Gendered Play, Racialized Reality Black Cyberfeminism, Inclusive Communities of Practice, and the Intersections of Learning, Socialization, and Resilience in Online Gaming

Introduction

While digital games hold promise for learning and socialization, emerging research and popular debates have critiqued inclusive access to these practices and literacies. This essay examines digital games for their potential to integrate diverse individuals and communities for learning and socialization, especially in online play and broadcasting of gameplay. For example, a level of cultural competency can be attained in well-developed games to overcome essentialist notions and assumptions about women and people of color. Using Black Cyberfeminism¹ as a theoretical lens to make sense of players’ experiences, and Racialized Pedagogical Zones (RPZs)² as an analytical frame to situate digital games’ entrenched ideologies of race and racism, we contend that games offer highly unproblematized depictions but have extreme potential for cultural competency. We further utilize Communities of Practice (CoP)³ as a frame for understanding and interrogating equitable access to community-supported collaborative learning and mastery within game culture, more broadly, and interest-driven guilds, clans, and affinity spaces, more specifically. In our extension of CoP, we integrate inclusive to highlight the resistive and resilient strategies employed by supportive communities for diverse women in addressing the systematic nature of oppression and power relations that undergird communities of practice, particularly in marked gendered spaces such as gaming.⁴

Marginalizing practices in game culture have become more widely publicized and understood in recent years, most notably because of high profile incidents of harassment.⁵ However, representations of women and racial or ethnic minorities by the gaming industry have also been problematic historically. For instance, since the 1980s video games have been critiqued for the hypersexualization of women and women are often the victims of misogynistic vitriol, as the incidents around Gamergate have exposed.⁶ People of color are featured in largely stereotypical ways and are all but absent from the gaming industry.⁷ Queer gamers and gamers with dis/abilities are almost entirely absent and, when present, are not depicted fairly.⁸ This differential treatment appears to have a symbiotic relationship with the exclusion of marginalized players.⁹ As researchers have noted, Internet technologies and virtual communities operate in a manner that benefits privileged identities.¹⁰ These unequal power relations are accepted as legitimate and are embedded in the cultural practices of digital technology.

Nevertheless, many gamers—most notably women—have resisted this perpetual state of inequity and the dominant narrative of power, control, and exclusion.¹¹ Although some in gaming contend that these are not overt practices of exclusion, many players and scholars acknowledge the existence of symbolic exclusion, where those who are valued have the privilege to define legitimate practice and participation within gaming culture.¹² The unequal power relations operating within the gaming community influence not only what gamers consume but also what they learn about themselves and others. Further, the racialized and gendered consumptive practices through gaming are often taken for granted. Commercial gaming culture is, with few exceptions, complicit in these exclusionary practices by continuing to design at a deficit, despite these increasingly apparent realities. But many gamers have begun to resist and challenge not only the imagery but also the practices that sustain white, masculine privilege within gaming and technology in general. While these practices have yet to reach a critical mass to disrupt the power structure operating within game culture as a whole, they exist counter to the mainstream and empower the marginalized operating within them.

While the literature will provide an overview of these practices, our purpose is to privilege the resistance and resilience strategies of the marginalized to disrupt the traditional narrative while they empower themselves. We utilize Kimberlé Crenshaw’s framework of intersectionality to reflect on identity, recognizing that “the problem with identity politics is not that it fails to transcend difference, as some critics charge, but rather the opposite—that it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences.”¹³ We also want to caution that while we focus on players who have historically been the marginalized in gaming culture and game research, we recognize that men’s experiences are similarly varied and subjugated by these hegemonic structures. By reflecting on the lived experiences of diverse women gamers, we highlight intersecting and diverging aspects of privilege, marginalization, and access. We first examine the history of digital gaming and scholarly work that examines issues of inequality in game culture. We make a distinction between work that has interrogated the lack of in-game representational diversity, which has a longer history, and recent work that has explored diverse experiences in gaming activities. We then discuss historical frameworks and theories, along with contemporary frameworks we have derived, with supporting case studies, that help us to understand the resistance strategies and resiliency that marginalized and minoritized players have employed in the hegemonic play space of game culture.

Commercial gaming and exclusionary practices

Digital games have a long history of being a commercially successful leisure activity, since making the transition from research labs to arcades. Women and people of color, though often not documented, have been part of that tradition. For example, Black and Latino youth assisted in propelling the video gaming industry into a million-dollar industry by spending time and money in arcades.¹⁴ Furthermore, many women and girls populated arcades¹⁵ and were involved in game development.¹⁶ Specifically, a 1983 study found that women, overall, had a positive view of arcades, but made up 20% of arcade players, mainly due to a lack of social support.¹⁷ Despite their early presence in play and production, most of the rhetoric around women and digital games focuses on their lack of participation.

While many early successes can be attributed to coin-operated arcade games in the 1970s and 1980s, digital games quickly transitioned to home game consoles.¹⁸ These spaces were marketed to different audiences: early arcade machines were mainly found in bars, where clientele were usually grown men, and home consoles were usually marketed for family enjoyment, which extended this leisure activity to families, namely children.¹⁹ The late 1970s also saw the advent of the first multiplayer games, when MUDs (or Multi-User Dungeons) were created, allowing for text-based role-playing, fantasy, puzzles, and combat and experience systems.²⁰

By the early to mid-1980s, as graphics became increasingly intricate, researchers were noting disparities in game representations and themes, who was playing, and who was being supported in their play. The earliest games were limited by technology, and gender or racial representation was difficult to discern.²¹ However, many of these early games contained violent or war-oriented themes, which were seen as unappealing to girls and women.²² As digital games increased in graphical complexity, more representational themes and marked gendered and racialized roles emerged. In the early 1980s researchers found that 92% of arcade games did not include any women, and those that did mostly contained “damsel in distress” roles.²³ For example, in Donkey Kong (1981) players controlled a white male protagonist (later popularized as Mario in Super Mario Bros.) who had to save a white, blonde princess from an aggressive ape.

Not surprisingly, by the mid-1980s gaming was starting to be seen as a culture, complete with its own attitude and lexicon, which privileged male participation and precluded women’s participation in the discourse.²⁴ Studies found that as early as kindergarten, children were already more likely to assume that video games were more appropriate for boys than girls, though computers were still viewed as gender-neutral until middle school.²⁵ In public play spaces—such as arcades, tournaments, and events—and in the home, men and boys dominated game play and access to computers and consoles,²⁶ a theme that has continued to be prevalent in the literature.²⁷ This male domination of gameplay was seen as evidence of the hegemonic structure that dominates production, marketing, and design of games that, in turn, privileges men’s participation and play in game culture.²⁸

Beyond leisure, gaming has long been associated with computing and technology-related trajectories and careers.²⁹ These fields have had similarly longstanding representational issues along gender and racial lines. Not only are games primarily created and distributed by men, but mainly White and Asian men.³⁰ Scholarly literature has made a link between early playful experimentation with computers and technology—historically facilitated primarily through digital gaming—and later trajectories in computing and technology-based careers. Since women’s participation in gaming was often limited, due to diverging social expectations, their trajectories in computing and its related subfield, game development, was often seen as being limited as well.³¹

However, despite the racial representational problems in games and production, most of the research on inequity in play has exclusively explored gender in a homogeneous way.³² This research can be grouped in three waves that are akin to the history of feminist thought. Leading up to the first major volume on gender and video games, From Barbie and Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games,³³ the research primarily focused on why girls were not playing games at the same rate or in the same way as boys. The “girl games movement” was an attempt to address these disparities in female play.³⁴ While revolutionary in its focus on bringing female interests into gaming, it was not without blind spots. Second wave research largely criticized and responded to first wave research by pointing out that designing for girls’ interests painted gender as a static construct, privileged male experiences as the norm and female experience as the alternative, invoked traditional stereotypes that could miss the mark in engaging girls in computing trajectories,³⁵ did not consider the variability of age and interests,³⁶ and did not wholly address the role of physical and social barriers to play.³⁷ Furthermore, once supportive environments were considered where women and girls could train, gendered differences in skill and ability declined, which helped to underscore the socially constructed differences in play and participation.³⁸

However, both of these waves were largely silent in addressing player experiences across gender and its intersections with race, ethnicity, culture, gender identity and sexuality beyond in-game character representation. Many notable scholars have aptly pointed out the problematic politics of racial representation in games.³⁹ Despite almost three decades of study dedicated to primarily white or white-assumed female experiences with games, however, very little had been documented around diverse racial or ethnic experiences with games. David Leonard’s 2006 essay, “Not a Hater, Just Keepin’ It Real,” was largely a call to arms to address this disparity in research:

Excluding race (and intersections with gender, nation, and sexuality) from public discussions through erasure and acceptance of larger discourses of colorblindness contributes to problematic, if not faulty, understandings of video games and their significant role in contemporary social, political, economic, and cultural organization. How can one truly understand fantasy, violence, gender roles, plot, narrative, game playability, virtual realities (all common within the current literature), and the like without examining race, racism, and/or racial stratification.⁴⁰

Third wave research, which is still at its early stages, has begun to explore player experiences in ways that account for a wide variety of sociocultural experiences. In particular, this research makes explicit the ways that gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity can be intersectionally experienced and understood.⁴¹ Intersectionality, as articulated by Kimberlé Crenshaw,⁴² is grounded in the work of Black feminist scholars, activists and writers who wanted to accentuate the importance of sociocultural experiences and constructs that intersect with gender. ⁴³ Intersectionality also helped influence critical race theory, a framework for understanding gender, race, power, and institutional structures in society.⁴⁴

Extending critical race theory as a frame, Gloria Ladson-Billings explains how conceptual categories have replaced older ideological constructs of race: in other words, constructs such as “school achievement,” “middle classness,” “maleness,” “beauty,” “intelligence,” and “science” have become synonymous with whiteness, while “welfare recipients,” “gangs,” “basketball players,” and “the underclass” have become synonymous with Blackness.⁴⁵ Similarly, colorblindness largely assumes that because racism and ethnocentrism are no longer as overt that their negative effects are not present concerns. However, Ladson-Billings posits that their effects are still harmful, albeit in ways that take more effort to understand. Bringing these conceptual categories into studies on digital game culture, we see that there are similar embedded conceptual assumptions about gender and race, with “gamer” often synonymous with white males, and “gender and games” often synonymous with white females.

Until recently, intersectional work has been largely absent in studies on digital gaming, beyond content analysis of what is missing in games. Notable emerging work has begun to explore intersectional player experiences in game culture across sexuality and gender identity.⁴⁶ Some scholarship also explores race and ethnicity.⁴⁷ But the largest emerging trend on understanding gender and intersectionality in the gaming literature focuses on queer experiences and queering games, while many questions about racial experiences still remain.

Here we assert the need for more inquiry into the experiences of players of color. While both queer gaming studies and racial/ethnic gaming studies are needed, there have historically been unique experiences for people of color, often relegated to being invisible in the current climate of colorblindness.⁴⁸ This partially accounts for the continuing emphasis on understanding gender differences (in a monolithic way) in gaming in many fields. We further examine digital games, learning, and socialization and then extend upon critical race theory by proposing a Black Cyberfeminist framework for understanding the experiences of women of color in gaming as well as an Inclusive Communities of Practice framework for understanding their resistance strategies in and through communities of practice and play.

Digital games, learning, socialization and race

In addition to being an entertainment medium, digital games have been seen to hold promise for learning and socialization.⁴⁹ Specifically, research in this area has highlighted that digital games offer the potential for situated learning, collaboration, distributed cognition, critical thinking, problem solving, increased motivation, systematic thinking and adaptive reasoning, which are all important for the development of 21st century skillsets and mindsets.⁵⁰ Integrating commercial games in formal and informal learning environments has been an area with extensive application and cited benefits.⁵¹ Research also demonstrates the collaborative, distributed and situated learning that occurs in online multiplayer games. ⁵²

However, with the well-cited potential of games for learning, many have raised issues important to socialization. For example, many scholars have touted the benefits of games allowing players to take part in “cultural narratives”.⁵³ Specifically, instead of being passive consumers of cultural models, learners can be actively engaged in representations of social and cultural systems.⁵⁴ While this can be beneficial to learning about systems, embedded values built in by designers can also make one economic or social system seemingly better than another.⁵⁵

Some game types focus more specifically on understanding cultures or subcultures as part of game play. Anna Everett and S. Craig Watkins describe urban/street games–such as the Grand Theft Auto series–as ones that require “a great degree of cultural competency,” which is central to “familiarity with certain racial themes [and] logistics”.⁵⁶ However, while authenticity and learning is a central part of playing these games, they rely on exaggerated stereotypes of urban life, which borrow from popular themes from urban focused Hollywood films and commercial hip hop music and videos. Although these forms of passively consumed media have themselves been problematic in representations of race, the act of performing or “doing race”⁵⁷ is a form of reproducing these sociocultural scripts in ways that may be more harmful to internalization. Racialized Pedagogical Zones (RPZs) “refer to the way that video games teach not only entrenched ideologies of race and racism, but also how gameplay’s pleasure principles of mastery, winning, and skills development are often inextricably tied to and defined by familiar racial and ethnic stereotypes.”⁵⁸

Nevertheless, taking on another racial identity in gaming is a complex act: players are immersed in racial narratives without necessarily confronting the inexorable difficulties associated with being a minoritized person. Lisa Nakamura’s work on “identity tourism,” first published in 1995 to describe text-based role playing games, highlights this tension as one in which the “fact that the personae chosen are overwhelmingly [racial] stereotypes blocks this possibility by reinforcing these stereotypes”.⁵⁹ In other words, a player paradoxically embodies a racial minoritized body within a highly stereotyped representation, which furthers the stereotype more than the minoritized experience.

With the exception of urban/street games, which over-represent racial minorities in highly stereotyped ways, and sports games, which represent the demographics of real world players, racial and ethnic minorities are underrepresented in digital games. Recent content analyses demonstrate that male characters make up more than 85% of playable characters and White characters make up more than 80% of playable characters.⁶⁰ Female characters and racial/ethnic minorities are more likely to be secondary, non-playable characters. Even worse are the statistics for female characters of color, of which 10% are African American, 7% are Asian, about 1% are Native American, and Latinas are almost nonexistent.⁶¹ As if signifying its importance to investigation, the literature that documents representation for women of color in games is over 15 years old. Further, female characters are more likely to be hypersexualized and women of color are more likely to be victims of violence.

Studies that examine the characters chosen by players, when given the chance to customize their own, have found that marginalized races and genders are similarly underrepresented. In these studies, of characters that had a discernible gender or race, 87% were male, and 92% were white, respectively, with Black characters accounting for 8% of characters and no other racial groups represented.⁶² There are a few potential reasons for this, which we will explore further herein.

Some have posited that marginalized players can achieve greater freedom playing online, rather than in person in public play spaces, where their gender (or race) can be hidden.⁶³ However, as we will discuss more below, it is increasingly difficult to hide your gender or race/ethnicity online. For example, with the rise of voice based communication, many players are linguistically profiled,⁶⁴ and, even without using voice based communication, many players resort to looking up other players’ information, often to use it against them during game play–something that has been termed “profile or avatar stalking.”⁶⁵

A related area has explored communities of practice and “affinity spaces” for learning.⁶⁶ Affinity spaces are fan-based communities that form around games and popular culture and enable individuals to learn more about their areas of interest. Because people not only create their own content in these communities, blogs and social networking spaces, but also impart knowledge for authentic audiences, they begin to take on identities as experts in their given subject areas, which is seen as important for meaningful learning. Furthermore, there are specific sets of skills that individuals have to learn in order to impart this knowledge, such as media editing and design, coding, modifying systems (“modding”), and software/hardware specifications, which are related to developing and expanding “tech-savvy” competencies.⁶⁷

While affinity spaces hold promise for helping players develop a lexicon of skills and identities, they also can be marginalizing to certain groups, particularly women and ethnic/racial minorities.⁶⁸ Goode discusses how the digital divide, which mostly affected individuals of lower socioeconomic status, and people of color, has transitioned to a “digital identity divide.”⁶⁹ Though the cost of computers and mobile devices has declined in recent years, thus allowing for more widespread adoption, many underserved communities and individuals have not developed the same sense of technology literacy, agency and confidence due to the historical inequity. This relationship can be similarly seen with gaming.⁷⁰

Furthermore, not having the same kinds of expectations and support around computers and technology disproportionately affects women and non-Asian people of color, who are less often stereotyped as being technology savvy. For example, many scholars have found that racial and class differences in how schools approach computing continue to put African Americans and Latinos at a disadvantage: schools that they attend are more likely to have computer literacy classes, as opposed to advanced mathematics and computing courses, like their White peers.⁷¹ The most recent statistics on who takes the AP computer science exam in the United States echoes this disparity, with less than 20% of women, 3% of African Americans and 8% of Latinos taking the exam nationally.⁷² In fact, in many states, students from these groups were not represented as having taken the exam at all. Taking a critical race theory perspective, Ladson-Billings labeled similar phenomena as a byproduct of conceptual categories affecting expectations in institutional learning: “ . . . . it is not just the distortions, omissions, and stereotypes of school curriculum content that must be considered, it also is the rigor of the curriculum and access to what is deemed ‘enriched’ curriculum . . .”⁷³

Moreover, scholars have found that merely playing games does not in and of itself lead to equitable trajectories in computing. While African Americans and Latinos consume gaming at higher rates than Whites and Asians,⁷⁴ they are significantly underrepresented in game development, compared to their population statistics.⁷⁵ For example, Black and Latino youth play games, on average, 20–30 minutes more daily than do white youth but only made up 2.5% and 8.2%, respectively, of the game development community, according to the 2014 game development industry survey. Women made up 22%, and transgendered people constituted about 0.7% of the industry. However, the 2014 survey included people in the education sector, students, and the unemployed, unlike prior surveys, which showed higher disparities, so the figures could skew higher than actual industry representation.

This disparity between game playing and game production can be seen as a form of the digital identity divide. DiSalvo and Bruckman, for example, found that African American men were less likely to have high-speed internet access or own the same kinds of high tech gaming equipment than their White peers, which could point to one reason why they were less likely to get into game development.⁷⁶ High tech computer equipment allows players to be more hands-on with their gaming experiences, through modding and experimentation, which can help lead to valuable development skills. However, lack of equipment is only one piece of the puzzle. Richard’s extensive study of game culture found that there were measurable differences in confidence and identification for women and players of color, which could be an indication of how the lack of diversity in game representation, and the preponderance of highly sexualized and highly stereotyped female and ethnic minority characters, can lead to stereotype threat.⁷⁷ Stereotype threat happens when either a lack of representation or adverse stereotype reinforcement in the environment elicits negativity about one’s social group.⁷⁸ Stereotype threat is often measured in school learning: it results in lowered test scores, in the short term, and distancing from the subject area, in the long term. However, it has increasingly been measured in other areas, such as sports and leisure, with similar results.⁷⁹ Richard further found that women and people of color in gaming were more susceptible to stereotype threat, which could account for their less visible or agentic participation.⁸⁰

Theoretical frameworks for understanding cyber inclusivity

We propose two frameworks that help us understand marginalization within contemporary gaming culture while interrogating the possibilities for intersectional practice to situate better the realities of women in gaming: (1) Black Cyberfeminism and (2) Inclusive Communities of Practice. In particular, we posit that these two frameworks help further our understanding of two key issues that still need to be addressed in gaming: understanding and designing for equity and inclusivity. Extending upon current work outlined earlier in this essay, we first discuss the concepts within each framework, later delineating their influence in informing future research and practice. We then outline case studies from our work that help ground these frameworks moving toward progressive models theorizing women’s experiences within gaming culture.

Black Cyberfeminism Framework

Anti-racist, critical feminism is equipped to address digital disparities and issues with equitable inclusivity. Expanding upon its core tenets, Gray modifies Black feminism to reflect the marginalized in digital realms.⁸¹ Extending Haraway’s concept of cyborg,⁸² which deessentializes identity, Black Cyberfeminism privileges the intersection of identities operating and existing in digital spaces. Incorporating a Black feminist critique of technology and the online self, Black Cyberfeminism suggests that the physical and digital are equal, neither able to rid bodily identifiers in any realm. By focusing solely on gender, Cyberfeminism, technofeminism, and other virtual feminisms may address women within internet technologies, but they fail to capture race and other intersections, and these must also be at the forefront of the analysis.

Black Cyberfeminism, as an extension of virtual feminisms and Black feminist thought, incorporates the tenets of interconnected identities, interconnected social forces, and distinct circumstances to theorize better how women are operating within internet technologies. This interconnectedness is directly applicable to all marginalized women. By addressing the following, Black Cyberfeminism will begin to capture the experiences, innovative methods and practices, and tactics of women to resist hegemony within internet technologies: (1) social structural oppression of technology and virtual spaces; (2) intersecting oppressions experienced in virtual spaces; and (3) the distinctness of the virtual feminist community.

Social Structural Oppression of Technology and Virtual Spaces

Black feminists routinely address matters of institutional racism, damaging stereotypical images, sexism, and classism.⁸³ Incorporating the inherent masculine bias in technology and the default whiteness of virtual spaces,⁸⁴ this theme is imperative to the creation of a Black Cyberfeminist framework. Kolko, Nakamura, and Rodman argue that the Internet is far from liberatory but rather is a space that continues a “cultural map of assumed whiteness.”⁸⁵ Kolko points out that attempts to make race and ethnicity present are met with colorblind resistance.⁸⁶ The assumed white masculine body excludes women and people of color; the mere presence of their bodies marks them as deviant in these spaces.⁸⁷ Deviant social behavior manifests in the materiality of the body. Blackness and any association with Blackness are punished in virtual spaces, leading to the exclusion of marginalized women.⁸⁸

Intersecting Oppressions in Virtual Spaces

The second theme of Black Cyberfeminist theory is that women must confront and work to dismantle the overarching and interlocking structure of domination in terms of race, class, gender, and other intersecting oppressions. Because individuals experience oppression in different ways, we must not create a one size fits all understanding of oppression. Black Cyberfeminism requires understanding the diverse ways that oppression can manifest in the materiality of the body and how this translates into virtual spaces.

Black Cyberfeminism also requires recognizing the privilege that some marginalized bodies hold before we can begin dismantling these privileges and understanding the multitude of ways that intersectionality can manifest. Black Cyberfeminism, in the spirit of feminism, encourages a privileging of women’s perspectives and ways of knowing, because race, gender, class status, disability, sexuality, and a host of other identifiers generate knowledge about the world. Valuing these perspectives is the only way to liberate women from the confines of hegemonic notions deeming these identities unworthy.

Black Cyberfeminism also recognizes that the lived experiences of women manifest in the virtual world as well. Women do not have the luxury of opting out of any aspect of their identity. By privileging these once marginalized identities, Black cyberfeminist spaces can begin to move women toward progressive and meaningful solutions to hegemonic notions about women.

Accepting the Distinctness of Marginalized Virtual Feminisms

Black Cyberfeminism also addresses the distinct nature of how women utilize virtual technologies. Women have used social media for activism and change as well as to advance contemporary feminism. The Internet has propelled activism and empowerment in that many individuals can take action on a singular issue. The tenets of Black Cyberfeminism never detach the personal from the structural or the communal, which sets Black Cyberfeminism apart. The key is in how marginalized women, specifically Black women, communicate and how Black women’s Internet usage is a continuation of their offline selves.

Black women were once touted as poster children for the digital divide.⁸⁹ What was not understood was the cultural and technical savvy that Black women incorporated to use technology on their terms and for their own purposes. A technology may have been created for one purpose, but Black women have been known to employ it to fulfill their own needs, thus displacing the hegemonic establishment. Digital social media are important in that they represent, for women of color and other marginalized groups lacking resources, a path to a space where their voices are heard, which can lead to empowerment. As “Black Twitter” has illustrated, people of color have co-opted traditional virtual spaces for their own means to communicate and empower their communities. So by employing the cultural tradition of sygnifyin’, marginalized bodies can express themselves with others without fear of retaliation or being othered within the spaces.⁹⁰

Black Cyberfeminism, which represents the blending of multiple ideas into a cohesive analytical framework, simultaneously contributes to and widens the scope of cyberfeminism, technofeminism, and Black feminist thought. Although all three share many theoretical assumptions, values, and aims, their confluence is truly as distinct as the women who exist within Black Cyberfeminism. Stemming from feminism’s third wave, Black Cyberfeminism represents a true engagement with the digital in the lives of wired women that encompasses a self-consciously critical stance toward the existing order with respect to the various ways that the digital affects women.

Inclusive Communities of Practice Framework

The framework of Inclusive Communities of Practice holds promise for helping to address the disparities that result from marginalizing and minoritizing practices in game culture. Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger originally coined the term community of practice to refer to the “legitimate peripheral participation” that occurs in communities of practitioners that most learners invariably participate in at some point in their lives.⁹¹ They are formed by people who engage in collective informal—but nonetheless important—learning in a shared area of interest.

A community of practice is defined by (1) the learning domain (i.e., gaming), (2) the community, which pursues their interest and activities around that domain (i.e., a gaming community) and (3) the practice, which involves developing social and material resources that are instrumental to learning. Communities of practice are further defined by (1) mutual engagement, or the actions and negotiations they make together toward their goal, (2) joint enterprise, or the common purpose that brings people together, and (3) shared repertoire, or the discourses and meanings they create through practice, which they express as a form of membership.⁹² A defining aspect of communities of practice is that learning occurs in authentic social contexts where it is applied and negotiated.

Within the context of gaming, learning operates within the larger structure of game culture and within the substructures of gaming communities (termed “clans,” “guilds,” and “companies,” depending on the game genre).⁹³ They engage in meaningful practices that further their learning of games, and related interests, such as live streaming game play (through, for example, Twitch. tv), modding, and creating videos, games, or artwork related to their games. During these activities they often become introduced to computing and technology skills and pathways as well as experiencing other aspects of learning and engagement with and about game culture and their wider society. They develop their own lingo, which is negotiated within the larger game culture, and their gaming subcommunities.

However, in communities of practice “the social structure of this practice, its power relations and its conditions for legitimacy define possibilities for learning.”⁹⁴ Specifically, power structures are often apparent in communities of practice, as in everyday life, and these structures strongly mediate the kinds of learning and engagement in which individuals can partake.

Richard studied how gender-supportive communities operated in game culture.⁹⁵ Her work was twofold, aiming to understand: (1) whether stereotype threat happened for women, people of color, and queer gamers in game culture in ways similar to how it happens in formal learning, and (2) whether socioculturally supportive communities could diminish its effects. Richard created a model to understand how stereotype threat works in gaming as well as how supportive environments can serve as a buffer to it (see fig. 1).⁹⁶ Within the female-supportive community studied (PMS Clan), women players were supported in their play so that they could further their skills and interests in gaming activities and careers within a safe space. Members were trained around competitive and overall gaming proficiency and the development of coping skills and resistance strategies. Specifically, she found that gender-supportive communities were measurably effective in the ways they helped female players increase their identification and confidence (i.e., self-concept) in gaming (i.e., learning domain), to the extent that they reached levels similar to those that male players reached in the wider gaming community. Within the learning and development literature, self-concept and domain identification are often referred to as “non-cognitive” skills that undergird learning and engagement.⁹⁷ While these capacities are not direct measures of learning (i.e., cognitive skills), they work in tandem with it. For example, a student who has more positive academic mindsets, such as feeling like they belong in the school community, or feeling like they can succeed at the task, is more prone to persevere and perform better academically. Richard found this to also be true within the informal learning space of gaming.

Richard’s Inclusive Communities of Practice Framework extends upon Wenger’s components of social learning theory.⁹⁸ In figure 2 Wenger’s original framework occupies the main model and Richard’s additions are located in the dashed box. This model highlights the reciprocal relationship between community factors and individual factors, and how community factors can help foster resiliency. There have been similar findings in computer science and engineering. For example, women and non-Asian ethnic minorities are often underrepresented in these fields, but programs that have fostered female-supportive activities, curriculum, and role models have been found to increase female enrollment, performance, and persistence.⁹⁹ Similarly, studies have found that families who teach positive racial and ethnic pride to youth of color are able to serve as a buffer to negative bias in learning environments.¹⁰⁰ In other words, supportive environments that help foster resistance and resiliency have helped encourage inclusive learning.¹⁰¹

Figure 1.

Richard’s Stereotype Threat in Gaming Framework.

Figure 2.

Richard’s Inclusive Communities of Practice Framework.

Operationalizing black cyberfeminism and inclusive communities of practice

As discussed at some length already, many aspects of how gaming is structured and sold foster a sense of white, male dominance and agency, and this affects who is assumed to play and participate in gaming. As a result, women and people of color are often assumed to be anomalies, which can explain in part why it is often first assumed that a player is a man and presumably white.¹⁰² Herein we detail cases from our work with players on the margins and how their experiences relate to Black Cyberfeminism and Inclusive Communities of Practice.

Many diverse women in gaming have relayed experiences of being marginalized and harassed. Most harassment that women receive is gender-based, and falls into three main areas used to subjugate women: their appearance, their sexuality, and their appropriateness in the space.¹⁰³

White, female player 1 [forum post]:

When I say . . .“The sniper is in the bottom corner in the bushes under the Tower,” how does that warrant a barrage of—“Get back in the kitchen . . . [Whore], [Slut], [Bitch] & even [Cunt]”. I can only Mute so many people and it’s soooo frustrating that it’s almost getting to the point that the [mic] stays off most of the time.

Black, female player [interview]:

Sometimes if your tag looks too feminine . . . they’ll kick you [out of the game], sometimes if you use voice chat, they’ll kick you.

White, female player 2 [forum post]:

The first thing I get is, “Shut up, little boy”. . . I typically don’t say anything . . . but eventually someone will get it or read my bio and say, “Wait, you’re a girl? Are you ugly? Are you fat? You’re a slut . . . etc.”. . . I rarely ever run into just decent guys who either don’t say anything about it or say, “Hey, you’re pretty good.”

Latina, female player 1 [interview]:

[Men] would send me pictures of things I didn’t want to see, or they would harass me, or if I were good—because I was great at Call of Duty 4—they’d say I was a guy playing under a girl’s name . . . I don’t talk on the mic, I just play . . . I just stopped talking cuz they’d be like, ‘oh that’s a girl, let’s harass her or ask for her number’ or something.

As evidenced through the statements of female players, who sought out the supportive space of PMS Clan, documented by Richard, the kind of harassment experienced outside the community serves to invalidate their presence in gaming (assuming maleness), and then actively attempts to dissuade or disconnect them once it’s discovered they are indeed women, whether this is through harassment or removal from the game. As a result of this, many women choose to hide their gender online, when they can, but this often means that they cannot play and participate in gaming activities to the fullest of their abilities because they are missing out on things like team communication. In PMS Clan, for example, female members add “PMS” to their gamertag (i.e., online gaming pseudonym) to denote clan membership, which often identifies them as women (male members use “H2O”). As a result, many members who are concerned about gender harassment use a second tag, in addition to other strategies to disguise their gender:

Female player [unknown race, forum post]:

I never play matchmaking on my own on my main tag, I’m always on my 2nd—are you shocked [?]—which you can’t tell if I’m a girl or guy . . .

White female player [forum post]:

I always always always always unplug my mic or mute people . . . Occasionally I hear people say my [Gamer tag] out loud, but just to say it . . . which is odd. I also can’t stand the “[Oh my God. You’re a girl. No way!]”. . . I refuse to talk, just to avoid the all-too-common jerk. However, I do keep my mic in for [certain game types that require coordination] (just because it IS absolutely necessary).

White female player [forum post]:

I have historically avoided speaking on Ventrilo [PC audio chat platform] except to close friends . . . for the longest time I kept a gender-neutral callsign and didn’t correct people when they called me “he”. . . and I still have yet to wear a mic with my PS3.

Throughout her ethnographic work, Richard noted not only that female players cited harassment as a common occurrence, forcing gamers to modify and marginalize their play, but that it had measurable, negative effects on how they played, an example of stereotype threat:

African American female player [interview]:

I feel [that the] positive experiences [playing online] are a little more than the negative experiences, but the negative experiences just kind of take down my whole vibe and my mood within the game . . . when you’re . . . by yourself, I think it makes you a little more easier of a target to hate on and harass and stuff.

White female player [forum post]:

When I first got my xbox I remember having the hardest time concentrating or playing because it felt like I was a huge target for them to pick on when I hadn’t done anything.

As her interviews and ethnographic research revealed, women did not always need to be actively harassed for their play to be marginalized. The overwhelming atmosphere of potential harassment was often enough to regulate their participation. It is a tale of resiliency that they continued to play, despite the vitriolic behavior, but their need for consistent self-monitoring to avoid hostility challenged their ability to reach the same levels of skill and practice as their male counterparts.

Women have created gender-oriented communities for support and to help develop coping strategies to withstand the oppressions they experience. These spaces are also where they can better their gaming abilities in environments where their play is not constantly under attack or scrutiny. In many communities for gamers on the periphery, such as women and people of color, resiliency is fostered through community policies and norms. For example, in PMS Clan, prospective members had to adhere to a strict and long recruitment period before they could become members, during which they had to demonstrate strict adherence to the rules.¹⁰⁴ Even after obtaining membership they had to abide by these rules or face expulsion. Such rules included the banning of misogynistic vernacular (like the use of “rape” when an opponent is bested) as well as homophobic and racist language. Furthermore, while men and women could join the clan and play together, all members had to attend weekly practices, separated by gender. During online practices and public matches, where they were often playing against all male teams who knew of the clan’s reputation and mission, they would have to maintain good sportsmanship and could not harass other players, even if they themselves were being harassed.

However, they also learned several coping strategies for dealing with problematic members of the opposing team, such as muting them, or having private discussions between matches about the best ways to deal with acrimonious players. Despite these practices potentially being seen as teaching avoidance strategies,¹⁰⁵ these tactics helped train female players to deal with the realities of playing under these prevalent pressures. While this particular community focused on gender support, study findings show promise that other socioculturally supportive communities, such as gaming communities for players of color and queer players, would demonstrate similar benefits. Community values, however, have a direct effect on the kinds of support they can offer their members, which can be inclusive and exclusive at the same time; for example, a community that orients around gender support may not be inclusive of racial or queer identity support.¹⁰⁶

Women of color have unique and often undocumented experiences in the spaces that intersect with gender and race. One of the tenets of Black Cyberfeminism is recognizing the lived experiences of women of color, who are often subjected to unique challenges due to the intersections of gender and race. Most women, across race and ethnicity, relayed experiences of gender harassment over racial harassment, with two salient exceptions: (1) women with strong signifiers of their racial or ethnic background were more likely to discuss racial or ethnic harassment,¹⁰⁷ and (2) women of color were more likely to discuss racial harassment when they felt they were in a safe space for racial discussion, which was not always the case in gender-oriented spaces. In PMS Clan, revealing experiences of racial or ethnic harassment was more prominent once sanctioned by other players, as exemplified through this forum post on PMS Clan’s site:

Black female player:

I love Modern warfare 2 . . . Like crazy!! :-) . . . but it’s sad when you have to get off of a game because 3–4 people just randomly call you out of your name. I have . . . [been] called a [Bitch] so many times. I feel so . . . ugh. And this is the only place I felt like venting about it at. :-(.

After receiving empathetic responses from others with similar stories of gender harassment, as well as being encouraged to mute them or ignore them because they are just “dumb people who you don’t even know,” as one female forum poster encourages, she receives a response from a longstanding black male clan member and division leader who is familiar with racism online. He begins by responding to posts where she is encouraged to mute and ignore other players:

Black male player:

That’s understandable and although it should be easy, for some reason for me it’s not. It’s like . . . okay, there’s really 1 word that ticks me off (the ‘N’ word) and somehow that is the first word they use when they lose and want to insult you. And they use it more than once. You avoid them, but 6 games later someone else says it. That’s why I try not to play with [players outside the clan] much anymore.

Black female player:

That’s another thing. I believe I get called the N word about 5 times a week if not more. Racism on xbox tells me that they [are] cowards because I honestly believe that the losers that call me the N word on xbox would not have the courage to say it to my face.

Richard’s interviews with diverse male and female players, in and outside of PMS Clan, revealed that gender harassment of female players was a highly prevalent part of their gaming experiences. However, men of color extensively discussed experiences of racial harassment as a significant part of their play online. Experiences of racial harassment, across gender, are further evidenced in excerpts from an interview with a twenty-two-year-old Latino player from a working-class background in New York City.

Latino, male player:

I’m Puerto Rican, I’m used to people calling me spic but people on Xbox when they hear all our voices, they’re like ‘he’s a nigger.’ I used to get mad, ‘I’m not a nigger, I’m not black, that’s racist, stop!’. . . but now I’m used to it.

Latino, male player [later in the interview]:

So she wins, I just say, “Yo, great game.” This other guy plugs in his mic . . . says, “Hey girl, get in the kitchen . . . nigger girl, get me some fucking fried chicken.” It starts getting racist and sexist at the same time, and she leaves.

Richard:

Now, how do you think he knew what her race was, because that’s interesting?

Latino, male player:

Her avatar was black on the profile picture, so I’m guessing he just saw that and just decided, “Okay, she’s black.”

In her interviews, it is noteworthy that it was almost exclusively men of color who discussed the saliency of gender and racial intersectional harassment. Part of this may be due to how striking and prevalent gender harassment is for women. Further, racial harassment is dependent on whether race can be discerned, such as through a racially unambiguous player avatar or through linguistic signifiers:

Female player from New Zealand [Unknown ethnicity, forum post on PMS Clan]:

It’s really annoying. I come from a really strong cultural background so racial slurs make me pretty mad. I’m so happy there’s a mute button or else I’d probably be leaving most games or having a pointless argument with a random person.

As further evidenced in interviews with women of color and forum posts, racial harassment does occur frequently, but may be less of a point of solidarity with other female gamers, which may be why it is not as frequently discussed. This is not only because gender harassment is most notable and prevalent in game culture for women but also because the community from which most interview subjects were solicited focused on gender. In fact, Richard found that while the clan also supported other marginalized gamers, who sought it out as a safe space because of its intolerance for prejudice of any kind, its main goal was gender support, and as such, other kinds of support were often secondary and, advertently or inadvertently, less supported.¹⁰⁸ This is not to discount its positive effects, since, by focusing narrowly on gender support, it was able to level the playing field for female players in meaningful ways.¹⁰⁹ However, the propensity for women of color to focus on gendered experiences over and above racial experiences—except when legitimized by other trusted members of color—points to the sidelining of parts of their experience in order to operate within a safe space built around supporting a homogeneous female identity.

However, among female gamers of color within clans built around their intersecting sociocultural groups, the Inclusive Communities of Practice framework is also applicable. Gray researched a variety of clans aimed at supporting women of color. Latina lesbians created a safe space for their intersecting identities offsetting racism, sexism, nativism, heterosexism, and virtual harassment in general. While they excluded entrance of many groups, this exclusion was rooted in survival and protection from oppression. For instance, they would restrict membership to gamers who spoke both English and Spanish. As Gray discovered, they limited entrance to women only and also were hesitant in allowing African Americans, who they indicated were discriminatory against their Latin identities. Because of the daily oppression they experience within the gaming community, Xbox Live had inadvertently facilitated connectivity among these gamers. Xbox Live has served as a unique space where not only can racial minorities and women embrace their community, but sexual minorities can also connect and interact and build their own gaming community. While this segregation reflects a ghettoization of marginalized bodies, relegating them to the periphery of larger society, it also reveals the lack of connection to the larger Xbox community for these gamers, and has worked to solidify their own affective ties to one another in addition to supportive ties to allies within the space.

Due to the exclusion that many marginalized gamers face, they begin to isolate themselves from the larger gaming community.¹¹⁰ Others adopt the tactic of distancing themselves from marginalized identities. Because gender identity is so contested in male-dominated arenas, many women and other marginalized gender identities attempt to distance themselves as much as possible from femininity and the category “woman.”¹¹¹ The intent of this approach is not to distance themselves from their identity, but to serve as a survival tactic, given the amount of disparate treatment some women endure.¹¹²

The following examples are tactics that some women and marginalized gamers employ to increase their acceptance within gaming culture: (1) not gendering gamertags; (2) refraining from speaking to avoid linguistic profiling; and (3) suggesting they are “one of the guys” in order not to seem different than their male counterparts.¹¹³ The first two strategies are exemplified in the preceding excerpts. The concept of wanting to be “one of the guys” is often mentioned by individuals who are either antithetical to female-supportive clans or feel that the mission of female-oriented communities should be to focus primarily on gaming, over and above gender identity. Often the rationale is that female players experience backlash because they are trying to assert their special status instead of catering to the norms of the broader gaming space. An example of this practice can be seen with forum posts from two former PMS Clan members:

Former female PMS Clan member 1:

Why can’t we just be gamers? why do we have to be GIRL gamers? does that mean, we play on easy mode? . . . no . . . we play the same game, same controller, same game mode as everyone. . . . i run into a ton of girls that want to do nothing but advertise that they are a GIRL gamer.

Former female PMS Clan member 2:

Guys are usually messing around and some are out to offend. But the girls just want to be the main chica and feel like putting down another girl makes them better. Sorry, it just makes you pathetic lol.

However, many realities of the masculinized play space actually reward being a woman who plays into the male hierarchy. Being one of the few women in a group of men is often met with the benefit of receiving less harassment, as is exemplified in one PMS Clan member’s forum post: “Usually if I am in a party full of [male members] and I am the only [female member] I don’t hear anything, but when there are 3 or more [women] together that’s when you usually run into it.” In other words, being one of only a few women in the space plays into expectations that you are supporting men, rather than asserting your independent agency as a woman player, which being part of an all or mostly female group would represent.¹¹⁴

Some might suggest that the strategies we have highlighted negate the contributions of women, but they should still be recognized as a choice that some women are free to make. An example from the virtual community of Xbox Live illustrates the extremes that many women endure just to be seen as equals. The Militant Misses Clan within Xbox Live represents an interesting case of how some women respond to masculine domination. The Militant Misses Clan focused on “hardcore” (i.e., competitive, high-stakes, and highly skilled) gaming, creating a segregated space that resembled proving grounds for their members to practice to defeat males.¹¹⁵ They created this segregated space because they weren’t being taken seriously as hardcore gamers within first and third person shooters. As a result, they took a militant approach to ensuring all of their members were adequately trained and prepared to fight in clan matches.

When asked what could be done about inequalities within the space, the Militant Misses responded by saying that increased gaming skills would reduce instances of hate within Xbox. The following excerpts outline their stance, exemplified through UReady4War2’s responses:

Mzmygrane:

But that’s what I’ve been trying to ask you. Why is that so important to yall?

UReady4War2:

Because we won’t be taken seriously—duh.

Mzmygrane:

Taken seriously by who?

UReady4War2:

Dudes.

Mzmygrane:

Why is that so important to you? Do you feel you need a man to confirm who you are?

UReady4War2:

Hell naw.

Mzmygrane:

Then what is it. Explain it to me. Your entire thought process. Why yall practice so much. Why you so mean to the girls?

UReady4War2:

Ok ok ok chill. Everytime I talk to you, you always bringing up how women aint taken seriously. You always bring up all that racist and sexist shit. But you know they only bring that up when they aint got nothing else to talk about. Seriously, kiki, if you pay attention to when men do all that shit talking to yall, its because yall pissed them off by sucking (begins laughing). Nah I’m just joking, kinda. But we aint had no dudes talk shit to us like that in a long time. They still talk shit, but they be mad that we just whooped dey ass in the game. We make them mad. They don’t make us mad anymore.

Mzmygrane:

But why are you so hard on women who just want to play for fun—like me?

UReady4War2:

Because there is a solution. There’s a way to not experience all that negative shit. Just get better at the game. Why wouldn’t you do that?

Mzmygrane:

Because I shouldn’t have to. Guys don’t have this burden. We do. And you are putting it back on us to deal with the burden. We’re not the problem. They are.

UReady4War2:

Fair enough. Just be ready to still be called bitch (laughing).

The Militant Misses did not enjoy being oppressed within the space and had identified a means to avoid that experience. However, as is outlined in the preceding excerpt, they place the responsibility on women to alleviate their oppressions.

As women of color, they would rather play with males and endure racism, sexism, heterosexism, and other inequalities. MM explain that these acts of hate are a part of the gaming experience and women . . . were too sensitive and should not be playing if [they] could not endure the hardships of the male space. . . . By excelling in the game, they have shifted the conversation so the focus is on the game—not who’s playing the game. However, the process involved to reach this point is problematic. . . . Another interesting point to note is that no member of MM had a gender signifier in their gamertag further reducing their association with female gamers. The women within this clan did not share prior stories of discrimination with [the researcher] as they refused to discuss that aspect of gaming.¹¹⁶

The adoption of these tactics by this female clan on Xbox Live is emblematic of a larger problem of not recognizing women as full participants in gaming culture. Their responses to the inequalities they face place the burden on them, despite their being the victims of vitriol and marginalizing practices. Although many participants within video game culture adopt these practices, there is still a significant segment of the marginalized population who will choose to resist and disrupt the hegemonic norm.

Beyond experiences within and outside supportive clans, some women of color express having different experiences and perspectives on technology use and utility. This relates directly to the first tenet of Black Cyberfeminism in interrogating the social structural oppression of technology. Women existing and resisting within masculinist structures operating within digital spaces disrupt the default norm. Re-creating and co-opting narratives forced upon the female body are essential to reframing technology and gaming as a “boys’” pastime. But due to the spaces operating sometimes for and by masculinity, the contentions in disrupting the norm come at the detriment of women, placing the burden on them to “fix” the problem. The following example reveals the gendered nature of adopting new technologies within gaming and what women of color do to resist the dominant structure forcing them to do so.

ShedaBoss:

Now I don’t game that often but I aint dumb.

MissUnique:

I know right. I feel like when I get on here and download the update that it’s like a foreign language. It takes me forever to figure out how to navigate the shit.

ShedaBoss:

I don’t have time to sit and watch tutorials and lectures on how to use a fucking app. They make the shit too damn hard. I feel like these dudes who make the shit like making people look slow.

ThugMisses:

Oh she talking crazy now!

(All laughing)

ShedaBoss:

No no no. Chill chill chill. Hear me out. We have to watch tutorials right? There are tons of them to watch? I think they feel like they want people to respect their jobs and what they do. It’s like the rise of the geek.

MzMygrane:

But we have just as much education as they do in some cases. Why is so hard for us to learn to navigate the new stuff?

ThugMisses:

Cuz we don’t want to. It’s not that we can’t. We won’t. I don’t want to do it on their terms. And the fact that they force us to isn’t fair. I had no idea a new update was coming. And if I don’t download it when they tell me to, I can’t get online. That’s fucking tyranny!

MissUnique:

Well it takes me forever. Not because I don’t wanna learn it, but because I can’t. The tutorials really make no sense to me. And they try and make them too fancy. If they wrote it in a textbook, I’d be good.¹¹⁷

The women of color highlighted in this exchange reflect upon both their dissonance with and resistance to adopting new technology. On the one hand, they express frustration for something that is difficult to learn, but at the same time, they also express acute awareness that these technologies have been designed for users with vastly different experiences and expectations than they have had. As such, while they may eventually adopt the innovation, they do so on their own terms. For instance, ShedaBoss indicated that it took her almost a year to download the New User Experience within Xbox Live. While she was unable to engage online, she felt empowered by resisting when she was told what to do by the authority within the space. In particular, though this episode may be interpreted as indicative of the digital identity divide, it could, conversely, be resonant of resistance to that divide. These women are claiming their own identity and identification with the technologies that they utilize and adopt as both a resistance and reclamation strategy.

Other examples reveal the nature of Latina and African American women’s resistance strategies to technological changes within gaming. They express that new experiences within gaming are inherently masculine, privileging male gamers. The following excerpt reveals the nature of how they interpret and navigate this perceived reality by discussing the new Xbox dashboard.

XpkXRicanMami:

Games are always catering to what boys want.

YeahSheBlaze:

It’s a man’s world (singing James Brown song)

[All laughing]

XpkXRicanMami:

But I think we [females] like simple things. Guys need flashing lights, scrolling images, big boobs (laughs) . . . you know what I’m saying. It’s like you have to keep changing things to keep guys happy.

MizzBoss917:

You know I’d be good with the first dashboard. The dashboard or marketplace or whatever it’s called right now is for people with a Kinect. To me, that’s still catering to a certain kind of gamer . . . [gets cut off by YeahSheBlaze].

YeahSheBlaze:

And to gamers with money. I don’t have a Kinect. Can’t afford one and don’t have space for one. But they assumed that everyone will upgrade to the Kinect.

MizzBoss917:

Watch and see. They gon’ force us to get the Kinect.¹¹⁸

The learning and socialization to which female gamers of color are subjected are reflected in this narrative. Women recognize the intricate relationship between masculinity and gaming and the gendered exclusion that follows. Historical practices and contemporary realities inform female gamers that their participation is ephemeral regardless of how constant women have been within the culture. However, through resistance, they continue to make their own mark and defy the conventions and limitations that have traditionally confined them.

Conclusion

The conceptual frameworks offered within this essay have the unique ability to interrogate how marginalized players operating within traditional masculine spaces have understood their oppressed status, have recognized the gendered and raced nature of the digital divide, and have made sense of their realities and experiences. No longer do marginalized groups exist as passive bystanders in the information age waiting for their turn or waiting to be taught. They are disrupting that marginalized status, allowing them to bring real world solutions to struggles in digital spaces, thus empowering their communities.

Gatekeeping practices in online gaming have often policed and subjugated women and players of color, across gender identities and sexualities. This has happened through racialized and sexualized scripts that dominate character representation in game production and distribution. And this has also happened through the norms that are fostered through prevalent, hegemonic practice.

However, the stories and experiences of women and other minoritized players, as recently explicated, serve as tales not only of marginalization but also of resistance and resiliency. We have demonstrated how these players not only have unique experiences but also have intersecting and diverging ones. Utilizing a Black Cyberfeminist framework and an Inclusive Communities of Practice framework, we have outlined how the experiences of women and players of color are marked by exclusion and resistance, subjugation and resilience. The experiences of women of color, however, are vast and varied, as we have outlined throughout, and are often marred by competing expectations, invisibility, and lack of support. Utilizing a Black Cyberfeminist lens, we make their experiences visible and valuable, as experiences to learn from and to honor. While we have discussed the limitations that they and other marginalized technology consumers face on the pathways to computing or play and consumption, we have also shone a spotlight on their own resistance to conforming to the norms of these spaces, and the perceived limitations, often setting their own path and creating their own rules and practices.

Women have utilized female-supportive clans and communities since the dawn of online gaming to play with power, beat males on their own turf, foster resiliency against all odds, and set their own terms.¹¹⁹ These individuals have rejected the many assumptions inherent in these male-dominated spaces and have been able to achieve significant personal, communal, and environmental changes. However, many of these spaces, while supporting female players and other marginalized players (as well as those who wish to support their play) cannot serve as a catchall for every experience and group, though they can serve as models for what works in meeting goals of equity and inclusivity. They also speak to a potential way forward: it is often through resistance that new play spaces are formed, and resiliency helps forge new pathways of existing, as exemplified through these players who have adapted positively within significant adversity. By participating on their own terms, they have crafted new environments of play but also set the agenda for challenging the accepted hegemonic narrative. These matrices of resilience extend beyond micro level change; they provide a template that can be adopted and replicated in a variety of spaces and contexts not only to disrupt but also to dismantle.