Review

Reviewed Work(s): Computer Games and the Social Imaginary by Graeme Kirkpatrick
Source: Contemporary Sociology, Vol. 43, No. 4 (July 2014), pp. 594-595
Published by: American Sociological Association
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43185570
Accessed: 17-01-2019 10:23 UTC

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594 Briefly Noted

country have been "re-nationalized" by con-

Transnational Migration , Media and Identity of trasting their home country with Western
Asian Women : Diasporic Daughters , by norms, strengthening their national identity
Youna Kim. New York, NY: Routledge, of their home country, while simultaneously
2013. 169pp. $44.95 paper. ISBN: 978041 attaching feelings of alienation from their
5851749.
home country. Kim shows contextual differ-
ences among these three countries in a clear-
Despite the rapidly increasing migrationer
oflight, to help readers understand such
East Asian women - specifically South Kore- inextricable contexts of their sense-making
an, Japanese, and Chinese - into Western of self in the globalized world through their
countries, related studies tend to focus on own eyes, the others' eyes, and most impor-
the economic contexts and implications;tantly, through the media.
studies of their socio-cultural shift are sur-
This book paves a way to further under-
prisingly scant. Transnational Migration ,
stand the symbolic meanings of East Asian
women's migration and how those symbols
Media and Identity of Asian Women: Diasporic
Daughters now provides us with detailed then affect Asian women, especially youth,
and meticulous information on the causes in the process of considering transmigration.
and effects of transnational migration on
this relatively "invisible' population, as
well as the effect of media, with the goal of
Computer Games and the Social Imaginary, by
developing a body of knowledge to explain Graeme Kirkpatrick. Maiden, MA: Polity
its implications in response to globalization. Press, 2013. 219pp. $19.95 paper. ISBN:
Throughout the book, Youna Kim tries 9780745641119.
to
depict the contextual differences and varia-
tions among these three countries; however, While the stated goal of this book is "to pro-
non-East- Asian readers might feel the depic- vide a clearer understanding of the cultural
tions are too similar to detect subtle differen- importance of the computer game," its anal-
ces. Those readers may then wonder whyysis is accentuated with a sharp political
they should be separately analyzed. In thisbite. The book looks beyond the immediate
sense, it would have been interesting iftechnological impact of computer games,
the interviews had included questions aboutand focuses instead on the critical aspects
their perceptions of their colleagues from theof gaming in relation to our fundamental
other two countries. Their co-construction of
social, political and economic conditions.
each other in comparison to WesternersTo- do this, Graeme Kirkpatrick takes an his-
they are different in their nationalities, but
torical approach and identifies key moments
the same in the category as Asians - would
in the past where gaming technology cata-
lyzed new modes of production and altered
then have contributed to their sense-making
of lived experiences in the West as East the way we perceive our society.
Asian women. In order to understand the Computer Games and the Social Imaginary
begins
later chapters in depth, readers should pay by situating the discussion within
much attention to Chapter Two, Mapping
the concept of the "social imaginary." By
the Diaspora , particularly focusing on the
reframing society as a place of shared beliefs
and collective actions corresponding to and
contextual differences among Korea, Japan,
and China. in accordance with those beliefs, the notion
of the social imaginary displaces the tradi-
Kim's summary at the end of each chapter
tional distinction between "real" and "virtu-
provides great syntheses of how East Asian
women in a foreign country have becomeal" worlds. After the broad theoretical
discussion, the book then moves to trace
trapped in and struggled with their home
country's stereotypic norms, their media
the lineage of the computer game. The his-
romanticized images of Western countries,
torical investigation begins with the devel-
opment of play and toys in modernity,
and their lived experiences in their real lives.
Chapter Five, Diasporic Nationalism and where
the Kirkpatrick dismisses the notion that
computer games are inevitable products of
Media , is particularly interesting in its por-
trayal of how East Asian women in a foreign technological progress. Instead, he argues

Contemporary Sociology 43, 4

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 Briefly Noted 595

that computer games emerge from "the research in universities by drawing perspec-
actions of specific social groups" (p. 5) in tives from a diverse body of scholars.
a few industrialized Western nations. Gam- Although feminist scholarship had made
ing therefore cannot be divorced from significant contributions to university cur-
ricula during the 1970s and 1980s, the role
political-economy. Just as economic digitali-
of "feminism" in higher education remains
zation was in part catalyzed by the prolifer-
ation of computer games, the emergence ambiguous.
of Indeed, many scholars have
online gaming also aided the maturingoffered of optimistic visions on the knowledge-
"networked capitalism." While acknowl- producing potential of feminist research -
edging the interconnectedness between that with new "knowledge, and education,
gaming and forces of neoliberal ideology, and time, we may, someday, create a new
the author sees computer games as more society" (p. 14). Yet against this vast poten-
than mere ideological instruments serving tial of feminist scholarship is the unsatisfy-
the capitalist political-economy. Instead, ing persistence of gender-based "epistemic
Apartheid" in both academia and the society
Kirkpatrick presents gaming as a distinctive
at-large. Indeed, "feminism's focus on half
"cultural field" with its own specialized dis-
course, and members of this cultural com- of the human races" (p. 14) means that it
munity often act "in accordance with should not simply be another "women's
standards that are beyond the manipulation studies" or "gender studies" department
by larger economic forces" (p. 5). The struc- on the college campus; instead, feminism
tural transformation of gaming discourse, should have the capacity to transform fun-
then, not only reshapes games and gaming damentally the existing academic knowl-
culture, but also leads to larger technological edge landscape and thereby lead to
shifts and changes of our life world. The normative changes in our society.
book concludes by pointing out the possibil- In this context, the contributors to this
ity that the gaming community, being a dis- anthology engage a broad range of theoreti-
tinctive sphere of the "social imaginary," cal and practical problems, including the
might serve as the site of radical and politi- capacity of feminist research to catalyze edu-
cally conscious oppositions against the capi- cational policy changes, the relationship
talist juggernaut. between feminist scholarship and social lib-
Although some of the grand historical eration movements, and the ways in which
claims made in this book may appear over- we might approach feminist cultural history
extended, the author nonetheless presents and historiography. The essays in this collec-
a compelling narrative on the cultural and tion, edited by Meg Luxton and Mary Jane
political implications of computer games Mossman, are organized into three parts.
within the contemporary economic context Part I focuses on feminism as a site of
of globalization and digitalization. Combin- political resistance by highlighting the con-
ing rigorous theoretical engagement with nections between feminist knowledge pro-
highly accessible prose, this book is a helpful duction and cases of liberation movements
read for graduate students in sociology, crit- throughout the world. Part II of the book
ical cultural and media studies. focuses specifically on the current challenges
of feminist research within the formal
domain of higher education. Part III then
Reconsidering Knowledge: Feminism and turns
the the reader's gaze to the past, where
Academy, edited by Meg Luxton and Maryauthors seek to find new possibilities of fem-
Jane Mossman. Nova Scotia, CAN: Fern- inist resistance and knowledge-production
wood Publishing, 2012. 168pp. $29.95 through historical reflections.
paper. ISBN: 9781552664766. Luxton and Mossman impressively
amassed essays from a large number of dif-
Based on the 2009 lecture series "Feminist
ferent academic disciplines, including
Knowledge Reconsidered: Feminism and and anthropology, philosophy, lit-
sociology
the Academy" at York University, this erary criticism, history and education into
edited
collection seeks to address some of the con- a tightly-packed and coherently-arranged
temporary issues and challenges of feminist
anthology of fewer than two hundred pages.

Contemporary Sociology 43, 4

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