Endowed English professor connects literature and role-playing games

Emily Friedman never expected a media trend built around recorded role-playing games to shape her research career. But today, she is helping define the emerging world of Actual Play, a booming genre she describes as “the biggest thing people haven’t heard of.”

Friedman came to Auburn in 2009 to study 18th-century literature, but when COVID-19 shuttered the archives where she and her students were transcribing unpublished handwritten manuscripts, she turned her focus to the media she was consuming.

“I kept thinking about what I watched while I was running or doing laundry, and it was Actual Play,” she said. “At their core, these games are about telling stories together — and that’s exactly what I study.”

Friedman holds the Jean Wickstrom Liles Professorship in the College of Liberal Arts, an honor she says affirms the value of her academic contributions to a field unlike any other.

“It's an affirmation of my public-facing work,” she said. “We don’t always have a framework for research that falls outside books and academic journals, but that work matters. And the more I engage in public scholarship, the more I appreciate its ability to reach wide audiences.”

Following a new lead

As a book historian in the Department of English, Friedman studies how cultural works are created and shared, linking contemporary storytelling to its historical roots. Researching Actual Play and Tabletop Role-Playing Games like Dungeons & Dragons revealed a natural throughline to her previous body of scholarship, exploring how people create and share narratives across different media.

Friedman’s research has since connected her with creators, subject-matter experts and audiences around the world and given students new ways to think about creativity, collaboration and human expression. Her undergraduate courses on narrative and games are wildly popular, drawing students from all corners of campus.

One of the most rewarding parts of the journey has been the connections she has built and the relationships her students have formed with one another.

“The first time I taught my games class, students said what they loved most was stepping away from screens and being fully present while playing board games,” she said. “At a time when we’re increasingly concerned about the challenges of generative artificial intelligence, that’s become a real North Star for me. What I love about teaching games as cultural objects is their emphasis on experiences and works created by humans.”

Leading the conversation

But Friedman is not just teaching and researching — she's exploding onto the cultural scene as one of the foremost experts on Actual Play. She has become a sought-after voice in the field, appearing in media interviews, on podcasts and at conventions around the world and contributing to the entertainment website Polygon. She is also completing a book, slated for publication with MIT Press in 2028, designed to tell the twenty-year history of Actual Play for a wider readership.

“Public scholarship helps bridge specialized academic conversations and broader audiences,” she said. “Teaching was my first experience with that kind of work, and now I engage audiences far beyond the classroom. Auburn’s support has been essential in helping me pursue that mission.”

Currently, Friedman is serving as the Public Humanities Fellow at the Folger Shakespeare Library, a role that is helping her identify new ways to grow research and collaboration around playful media and game studies at Auburn. 

As Auburn’s resident gaming expert, she hosted a Common Book program event with Matthew Mercer, a celebrated voice actor and Game Master, as well as Big Bad Con, a nonprofit game convention that connects analog game designers with industry professionals.

Although her endowed position opens doors for public engagement, Friedman says its true value lies in providing a rare and valuable resource: the gift of time.

“As soon as it was awarded, it transformed the amount of time I was able to devote to both my students and finishing my next book,” she said. “In retrospect, it’s hard to imagine delivering my manuscript on time without the Lileses’ support.”