{"title":"Bridging anthropological theory: Accumulating and containing wealth in World of Warcraft landscapes","authors":"Rachael Root","doi":"10.1177/0308275X231156718","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Human ingenuity responds to changing environments and resources with technological sophistication and variations in accumulative behaviors. While anthropologists look to the past and to processes of globalization to sketch these shifts in the natural world, there is a growing awareness that these transformations also occur in digital online worlds. I argue that archaeology’s attention to materiality provides useful analysis and directions for ethnographic video game analysis. I use research from the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor, where players marshal social and economic resources in both the natural and digital worlds. In constructing reputations and accumulating prestige, players integrate online and offline resources, traversing the tangible/digital divide in their pursuit of achievement. Archaeological perspectives and theories of aggrandizement, containment, systems, landscapes, and ontological materiality provide opportunities to expand ethnographic video game research and debates into new directions.","PeriodicalId":46784,"journal":{"name":"Critique of Anthropology","volume":"43 1","pages":"66 - 83"},"PeriodicalIF":1.5000,"publicationDate":"2023-02-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Critique of Anthropology","FirstCategoryId":"90","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0308275X231156718","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"ANTHROPOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Human ingenuity responds to changing environments and resources with technological sophistication and variations in accumulative behaviors. While anthropologists look to the past and to processes of globalization to sketch these shifts in the natural world, there is a growing awareness that these transformations also occur in digital online worlds. I argue that archaeology’s attention to materiality provides useful analysis and directions for ethnographic video game analysis. I use research from the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor, where players marshal social and economic resources in both the natural and digital worlds. In constructing reputations and accumulating prestige, players integrate online and offline resources, traversing the tangible/digital divide in their pursuit of achievement. Archaeological perspectives and theories of aggrandizement, containment, systems, landscapes, and ontological materiality provide opportunities to expand ethnographic video game research and debates into new directions.
人类的聪明才智通过技术的复杂性和累积行为的变化来应对不断变化的环境和资源。当人类学家回顾过去和全球化进程来描绘自然界的这些变化时,人们越来越意识到这些变化也发生在数字网络世界中。我认为考古学对物质性的关注为民族志电子游戏分析提供了有用的分析和方向。我使用了大型多人在线角色扮演游戏《魔兽世界:德拉诺之王》(World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor)的研究,在这款游戏中,玩家可以在自然世界和数字世界中管理社会和经济资源。在建立声誉和积累声望的过程中,玩家整合线上和线下资源,在追求成就的过程中跨越有形/数字鸿沟。考古学的观点和强化、遏制、系统、景观和本体论物质性的理论提供了将人种学电子游戏研究和辩论扩展到新方向的机会。
期刊介绍:
Critique of Anthropology is dedicated to the development of anthropology as a discipline that subjects social reality to critical analysis. It publishes academic articles and other materials which contribute to an understanding of the determinants of the human condition, structures of social power, and the construction of ideologies in both contemporary and past human societies from a cross-cultural and socially critical standpoint. Non-sectarian, and embracing a diversity of theoretical and political viewpoints, COA is also committed to the principle that anthropologists cannot and should not seek to avoid taking positions on political and social questions.