Theorizing gender and digital gameplay: Oversights, accidents and surprises

Abstract

This paper attempts to tell a story of a different kind about gender and digital gameplay. Resisting the repetition of stereotypes about who plays, how and why, we show how, as researchers, our own assumptions and presumptions about gender keep surprise at bay, enforcing instead "findings" that solidify an inner "truth" about gender. Re-citing hegemonic gender ideologies that tell us nothing we don't already know, we argue here, is no accident. Rather than recurring encounters with the all-too-familiar, we are entitled to expect to be surprised by the research we do, and more serious interpretive work, in conjunction with alternative methodologies, promise very different findings than those hitherto attributed to women and girls playing games.