VIDEOGAMES: WOMEN IN VIDEOGAMES & FURTHER FEMINIST THEORY

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Part 1: Background reading on Gamergate

1) What was Gamergate? 

- One of the first fronts of the modern culture wars, driven by social media, misogyny and the weaponised disaffection of young men.

2) What is the recent controversy surrounding narrative design studio Sweet Baby Inc? 

-  A group with more than 200,000 followers on PC games storefront Steam, believes that Sweet Baby Inc is secretly forcing game developers to change the bodies, ethnicities and sexualities of video game characters to conform to “woke” ideology. 

3) What does the article conclude regarding diversity in videogames?

- Nobody is forcing diversity into video games. It is happening naturally, as players and developers themselves diversify. 


Part 2: Further Feminist Theory: Media Factsheet

1) What definitions are offered by the factsheet for ‘feminism ‘and ‘patriarchy’?

- Feminism is a movement which aims for equality for women – to be
treated as equal to men socially, economically, and politically.

- Patriarchy is male dominance in society.

2) Why did bell hooks publish her 1984 book ‘Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center’?

- To offer a more inclusive feminists theory that advocated for women within a sisterhood to acknowledging and accepting their differences.

3) What aspects of feminism and oppression are the focus for a lot of bell hooks’s work?

- She argues that male involvement within the equality movement was important, encouraging men to do their part.

4) What is intersectionality and what does hooks argue regarding this?

- Where multiple identities intersect to create a whole that is different from separate component identities.

5) What did Liesbet van Zoonen conclude regarding the relationship between gender roles and the mass media?

- The mass media leads to much of the observable gender identity structures in advertising, film and TV.

6) Liesbet van Zoonen sees gender as socially constructed. What does this mean and which other media theorist we have studied does this link to?

- An idea that has been created and accepted by the people in a society.

7) How do feminists view women’s lifestyle magazines in different ways? Which view do you agree with?

- Van Zoonen argues that women’s magazines mediate images that tell women “how to be a perfect mother, lover, wife, homemaker, glamorous accessory, secretary – whatever suits the needs of the system”.

8) In looking at the history of the colours pink and blue, van Zoonen suggests ideas gender ideas can evolve over time. Which other media theorist we have studied argues things evolve over time and do you agree that gender roles are in a process of constant change? Can you suggest examples to support your view?

- Stuart Hall Encoding and Decoding.
- I agree because societal norms are always changing and there is an increase in diversifying gender and changing people's perspectives.

9) What are the five aspects van Zoonen suggests are significant in determining the influence of the media?

Van Zoonen argues that the influence of the media is dependent on:
• Whether the institution is commercial or public
• The platform upon which they operate (print versus digital media)
• Genre (drama versus news)
• Target audiences
• The place the media text holds within the audiences’ daily lives

10) What other media theorist can be linked to van Zoonen’s readings of the media?

- Judith Butler.

11) Van Zoonen discusses ‘transmission models of communication’. She suggests women are oppressed by the dominant culture and therefore take in representations that do not reflect their view of the world. What other theory and idea (that we have studied recently) can this be linked to?

- It can be linked to Stuart Hall as he says that  power is maintained in societies not just through coercion or force, but also through the creation and propagation of dominant ideologies that are accepted as 'common sense.

12) Finally, van Zoonen has built on the work of bell hooks by exploring power and feminism. She suggests that power is not a binary male/female issue but reflects the “multiplicity of relations of subordination”. How does this link to bell hooks?

- bell hooks believes that feminism should challenge dominance and that power should be distributed equally so that the patriarchal structures can't exist.


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