Playing Oppression

A striking analysis of popular board games' roots in imperialist reasoning—and why the future of play depends on reckoning with it.Board games conjure up images of innocuously enriching entertainment: family game nights, childhood pastimes, cooperative board games centered around resource management...

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Autori principali: Flanagan, Mary, Jakobsson, Mikael
Natura: Online
Lingua:inglese
Pubblicazione: The MIT Press 2023
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Accesso online:ONIX_20230731_9780262373715_12
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author Flanagan, Mary
Jakobsson, Mikael
author_browse Flanagan, Mary
Jakobsson, Mikael
author_facet Flanagan, Mary
Jakobsson, Mikael
author_sort Flanagan, Mary
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description A striking analysis of popular board games' roots in imperialist reasoning—and why the future of play depends on reckoning with it.Board games conjure up images of innocuously enriching entertainment: family game nights, childhood pastimes, cooperative board games centered around resource management and strategic play. Yet in Playing Oppression, Mary Flanagan and Mikael Jakobsson apply the incisive frameworks of postcolonial theory to a broad historical survey of board games to show how these seemingly benign entertainments reinforce the logic of imperialism.Through this lens, the commercialized version of Snakes and Ladders takes shape as the British Empire's distortion of Gyan Chaupar (an Indian game of spiritual knowledge), and early twentieth-century “trading games” that fêted French colonialism are exposed for how they conveniently sanitized its brutality while also relying on crudely racist imagery. These games' most explicitly abhorrent features may no longer be visible, but their legacy still lingers in the contemporary Eurogame tendency to exalt (and incentivize) cycles of exploration, expansion, exploitation, and extermination.An essential addition to any player's bookshelf, Playing Oppression deftly analyzes this insidious violence and proposes a path forward with board games that challenge colonialist thinking and embrace a much broader cultural imagination.
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-1115782024-04-14T13:03:29Z Playing Oppression Flanagan, Mary Jakobsson, Mikael board game history colonialism critical analysis cultural studies Eurogames game design game studies interaction criticism post-colonialism thema EDItEUR::W Lifestyle, Hobbies and Leisure::WD Hobbies, quizzes and games::WDM Indoor games::WDMG Board, table top and strategy games thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTR National liberation and independence thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology A striking analysis of popular board games' roots in imperialist reasoning—and why the future of play depends on reckoning with it.Board games conjure up images of innocuously enriching entertainment: family game nights, childhood pastimes, cooperative board games centered around resource management and strategic play. Yet in Playing Oppression, Mary Flanagan and Mikael Jakobsson apply the incisive frameworks of postcolonial theory to a broad historical survey of board games to show how these seemingly benign entertainments reinforce the logic of imperialism.Through this lens, the commercialized version of Snakes and Ladders takes shape as the British Empire's distortion of Gyan Chaupar (an Indian game of spiritual knowledge), and early twentieth-century “trading games” that fêted French colonialism are exposed for how they conveniently sanitized its brutality while also relying on crudely racist imagery. These games' most explicitly abhorrent features may no longer be visible, but their legacy still lingers in the contemporary Eurogame tendency to exalt (and incentivize) cycles of exploration, expansion, exploitation, and extermination.An essential addition to any player's bookshelf, Playing Oppression deftly analyzes this insidious violence and proposes a path forward with board games that challenge colonialist thinking and embrace a much broader cultural imagination. 2023-07-31T10:53:39Z 2023-07-31T10:53:39Z 2023 book ONIX_20230731_9780262373715_12 9780262373715 9780262047913 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/111578 eng The MIT Press image/jpeg n/a https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/11779.001.0001 The MIT Press The MIT Press 10.7551/mitpress/11779.001.0001 10.7551/mitpress/11779.001.0001 ae0cf962-f685-4933-93d1-916defa5123d 9780262373715 9780262047913 The MIT Press 240 Cambridge open access
spellingShingle board game history
colonialism
critical analysis
cultural studies
Eurogames
game design
game studies
interaction criticism
post-colonialism
thema EDItEUR::W Lifestyle, Hobbies and Leisure::WD Hobbies, quizzes and games::WDM Indoor games::WDMG Board, table top and strategy games
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTR National liberation and independence
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology
Flanagan, Mary
Jakobsson, Mikael
Playing Oppression
title Playing Oppression
title_full Playing Oppression
title_fullStr Playing Oppression
title_full_unstemmed Playing Oppression
title_short Playing Oppression
title_sort playing oppression
topic board game history
colonialism
critical analysis
cultural studies
Eurogames
game design
game studies
interaction criticism
post-colonialism
thema EDItEUR::W Lifestyle, Hobbies and Leisure::WD Hobbies, quizzes and games::WDM Indoor games::WDMG Board, table top and strategy games
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTR National liberation and independence
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology
topic_facet board game history
colonialism
critical analysis
cultural studies
Eurogames
game design
game studies
interaction criticism
post-colonialism
thema EDItEUR::W Lifestyle, Hobbies and Leisure::WD Hobbies, quizzes and games::WDM Indoor games::WDMG Board, table top and strategy games
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHT History: specific events and topics::NHTR National liberation and independence
thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology
url ONIX_20230731_9780262373715_12
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