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Playing with Religion: Representation of Islam in Video Games
Abstract
This paper analyzes mainstream video games produced in the United States, Europe, and the Arab world and explores the ways these games deal with the representation of Islam and Muslim identity. It is based on a content analysis of more than 80 games developed between the years 2005-2011, alongside interviews with 8 different game producers. It analyzes audiovisual signifiers, narrative structures, and rule systems utilized by these games in order to construct the “virtual representation” of Islam. The research methodology encompasses recent trends in Islamic studies, cultural studies, and game studies. Substantive portions of the materials considered in this paper were gathered during fieldwork trips to Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon. Video games represent a mainstream media and popular leisure time activity. They exhibit strong popular appeal and economic relevance, contrasted by a lack of culture prestige and scientific coverage. Today we are in crucial need of critically understanding the symbolic and ideological dimensions of in-game representational politics. This paper analyzes how various genres of mainstream European and American video games have portrayed Islam and Muslim identity. It then compares these representations with portrayals of Islam found in existing Arab games of similar genres. Capitalizing on the Bogost’s notion of “procedural rhetoric,” this paper specifically discusses how Islam is embedded into the rule systems governing the player’s interaction with the game. Essentially, this paper argues that whereas Western games oftentimes present Islam as a threat, flatten out the diverse Muslim identities and reconstruct them into a series of social stereotypes, the Arab games use distinctive Islamic narrative to frame their game play and communicate Islamic principles and moral values to the youth. Nevertheless, the way Islam and its values are integrated into a game is fundamentally determined by the game’s genre and the “procedural forms” it enables. Since most of the Arab games utilize genres established by their successful Western counterparts, their authors have to appropriate the existing procedural forms and refashion them along the lines of Islamic principles. In other words, although the contemporary Arab games vary significantly in their background, aims, and design, and on a symbolic level offer multifaceted concepts of Islam and Muslim identity, on a structural level they remain “Western” and do not transcend the patterns established by the global video game industry. Therefore, from a broader perspective, this paper discusses the connections between global consumer culture, consumption of religion, and Islamization of commerce.
Discipline
Media Arts
Geographic Area
All Middle East
Sub Area
19th-21st Centuries