Video Games, Colonization, and Critical Computer Literacy (2009)
Most critical examinations of video game use focus on the extent to which many video games contribute to a culture of violence and sexism, lead to addiction, and disincline habitual users from healthy social interaction and physical exercise. These problems are real and important. But there is a much more pervasive yet subtle problem with video game use that has not yet made it onto the research and educational policy radar screen. This is the impact of video game use on ecological perception. Ecological perception refers to the following four dimensions of perceptual behaviour:
1)ATTENTION SPAN
2)INSTANT GRATIFICATION EXPECTATION (“IGE”)
3)HABITS OF PERCEPTION (These include the time and space scales andpattern ranges which an individual brings to her experience.)
4)LANGUAGE HABITS (The complexity and tenor of the language net that an individual develops, the narrative and moral significances cast by this net, and thesocial expectations formed as a result.)
These dimensions govern how children perceive the world they live in – how they perceive the people, the nonhuman beings, the landscapes and places, and the social practices in their world. They also govern how children locate and orient themselves within their world, setting directions and limits on identity formation and habits of interaction with others.
In this presentation, I will explore the ways in which ecological development is impacted by “the micro-features” of video game use – the complex dynamics of engagement that video games lead children into. I will present evidence to suggest that the frequent use of many popular kinds of video games—both those purporting to be educational and those purporting only to be fun and exciting—can train into children certain limits of attention, excesses of “Instant Gratification Expectation,” perceptual habits centered on the fast- moving and readily digested, and (particularly for video games targeted at boys and young men) language habits oriented around the values of competitive acquisition, colonization, or mutual extermination. In other words, the dynamics of computer-game engagement can lead to a certain “colonization” of our children. I will also explore the potential of bringing these problems to children’s critical view, suggesting that this critical thinking” approach to video game use can not only diminish the harmful effects of colonization, but actually advance children’s “ecological development.”
In sum, I am arguing the need for, and suggesting possible strategies for, helping children and youth make progress toward a form of “computer literacy” that goes beyond keyboard dexterity, interfacing skills, and internet navigational expertise, to:
·awareness of the impact of computer gaming on their attention, expectation, andperceptual and language habits,
·understanding of computer programs as constructed texts,
·critical awareness of the cultural messages that computer games deliver,
·social and educational reflexivity in their use of computer games and programs. I call this “critical computer literacy.”
Pamela Courtenay-Hall is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Prince Edward Island. Her research interests are in the areas of: environmental thought, feminist theory, ethics, philosophy of science, philosophy of education, parenting, sexuality, and critical thinking. She has a B.A. (Mathematics) and B. Ed. (Senior/Intermediate Mathematics and Physics) from the University of Windsor, and M.A. in Philosophy from the University of Windsor with a concentration in ethics and environmental ethics, and an M. A. in Philosophy from the University of Notre Dame with a concentration in philosophy of science. Her Ph. D. in Philosophy is from the University of Toronto and her thesis title was “Ecoholism and its critics: A critical exploration of holism in environmental ethics and the sciences of ecology”.