Link to join the webinar: https://uio.zoom.us/j/65158210142
In this talk, Massanari discusses how gaming spaces have become fertile soil for far-right recruitment and mobilization. Tracing the connections between 2014’s Gamergate and the current surge of populist movements globally, Massanari demonstrates that concepts borrowed from gaming culture are increasingly part of far right discourse. However, because games are “just play” it’s easy for outsiders to overlook the troubling implications of the vernacular and memes shared in gaming spaces. Ultimately, Massanari argues that researchers need to take games and other pop cultural products seriously, as they have become a kind of habitus for many within the far right.
Adrienne Massanari is an Associate Professor in the Communication Studies division at the School of Communication (American University, USA). Her research interests include digital culture, online communities, platform politics, game studies, pop culture, and gender and race online. Massanari's new book for MIT Press (October 2024), Gaming Democracy: How Silicon Valley Leveled Up the Far Right, discusses how Silicon Valley’s culture and politics contributed to the rise of the far-right. Her 2015 book, Participatory Culture, Community, and Play: Learning from Reddit (Peter Lang), explored the unique culture of Reddit.com. Massanari’s work has appeared in New Media & Society, Feminist Media Studies, Social Media + Society, Journal of Communication, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Journal of Information Technology & Politics, and First Monday.
The webinar series on Researching the Far Right: Methods and Ethics is co-organized by C-REX and the Canadian Network for Research on Security, Extremism and Society (CANSES). The series aims to facilitate a much needed discussion about the methodological, ethical, political, practical and professional challenges that arise when researching the far right.
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