gender and gaming

If given any opportunity to say something about this for the W1sCon panel

Power, Information and Play my own paper - crucial point is realizing and taking apart the ways people tie in non-hierarchical collaboration to gender. (dirty essentialists!) (okay, "dirty essentialists" is not productive... and is this too complicated to get across?)

talk about the stereotypes from Knights of the Dinner Table. How they apply but how they don't and are quite irritating. Sara is 10 times as knowledgeable as the guys about game system trivia, so as to be taken seriously, but ALSO always talks to everything before fighting out of girly niceness. "Wait! Let's TALK to the Ogre." She is written as having a better understanding of psychology and relationships and behaves ethically. The guys sometimes see these qualities as "ruining the game".

The simple fact that most of the gaming community doesn't actually believe there IS any sexism in gaming. They desperately need education, a Feminism 101 primer.

the scandinavian gamers and theorists of Solmukohta and their excellent books. Their LARP based on Le Guin. Actually maybe this is where to start, as it's a positive and cool thing. (Instead of my getting lost in a labyrinth of endless sniping against evil, when the whole great thing about W1sCon is you don't have to spend all your time explaining what sexism is and how to see it.)

Okay - focus.

- the finnish books and the Le Guin LARP. [go find book Beyond Role and Play and As Larp Grows Up]
- Rook's link collection for this
- my paper (toot, toot!)
- Rook's points about family roles, example of v1nland "wife and mother" roles being powerful
- our upcoming book on RPG theory
- mention Emily Short's fabulous games!!! so good!!! Galatea and Metamorphoses and the others.
- Br@wny Thews (gently and instructively objectify barbarian gladiators, chainmail bikini style)

That is plenty to say and in fact too much.

But it really needs to be said.

Comments

[Brian David Phillips, PhD, CH]

I just stumbled across this post . . . how did your talk go? The paper looks interesting. I am opening submissions for a peer-reviewed journal on live role playing later this month (the CFP will be posted by the end of Dec.). I linked to your post here http://briandavidphillips.typepad.com/brian/2004/12/gender_and_gami.html as well. - Brian