Discussing the state of play in contemporary popular culture, specifically the role of crime and crime control in the video game medium, this book discusses the criminological importance of video games.
Pulling together an international group of scholars from Brazil, Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States, this edited volume analyzes a wide range of noteworthy video games, including Bioshock, Death Stranding, Diablo 2, Beat Cop, The Last of Us, Disco Elysium, Red Dead Redemption, P.T., Spider-Man, Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, and Grand Theft Auto. The book thus seeks to advance dialog on video games as important cultural artifacts containing significant insights regarding dominant perceptions, interests, anxieties, contradictions, and other matters of criminological interest.
Covering policing, vigilantism, different forms of violence, genocide, mental illness, and criminological theory, Video Games, Crime and Control will be of great interest to students and scholars of Criminology, Media Studies, and Sociology, specifically those focusing on Game Studies and Cultural Criminology.
Discussing the state of play in contemporary popular culture, specifically the role of crime and crime control in the video game medium, this book discusses the criminological importance of video games.
Recenzijos
"This incredible book is the comprehensive criminology of video games! Its a deep dive into what they teach about crime, violence, consequences, and games ability to reify harms and solutions. Culture plays with rule breaking use this book to understand the place and value of video games in understanding crime." - Jack Denham, Associate Dean: Social Sciences, York St. John University
"Extends the criminological gaze towards an immensely popular yet strangely neglected area of popular culture. The result is a series of fascinating and illuminating explorations of how video games reflect and perhaps shape or contest our common conceptions of crime, justice, transgression and pleasure. A fabulous contribution to popular criminology!" - Majid Yar, Professor Emeritus of Criminology, Lancaster University
Introduction
Kevin F. Steinmetz & Jonathan A. Grubb
Chains in Bioshock: The Illusion of Freedom and Free Will
Melissa A. Petkovsek
The Apprehensive Violence of Death Stranding: Meditations on Ropes and
Sticks
Kevin F. Steinmetz
Are You Sure the Only You is You?: Domestic Violence and Critiquing the
Other in the Spectral Remains of P.T.
Sara Skott & Karl-Fredrik Scott Bengtson
Demonology, Dark Fantasy, and the Devil: Representations of Early
Criminological Theory and Justice in Diablo
2.
Chad Posick
Were Thieves in a World that Dont Want Us No More: The Red Dead
Redemption Series as a Case Study of the Philosophies of Punishment
Shon M. Reed, Logan P. Kennedy, & Breanna Boppre
Making Light of Darkness: Crime and Justice in LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker
Saga
Colin Atkinson
Fighting Fire with Fire: Disco Elysium and procedural (In)Justice
Edward L. W. Green
To Serve and Protect from Behind the Mask: Miles Morales in Marvels
Spider-Man and Marvels Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Policing, Justice, and
Representation
Christina Fawcett & Steven Kohm
Cynicism in Police Simulation: A Case Study of Beat Cop
James Popham, Andrea Corradi, Michael Ouellet, Sarthak Pal, Chris McDiarmid,
Jocelyn Booton, & Michelle Goodridge
Kevin F. Steinmetz is a professor of criminology in the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work at Kansas State University, USA. His scholarship cuts across multiple areas including cybercrime, criminological theory, racial inequality and criminal justice, gender and crime, as well as crime, criminal justice, and popular culture. He is the author of Hacked: A Radical Approach to Hacker Culture and Crime and Cybercrime and Society. His works have also appeared in prestigious outlets, including The British Journal of Criminology, Theoretical Criminology, Critical Criminology, Crime Media Culture.Jonathan A. Grubb is the Military Domestic Abuse Senior Research and Evaluation Analyst for the National Organization for Victim Advocacy (NOVA). His research centers on the spatiotemporal clustering of crime, victimization of vulnerable populations, perceptions and attitudes of professionals working with victims of domestic violence as well as human trafficking, and arson within urban environments. Recent publications include Crime TV: Streaming Criminology in Popular Culture which utilizes modern television shows as a frame for understanding criminological theory.
