More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play
Live action role players make the imaginative worlds of tabletop games manifest through collaborative storytelling and embodied play. Escaping the everyday, these communities could radically reimagine culture and challenge oppressive ideologies. Instead, they are deeply invested in essentializing “r...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2020-10-01
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| Series: | Humanities |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/9/4/124 |
| _version_ | 1797550291513507840 |
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| author | Samantha Eddy |
| author_facet | Samantha Eddy |
| author_sort | Samantha Eddy |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Live action role players make the imaginative worlds of tabletop games manifest through collaborative storytelling and embodied play. Escaping the everyday, these communities could radically reimagine culture and challenge oppressive ideologies. Instead, they are deeply invested in essentializing “race”. I conducted a three-year ethnographic study alongside 20 semi-structured interviews to explore racecraft in live action role play. Supporting the groundbreaking work of Karen and Barbara Fields, I find that racecraft is a social process—continually negotiated and maintained through intimate interactions and community exchanges. Through this process, the definition of “race” is continually adapted while belief in this category remains entrenched. When participants confront racist stereotypes, practitioners coerce marginalized members into a false exchange. These members are encouraged to share experiences detailing the damage of problematic representations. Practitioners then reduce these experiences to monolithic understandings of “race”. In this insidious manner, anti-racist confrontations become fodder for racecraft. Complicating this further, patterned racism is characterized as an inborn quality of whiteness, minimizing practitioners’ accountability. Responsibility is then shifted onto marginalized participants and their willingness to engage in “racial” education. This trap is ingrained in the double standard of racism, adapting “race” such that whiteness is unrestricted by the monolithic definitions applied to those outside this category. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T15:27:13Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-122a68a4108c4b9cb48861e846a850e4 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2076-0787 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T15:27:13Z |
| publishDate | 2020-10-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Humanities |
| spelling | doaj.art-122a68a4108c4b9cb48861e846a850e42023-11-20T17:56:25ZengMDPI AGHumanities2076-07872020-10-019412410.3390/h9040124More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role PlaySamantha Eddy0Sociology, Boston College, Boston, MA 02467, USALive action role players make the imaginative worlds of tabletop games manifest through collaborative storytelling and embodied play. Escaping the everyday, these communities could radically reimagine culture and challenge oppressive ideologies. Instead, they are deeply invested in essentializing “race”. I conducted a three-year ethnographic study alongside 20 semi-structured interviews to explore racecraft in live action role play. Supporting the groundbreaking work of Karen and Barbara Fields, I find that racecraft is a social process—continually negotiated and maintained through intimate interactions and community exchanges. Through this process, the definition of “race” is continually adapted while belief in this category remains entrenched. When participants confront racist stereotypes, practitioners coerce marginalized members into a false exchange. These members are encouraged to share experiences detailing the damage of problematic representations. Practitioners then reduce these experiences to monolithic understandings of “race”. In this insidious manner, anti-racist confrontations become fodder for racecraft. Complicating this further, patterned racism is characterized as an inborn quality of whiteness, minimizing practitioners’ accountability. Responsibility is then shifted onto marginalized participants and their willingness to engage in “racial” education. This trap is ingrained in the double standard of racism, adapting “race” such that whiteness is unrestricted by the monolithic definitions applied to those outside this category.https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/9/4/124racecraftracismepistemologies of ignorancelive action role play |
| spellingShingle | Samantha Eddy More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play Humanities racecraft racism epistemologies of ignorance live action role play |
| title | More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play |
| title_full | More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play |
| title_fullStr | More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play |
| title_full_unstemmed | More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play |
| title_short | More than a Game: Racecraft and the Adaptation of “Race” in Live Action Role Play |
| title_sort | more than a game racecraft and the adaptation of race in live action role play |
| topic | racecraft racism epistemologies of ignorance live action role play |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/9/4/124 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT samanthaeddy morethanagameracecraftandtheadaptationofraceinliveactionroleplay |