2023
Mukherjee, Souvik
Ludonarrative Postcolonialism: Re-Playing the Colonial Discourse Book Section
In: Ghosal, Torsa (Ed.): Global Perspectives on Digital Literature: A Critical Introduction for the Twenty-First Century, Routledge, 2023, ISBN: 9781003214915.
Abstract | Links | Tags: Case studies, Literary framework, Ludonarrative, Postcolonialism, Video games
@incollection{Mukherjee2023d,
title = {Ludonarrative Postcolonialism: Re-Playing the Colonial Discourse},
author = {Souvik Mukherjee },
editor = {Torsa Ghosal},
url = {https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003214915-5/ludonarrative-postcolonialism-souvik-mukherjee
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003214915},
doi = {10.4324/9781003214915},
isbn = {9781003214915},
year = {2023},
date = {2023-06-22},
urldate = {2023-06-22},
booktitle = {Global Perspectives on Digital Literature: A Critical Introduction for the Twenty-First Century},
publisher = {Routledge},
abstract = {The relationship between stories and games has become seemingly more complicated in recent times with the emergence of digital games and other narrative forms that have a ludic (gamelike) character. Critical theoretical framework from Game Studies has thus been used to analyse earlier narrative media and theoretical framework from literary studies has been used to study games. What is remarkable, however, is that certain theoretical frameworks from literary studies have not made it into the discussions of games: one prominent omission is that of postcolonialism. As a literary framework, postcolonialism opens texts up to questions of inequality and facilitates reading against the grain from a subaltern position. Advancing emergent work on videogames and postcolonialism, this chapter shows how any reading of the ludonarrative digital text benefits from postcolonial reading strategies. Two case studies are considered. Both span multiple narrative media, and in both narratives, the postcolonial angle is a persistent presence which, as this chapter argues, continually disrupts and diversifies the reading(s) that are conventionally made available to us.},
keywords = {Case studies, Literary framework, Ludonarrative, Postcolonialism, Video games},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {incollection}
}
The relationship between stories and games has become seemingly more complicated in recent times with the emergence of digital games and other narrative forms that have a ludic (gamelike) character. Critical theoretical framework from Game Studies has thus been used to analyse earlier narrative media and theoretical framework from literary studies has been used to study games. What is remarkable, however, is that certain theoretical frameworks from literary studies have not made it into the discussions of games: one prominent omission is that of postcolonialism. As a literary framework, postcolonialism opens texts up to questions of inequality and facilitates reading against the grain from a subaltern position. Advancing emergent work on videogames and postcolonialism, this chapter shows how any reading of the ludonarrative digital text benefits from postcolonial reading strategies. Two case studies are considered. Both span multiple narrative media, and in both narratives, the postcolonial angle is a persistent presence which, as this chapter argues, continually disrupts and diversifies the reading(s) that are conventionally made available to us.
2021
Mukherjee, Souvik
Crab-Rangoons in Kyrat: (Re)Writing South-Asian History in Far Cry 4 Journal Article
In: Games and Culture, vol. 16, iss. 8, pp. 1065-1086, 2021, ISSN: 1555-4120.
Abstract | Links | Tags: Border-thinking, Minor history, Postcolonialism, South Asia, Subaltern pasts
@article{Mukherjee2021,
title = {Crab-Rangoons in Kyrat: (Re)Writing South-Asian History in Far Cry 4},
author = {Souvik Mukherjee},
doi = {10.1177/15554120211005240},
issn = {1555-4120},
year = {2021},
date = {2021-12-01},
journal = {Games and Culture},
volume = {16},
issue = {8},
pages = {1065-1086},
abstract = {Recent research has started focusing on the representation of history in videogames. Such representation is almost always of mainstream history and usually presented from a Western perspective. Set in a fictitious Himalayan kingdom in South Asia, Ubisoft’s Far Cry 4 is arguably a crucial example of how history is represented using Western and even colonial frameworks and where the narratives that do not emerge from conventional written history are almost always rendered invisible. Using the frameworks of Subaltern Studies and “border-thinking,” this essay attempts to unpack issues of Orientalism and “colonial difference”; it then engages with postcolonial digital humanities and postcolonial game studies to comment on how history is represented in videogames and how the neglected gaps and silences in the game are important in constructing the historiography in videogames. In the process, the essay engages in a debate with current notions of videogame-historiography.},
keywords = {Border-thinking, Minor history, Postcolonialism, South Asia, Subaltern pasts},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
Recent research has started focusing on the representation of history in videogames. Such representation is almost always of mainstream history and usually presented from a Western perspective. Set in a fictitious Himalayan kingdom in South Asia, Ubisoft’s Far Cry 4 is arguably a crucial example of how history is represented using Western and even colonial frameworks and where the narratives that do not emerge from conventional written history are almost always rendered invisible. Using the frameworks of Subaltern Studies and “border-thinking,” this essay attempts to unpack issues of Orientalism and “colonial difference”; it then engages with postcolonial digital humanities and postcolonial game studies to comment on how history is represented in videogames and how the neglected gaps and silences in the game are important in constructing the historiography in videogames. In the process, the essay engages in a debate with current notions of videogame-historiography.
Mukherjee, Souvik
Playful Maps of Empire: Colonial Cartography in Digital Games' Representation of Global History Journal Article
In: Memoria e Ricerca: Rivista di Storia Contemporanea, vol. 29, iss. 66, pp. 75-96, 2021, ISSN: 1127-0195.
Abstract | Links | Tags: Counterplay history, Gameplay experience, History of cartography, Postcolonialism, Videogame maps
@article{Mukherjee2021b,
title = {Playful Maps of Empire: Colonial Cartography in Digital Games' Representation of Global History},
author = {Souvik Mukherjee},
doi = {10.14647/99992},
issn = {1127-0195},
year = {2021},
date = {2021-01-01},
journal = {Memoria e Ricerca: Rivista di Storia Contemporanea},
volume = {29},
issue = {66},
pages = {75-96},
abstract = {This essay addresses the role of videogame maps in representing history in the last thirty years and how the game’s cartography influenced the construction of history and vice versa in videogames. Starting from the idea that perspective, topography and the environment are important in understanding the map and following some Derrida’s comments on the role of maps in portraying history in videogames, the author highlights different casestudies in which Eurocentric point of view around colonial cartography guided the videogame-design’s sector for many years. Finally, the author analyses new approaches of «counterplay history» used in recent videogames releases. For the development of these new videogames, the author points out the importance of postcolonial perspectives in making possible new ways of engagement with history’s representation throughout the gameplay experience.},
keywords = {Counterplay history, Gameplay experience, History of cartography, Postcolonialism, Videogame maps},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
This essay addresses the role of videogame maps in representing history in the last thirty years and how the game’s cartography influenced the construction of history and vice versa in videogames. Starting from the idea that perspective, topography and the environment are important in understanding the map and following some Derrida’s comments on the role of maps in portraying history in videogames, the author highlights different casestudies in which Eurocentric point of view around colonial cartography guided the videogame-design’s sector for many years. Finally, the author analyses new approaches of «counterplay history» used in recent videogames releases. For the development of these new videogames, the author points out the importance of postcolonial perspectives in making possible new ways of engagement with history’s representation throughout the gameplay experience.
2019
de Wildt, Lars; Apperley, Thomas H.; Clemens, Justin; Fordyce, Robbie; Mukherjee, Souvik
(Re-)Orienting the Video Game Avatar Journal Article
In: Games and Culture, vol. 15, iss. 8, pp. 962–981, 2019, ISSN: 1555-4120.
Abstract | Links | Tags: Avatars, Cultural appropriation, Diversity, Game culture, Postcolonialism
@article{deWildt2019,
title = {(Re-)Orienting the Video Game Avatar},
author = {Lars de Wildt and Thomas H. Apperley and Justin Clemens and Robbie Fordyce and Souvik Mukherjee},
doi = {10.1177/1555412019858890},
issn = {1555-4120},
year = {2019},
date = {2019-06-17},
urldate = {2019-06-17},
journal = {Games and Culture},
volume = {15},
issue = {8},
pages = {962–981},
abstract = {This article explores the cultural appropriation of the term avatar by Western tech culture and what this implies for scholarship of digital games, virtual worlds, social media, and digital cultures. The term has roots in the religious tradition of the Indian subcontinent and was subsequently imported into video game terminology during a period of widespread appropriation of Eastern culture by Californian tech industries. We argue that the use of the term was not a case of happenstance but a signaling of the potential for computing to offer a mystical or enchanted perspective within an otherwise secular world. This suggests that the concept is useful in game cultures precisely because it plays with the “otherness” of the term's original meaning. We argue that this indicates a fundamental hybridity to gaming cultures that highlight the need to add postcolonial perspectives to how issues of diversity and power in gaming cultures are understood.},
keywords = {Avatars, Cultural appropriation, Diversity, Game culture, Postcolonialism},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
This article explores the cultural appropriation of the term avatar by Western tech culture and what this implies for scholarship of digital games, virtual worlds, social media, and digital cultures. The term has roots in the religious tradition of the Indian subcontinent and was subsequently imported into video game terminology during a period of widespread appropriation of Eastern culture by Californian tech industries. We argue that the use of the term was not a case of happenstance but a signaling of the potential for computing to offer a mystical or enchanted perspective within an otherwise secular world. This suggests that the concept is useful in game cultures precisely because it plays with the “otherness” of the term's original meaning. We argue that this indicates a fundamental hybridity to gaming cultures that highlight the need to add postcolonial perspectives to how issues of diversity and power in gaming cultures are understood.
Apperley, Thomas H.
Digital Gaming's South-South Connection Book Section
In: Penix-Tadsen, Phillip (Ed.): Video Games and the Global South, pp. 211-224, ETC Press, 2019, ISBN: 9780359641390.
Links | Tags: Global South, Postcolonialism, Video games
@incollection{Apperley2019c,
title = {Digital Gaming's South-South Connection},
author = {Thomas H. Apperley},
editor = {Phillip Penix-Tadsen},
url = {https://kilthub.cmu.edu/articles/book/Video_Games_and_the_Global_South/8148680},
doi = {10.1184/R1/8148680},
isbn = {9780359641390},
year = {2019},
date = {2019-05-18},
booktitle = {Video Games and the Global South},
pages = {211-224},
publisher = {ETC Press},
keywords = {Global South, Postcolonialism, Video games},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {incollection}
}
Loban, Rhett; Apperley, Thomas H.
Eurocentric Values at Play: Modding the Colonial from the Indigenous Perspective Book Section
In: Penix-Tadsen, Phillip (Ed.): Video Games and the Global South, pp. 87-99, ETC Press, 2019, ISBN: 9780359641390.
Links | Tags: Indigenous studies, Modding, Postcolonialism
@incollection{Loban2019,
title = {Eurocentric Values at Play: Modding the Colonial from the Indigenous Perspective},
author = {Rhett Loban and Thomas H. Apperley},
editor = {Phillip Penix-Tadsen},
url = {https://kilthub.cmu.edu/articles/book/Video_Games_and_the_Global_South/8148680},
doi = {10.1184/R1/8148680},
isbn = {9780359641390},
year = {2019},
date = {2019-05-18},
booktitle = {Video Games and the Global South},
pages = {87-99},
publisher = {ETC Press},
keywords = {Indigenous studies, Modding, Postcolonialism},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {incollection}
}