Being in a class about video games as someone who, for the majority of my life, has never played video games, owned any consoles, or engaged in the gaming community in any way at first felt daunting. With little knowledge about a lot of the mentions made in class, I was worried that it would be difficult to analyze a medium with which I have so little experience. What I have come to learn, especially after attending the Games + The Academy panel at the Year of Games Symposium, is that everyone who engages with games comes from a different viewpoint, a different set of prejudices, and a life of different experiences.
The speakers on the Games + The Academy panel gave me, more than anything, a new perspective on how differently people interact with the games they play and how that, in turn, influences the kind of academic work they produce. On the panel, there were representatives from various avenues of analysis, ranging from indigenous studies to artificial intelligence, all analyzing the same medium.
Despite their differing approaches, all these scholars shared the foundation of merging their love of games with the formal structure of universities. Many of the common themes among the speakers had to do with the friction they faced with their various institutions, representing the rigidity of academia in accepting new and innovative forms of study.
This very point took me back to the end of the summer when I was registering for classes. As a Cinema and Media Studies major, I often take classes that my parents, other students, and probably many people find a little silly for a college setting. When I told my parents I was registering for a course called Critical Game Studies, they were skeptical to say the least, mirroring the kind of skepticism that the speakers faced when introducing gaming to the university setting. After being exposed to their multitude of perspectives and the content of the course so far (obviously), it is clear to me that it is these differences that make games such a suitable candidate for critical analysis.
While it is sad that this is the case, the friction that exists between games and the academy reminds me of the academic tension in my home state of Florida between public institutions and curriculum focused on race, gender identity, and so much more. While the tension is different, with the situation in Florida being a political device, the situation of games in academia feels close to home for me. Both situations represent a pattern in which fields of study must fight for their legitimacy within institutions despite their intellectual depth. That ongoing struggle for recognition and respect makes the journey of video game studies feel deeply familiar to me.
Whether looking at it through the lens of indigenous studies, gender and sexuality studies, artificial intelligence, design, history, etc., games are a canvas of opportunity for critical thinking. Hearing the panelist talk about their own journeys of bringing games to academia, it became clear that the pushback games face in academia is a measure of their value, not a dismissal of it. Games are a challenge to traditional academic boundaries, but one very obviously worth taking.
