scholarly journals “THE CREATURE ITSELF IS NASTY, BUT NOTHING REALLY COMPARES TO THE BUILDING OF DREAD BEFORE YOU EVER GET TO IT”: ONLINE PLAYER AND DEVELOPER COMMENTARY ON FEMALE MONSTROSITY IN VIDEO GAMES

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Marie Stang
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Body Size ◽  
Video Games ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
White Male ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
Female Representation ◽  
Gender Representations ◽  
Gaming Communities ◽  
Selection Of

Gender representation in video games has long been a fraught topic of discussion within online gaming communities. In game scholarship, analysis of the usually harmful tropes and trends of female representation has resulted in countless studies demonstrating that video games are often a regressive medium in terms of representation, privileging heterosexual white male subjectivities and erasing, marginalizing, or even vilifying anyone outside of that specific demographic. These conversations and scholarly studies tend to focus on the representation of human women, especially as victimized damsels-in-distress. Considerably less work has been done to analyse the portrayal of villainous and monstrous nonhuman women in games, even though countless science fiction, fantasy, and horror games feature these kinds of characters. Many of these games utilize harmful tropes and design practices related to female villainy and monstrosity, thereby reinforcing misogynistic ideologies. With the understanding that gender representations in games can have deep cultural ramifications, especially as they intersect with representations of race, sexuality, queerness, body size, disability, mental illness, and age, this paper examines online player and developer discourse regarding female-coded monsters from a selection of commercially successful “AAA” video games. The intent of this project is to contribute to ongoing scholarship on monstrosity in games by looking at how developers explain and justify their design processes in online interviews and forum posts and how players/fans articulate their attitudes towards and reception of these monstrous creatures.

Gender, Representation, Experience: The Case of Village Performers in Java

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 140-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
FELICIA HUGHES-FREELAND
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Gender Representation ◽  
New Order ◽  
Gender Ideologies ◽  
Gender Representations ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Performance Culture ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Points Of View

This article explores how gender representations are deployed in anthropological analysis with reference to female performers (ledhek) in rural Java during the last decades of Suharto's New Order Indonesia (1966–1998). 1 It shows how the negative ascriptions given to ledheks were consistent with state promulgated gender ideologies in Indonesia, and explores the women's experiences in performances and everyday life. This different standpoint allows us to understand their dancing from the performers’ points of view, rather than from that of official state endorsed ideas of acceptable performance culture.

scholarly journals Brief use of a specific gun in a violent game does not affect attitudes towards that gun

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (11) ◽  
pp. 160310 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Hilgard ◽  
Christopher R. Engelhardt ◽  
Bruce D. Bartholow
Keyword(s):  
Public Policy ◽  
Video Games ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Real World ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Aggressive Behaviour ◽  
Product Placement ◽  
Gun Violence ◽  
Product Evaluations ◽  
Gun Ownership

Although much attention has been paid to the question of whether violent video games increase aggressive behaviour, little attention has been paid to how such games might encourage antecedents of gun violence. In this study, we examined how product placement, the attractive in-game presentation of certain real-world firearm brands, might encourage gun ownership, a necessary antecedent of gun violence. We sought to study how the virtual portrayal of a real-world firearm (the Bushmaster AR-15) could influence players' attitudes towards the AR-15 specifically and gun ownership in general. College undergraduates ( N  = 176) played one of four modified video games in a 2 (gun: AR-15 or science-fiction control) × 2 (gun power: strong or weak) between-subjects design. Despite collecting many outcomes and examining many potential covariates and moderators, experimental assignment did little to influence outcomes of product evaluations or purchasing intentions with regard to the AR-15. Attitudes towards public policy and estimation of gun safety were also not influenced by experimental condition, although these might have been better tested by comparison against a no-violence control condition. By contrast, gender and political party had dramatic associations with all outcomes. We conclude that, if product placement shapes attitudes towards firearms, such effects will need to be studied with stronger manipulations or more sensitive measures.

Evidence for divergent natural selection of a Lake Tanganyika cichlid inferred from repeated radiations in body size

2009 ◽  
Vol 18 (14) ◽  
pp. 3110-3119 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. TAKAHASHI ◽  
K. WATANABE ◽  
H. MUNEHARA ◽  
L. RÜBER ◽  
M. HORI
Keyword(s):  
Body Size ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Lake Tanganyika ◽  
Divergent Natural Selection ◽  
Selection Of

Mental Illness and the Media: Part II. Content Analysis of Press Coverage of Mental Health Topics

1986 ◽  
Vol 31 (5) ◽  
pp. 431-433 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Matas ◽  
N. El-Guebaly ◽  
D. Harper ◽  
M. Green ◽  
A. Peterkin
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Mental Illness ◽  
Content Analysis ◽  
Public Image ◽  
Press Coverage ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
The Public ◽  
Accuracy Check ◽  
The Media ◽  
Selection Of

The public image of psychiatry has been tarnished in recent years. In order to determine the extent to which press coverage has contributed to negative attitudes towards psychiatry, we conducted a content analysis of a random selection of newspaper articles which appeared over a twenty-year period in two different newspapers. We found that although there had been some minor, cosmetic changes over the years, such as more appropriate headlines and more direct quotes from psychiatric experts, on the whole, content and attitudes had changed very little. An accuracy check of media reporting of forensic cases over a 20-year period revealed that when reporters have access to written material, the accuracy levels are greatly improved.

scholarly journals Let the Game Begin: Ergodic as an Approach for Video Game Translation

2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 107
Author(s):  
SF. Lukfianka Sanjaya Purnama ◽  
SF. Luthfie Arguby Purnomo ◽  
Dyah Nugrahani
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Translation Process ◽  
Translation Strategies ◽  
The City ◽  
Selection Of

This paper attempts to propose ergodic as an approach for video game translation. The word approach here refers to an approach for translation products and to an approach for the translation process. The steps to formulate ergodic as an approach are first, Aarseth’sergodic literature is reviewed to elicit a basis for comprehension toward its relationship with video games and video game translation Secondly, taking the translation of Electronic Arts’Need for Speed: Own the City, Midway’s Mortal Kombat: Unchained, and Konami’s Metal Gear Solid, ergodic based approach for video game translation is formulated. The formulation signifies that ergodic, as an approach for video game translation, revolves around the treatment of video games as a cybertext from which scriptons, textons, and traversal functions as the configurative mechanism influence the selection of translation strategies and the transferability of variables and traversal function, game aesthetics, and ludus and narrative of the games. The challenges countered when treating video games as a cybertext are the necessities for the translators to convey anamorphosis, mechanical and narrative hidden meaning of the analyzed frame, to consider the textonomy of the games, and at the same time to concern on GILT (Globalization, Internationalization, Localization, and Translation).KeywordsErgodic ; Translation Approach; Video Game Translation ; Textonomy; Anamorphosis

scholarly journals Positive selection of skeleton genes during domestication indicates the potential genetic mechanism for loss of flight in ducks

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tao Zhu ◽  
Xin Qi ◽  
Yu Chen ◽  
Liang Wang ◽  
Xueze Lv ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Body Size ◽  
Phenotypic Variation ◽  
Bone Development ◽  
Bird Species ◽  
Genomic Data ◽  
Domestic Animals ◽  
Genetic Mechanism ◽  
Bone Morphology ◽  
Domestic Ducks ◽  
Selection Of

Abstract Background Domestication alters lots of phenotypic, neurologic and physiologic traits between domestic animals and their wild ancestors. Domestic ducks were originated from mallards (Anas platyrhynchos) and some documents also showed that spot-billed ducks (Anas zonorhyncha) could also genetically contribute a small part to the domestication. Compared with the two ancestral species, domestic ducks generally present changes in body size and bone morphology, which is supposed to lead to loss of fight in domestic ducks. In the present study, we performed both genomic and transcriptomic analysis to identify candidate genes in order to elucidate the genetic mechanism underlying the phenotypic variation. Results Our results showed that genes associated with the skeleton systems were positively selected during domestication by Fst analysis between the wild and domestic ducks. We also found that many differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the breast muscle between the wild and domestic ducks were enriched in the pathway for ossification. Among the genes, FGF14 and EIF2AK3 were also under strong selection by the genomic data, and they were both reported to be associated with limb morphology, bone development and flightlessness in some bird species. Conclusions Our study showed that the skeleton related genes were positively selected in the process of domestication, which could also cause the loss of flight in domestic ducks.

The Futurians, Gamergate, and Fandom

2022 ◽  
pp. 234-249
Author(s):  
Julia Crouse Waddell
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Social Identity ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Group Dynamics ◽  
Social Identity Theory ◽  
Social Identification ◽  
Social Identities ◽  
Shared Interest ◽  
Fan Clubs ◽  
Formation Of Groups

From the science fiction fan clubs of the 1930s to the modern gamers, devoted fans have found one another and formed groups bonded over their shared interest. As groups formed, social identities began to emerge, distinguishing ingroups and outgroups. Social identity theory helps to explain the formation of groups as well as inevitable competition over resources and power. As technology became more sophisticated, fans were able to communicate with greater ease facilitating ingroup social identification. The inherent properties of video games reinforce both the cooperation among ingroup members as well as the rivalry with outgroups. Understanding the mechanisms within video games as well as the affordances of CMC and social media help to explain the group dynamics that support the Gamergate social identity.

Revolution and After

October ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 158 ◽  
pp. 126-154
Author(s):  
Stephanie Schwartz
Keyword(s):  
White Male ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Selection Of

In 1988, the Cuban collective ABTV engaged in its first of several acts of art-historical homage. ABTV (Tanya Angulo, Juan Pablo Ballester, José Ángel Toirac, and Illeana Villazón) photocopied reproductions of Sherrie Levine's After Series, the now canonical work of postmodernism in which Levine rephotographed reproductions of selection of photographs by America's white male modernist masters. This essay takes ABTV's homage as the starting point for an inquiry into the relationship between postmodernism and postcolonialism. How, it asks, has an obsession with “ends” shaped our histories of photography and revolution?

Carceral violence at the intersection of madness and crime in Batman: Arkham Asylum and Batman: Arkham City

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-285
Author(s):  
Christina Fawcett ◽  
Steven Kohm
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Video Games ◽  
General Population ◽  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
Comic Book ◽  
The State ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
High Security

The action-adventure video games Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009) and Batman: Arkham City (2011) draw on familiar comic book narratives, themes and characters to situate players in a world of participatory violence, crime and madness. In the first game, the player-as-Batman is situated in Arkham Asylum, a high-security facility for the criminally insane and supervillains that also temporarily houses a general population of prisoners from Blackgate Penitentiary. The elision of criminality and mental illness becomes amplified in the second game with the establishment of Arkham City, a combined facility that conflates asylum and prison, completely dissolving any distinction between crime and madness. We draw on Rafter’s conceptual framework of popular criminology to seriously interrogate the representation of violence, crime and madness in these games. More than simply texts offering popular explanations for crime, the games directly implicate the player in violence enacted upon the bodies of criminals and patients alike. Violence is necessary to move the action of the game forward and evokes a range of emotional responses from players who draw from personal experience and other cultural and media representations as they navigate the game. We argue that while the game celebrates violence and the brutal conditions of incarceration, it also offers possibilities for subversive and critical readings. While working to affirm assumptions about crime and mental illness, the game also provides a visceral and visual critique of excessive punishment by the state as a source of injustice for those deemed mad or bad.

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