Above the Action
The Cultural Politics of Watching Dota 2
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12918342 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jessica Elam (Baker University), Nick Taylor (0000-0003-3195-1020, North Carolina State University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 501-518 |
| Publication date | 2019-08-24 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Communication Culture and Critique (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1753-9137 • E-ISSN: 1753-9129 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1093/ccc/tcz033 |
| OpenAlex | W3006432591 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 21 |
The rise of live-streaming platforms, and the related surge in popularity of esports, remind us that there is a politics of watching play. This article extends intensified scholarly interest in game spectatorship, offering a materialist consideration of the embodied work involved in spectating competitive game play. Most readily associated with the discursive alignments between competitive gaming and/as sport, the active camera mode used by esports competitors and “shoutcasters” facilitates analyzing the highly kinetic action of team-based combat in first-person shooters and multiplayer online battle arenas. Here, we draw from microanalyses of audio-visual recordings taken as individual participants spectated a Dota 2 match. Examining the cognitive and perceptual competencies they draw from, we argue that participants are incorporated into apparatuses of perception associated with militarized optical media. While at a discursive level esports spectators may be watching sports, at a material level they are playing with the logics of drones
Action (physics · Battle · CONTEST · Embodied cognition · Fandom · Media studies · Perception · Political science · Politics · Popularity · Sociology · Cinema and Media Studies · Computer Science · Digital Games and Media · Psychology · Sports, Gender, and Society · History · Law · Social Psychology
Discipline and Punish
Geography of the Digital Hearth
Gameplay Mode
Raising the Stakes
Romancing the Drone
Signs of meta-change in second modernity
Metagaming
American Football, Flags, and âFunâ
Discipline and Punish
Technologies of Captivation
Mechanics and Metagame
On the Digital Playing Field
Events and Collusions
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |