interviews, the majority of participants believed that the game is appropriate to teach social issues and mentioned that they had a better understanding of serious situations in Darfur and produced sympathy and empathy for people who live in there. However, participants also stated weaknesses of this game, including the quality of this serious game (unattractive and poor quality of graphics and narratives) and the limited scenarios about refugee life in Darfur illustrated in the game.
Darfur Is Dying was created in 2006, and the poor quality of the game might be caused by the limited technology at that time. According to the limitations of the study, further studies are needed to use the latest digital games to see whether the playing experience related to the quality of graphics and simulation might influence the effectiveness of using digital games to teach for social justice and to raise people’s awareness of injustice