Depicting the Human Relationship to Nature and Culture: Transactionality and the Homo Economicus | Analog Game Studies

Abstract:

This article examines the issue of the depiction of the human relationship to culture and nature in games via a philosophical exploration of how similar issues have been depicted and debated in anthropology and archaeology as well as in environmental history. In recent years, parallel investigations of the representation of colonialist themes, and along with that the representation or indeed misrepresentation of race, traditional societies and other cultures more generally, have been much discussed in the tabletop and other games media and scholarship. 1 Alongside colonialism and race, reflective, self-critical engagement with the representation of any number of topics from gender to brutality, conflict, and war in (war)games have been receiving increasing coverage.2

This article examines the issue of the depiction of the human relationship to culture and nature in games via a philosophical exploration of how similar issues have been depicted and debated in anthropology and archaeology as well as in environmental history. In recent years, parallel investigations of the representation of colonialist themes, and along with that the representation or indeed misrepresentation of race, traditional societies and other cultures more generally, have been much discussed in the tabletop and other games media and scholarship. 1 Alongside colonialism and race, reflective, self-critical engagement with the representation of any number of topics from gender to brutality, conflict, and war in (war)games have been receiving increasing coverage.2