Social Exclusion, Power, and Video Game Play

New Research in Digital Media and Technology

Edited by David G. Embrick; Talmadge J. Wright and Andras Lukacs

While many books and articles are emerging on the new area of game studies and the application of computer games to learning, therapeutic, military, and entertainment environments, few have attempted to contextualize the importance of virtual play within a broader social, cultural, and political environment that raises the question of the significance of work, play, power, and inequalities in the modern world. Studies tend to concentrate on the content of virtual games, but few have questioned how power is produced or reproduced by publishers, gamers, or even social media; how social exclusion (based on race, class, or gender) in the virtual environment is reproduced from the real world; and how actors are able to use new media to transcend their fears, anxieties, prejudices, and assumptions. The articles presented by the contributors in this volume represent cutting-edge research in the area of critical game play with the hope of drawing attention to the need for more studies that are both sociological and critical.

Lexington Books

Pages: 282 • Trim: 6¼ x 9¼

978-0-7391-3860-1 • Hardback • March 2012 • $126.00 • (£97.00)

978-0-7391-3861-8 • Paperback • October 2013 • $54.99 • (£42.00)

978-0-7391-3862-5 • eBook • March 2012 • $52.00 • (£40.00)

Subjects: Social Science / Sociology / General, Games & Activities / Role Playing & Fantasy, Games & Activities / Video & Electronic, Social Science / Anthropology / General, Social Science / Media Studies, Social Science / Popular Culture, Technology & Engineering / Social Aspects, Technology & Engineering / Telecommunications

Social Exclusion, Power, and Video Game Play

New Research in Digital Media and Technology

Hardback

Paperback

eBook

Summary

While many books and articles are emerging on the new area of game studies and the application of computer games to learning, therapeutic, military, and entertainment environments, few have attempted to contextualize the importance of virtual play within a broader social, cultural, and political environment that raises the question of the significance of work, play, power, and inequalities in the modern world. Studies tend to concentrate on the content of virtual games, but few have questioned how power is produced or reproduced by publishers, gamers, or even social media; how social exclusion (based on race, class, or gender) in the virtual environment is reproduced from the real world; and how actors are able to use new media to transcend their fears, anxieties, prejudices, and assumptions. The articles presented by the contributors in this volume represent cutting-edge research in the area of critical game play with the hope of drawing attention to the need for more studies that are both sociological and critical.

Details

Lexington Books

Pages: 282 • Trim: 6¼ x 9¼

978-0-7391-3860-1 • Hardback • March 2012 • $126.00 • (£97.00)

978-0-7391-3861-8 • Paperback • October 2013 • $54.99 • (£42.00)

978-0-7391-3862-5 • eBook • March 2012 • $52.00 • (£40.00)

Subjects: Social Science / Sociology / General, Games & Activities / Role Playing & Fantasy, Games & Activities / Video & Electronic, Social Science / Anthropology / General, Social Science / Media Studies, Social Science / Popular Culture, Technology & Engineering / Social Aspects, Technology & Engineering / Telecommunications

Author

David Embrick is assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at Loyola University, Chicago.

J. Talmadge Wright is associate professor in the Department of Sociology at Loyola University, Chicago.

Andras Lukacs is a PhD candidate at Loyola University, Chicago.

Table of Contents

Part I. Introduction
Chapter 1: Introduction to Social Exclusion, Power and Video Game Play
David G. Embrick, J. Talmadge Wright and Andras Lukacs
Part II. Social-Psychological Implications of Virtual Play
Chapter 2: Marking the Territory: Grand Theft Auto IV as a Playground for Masculinities
Elena Bertozzi
Chapter 3: Discursive Engagements in World of Warcraft: A Semiotic Analysis of Player Relationships
Elizabeth ErkenBrack
Chapter 4: The Intermediate Ego – The Location of the Mind at Play
Vanessa Long
Chapter 5: Producing the Social in Virtual Realms
J. Talmadge Wright
Part III. Social Inequalities in Video Game Spaces: Race, Gender, and Virtual Play
Chapter 6: Racism in Gaming: Connecting Extremist and Mainstream Expressions of White Supremacy
Jessie Daniels and Nick LaLone
Chapter 7: Worlds of Whiteness: Race and Character Creation in Online Games
David Dietrich
Chapter 8: Gendered Pleasures: The Wii, Embodiment and Technological Desire
Adrienne Massanari
Chapter 9: Sincere Fictions of Whiteness in Virtual Worlds: How Fantasy Massively Multiplayer Online Games Perpetuate Colorblind, White Supremacist Ideology
Joel Ritsema and Bhoomi Thakore
Chapter 10: The Goddess Paradox: Hyper-resonance Shaping Gender Experiences in MMORPGs
Zek Cypress Valkyrie
Part IV. Game Fans Speak Out
Chapter 11: To Play is to Design: An Analysis of Player/Designer Interactions in World of Warcraft
Sean C. Duncan
Chapter 12: Western Otaku: Games Crossing Cultures
Mia Consalvo
Chapter 13: Beyond the Virtual Realm: Fallout fans, Producers, and the Troublesome Issue of Ownership in Videogame Fandom
R.M. Milner
Part V. Summary and Conclusions
Chapter 14: Conclusion
Andras Lukacs, David G. Embrick, and J. Talmadge Wright

Reviews

As an increasingly popular pastime, video gaming is big business. Well-founded claims of gaming's economic and social importance still begin the many academic books appearing now on the subject--including the book under review--suggesting that video gaming's legitimacy as a research topic is still a source of anxiety. Most work in this burgeoning field is devoted to games as objects--their genres, aesthetics, and technologies. In contrast, this collection of essays investigates the gamers--their motivations, habits, and interactions. Embrick, Wright, and Lukacs (all, Loyola Univ., Chicago) are, respectively, sociologists (Embrick and Wright) and an informatics specialist. They organize the 12 main essays, most by young scholars, into sections that look at "social-psychological implications," "social inequalities" (e.g., gender), and "game fans." Though they have different disciplinary backgrounds, the contributors share a focus on players' social construction--as group actors in World of Warcraft, as individual consciousnesses, as concerned consumers. The power and social exclusion discussed in the text takes place in the worlds of gaming. Thinking about the relation of those ludic politics to the more painful ones of the real world is left largely to the reader. Summing Up: Recommended.
— Choice Reviews

Social Exclusion, Power, and Video Game Play is a timely collection of essays on virtual worlds and online games. The contributors challenge sociologists (and others) to take these spaces of social interaction seriously, as both revealing and shaping broader cultural dynamics. By exploring issues including the psychology of online identity, the impact of racism and sexism, and relationships between design, play, and fandom, this book helps bring questions of power and inequality to the fore in debates over the impact of online games in virtual-world and physical-world contexts, both very 'real.'
— Tom Boellstorff, University of California, Irvine and author of Coming of Age in Second Life: An Anthropologist Explores the Virtually Human