As the nascent field of computer games research and games studies develops, one rich area of study will be a semiotic analysis of the tropes, conventions, and ideological sub-texts of various games. This article examines the centrality of race and gender in the narrative, character development, and ideologies of platform video games, paying particular attention to the deployment of stereotypes, the connection between pleasure, fantasy and race, and their link to instruments of power. Video games represent a powerful instrument of hegemony, eliciting ideological consent through a spectrum of white supremacist projects. If the 20 th century is the era of film, a time when Hollywood unified America through stories and imagination, the 21 st century will undoubtedly be the era of video games. Video game sales reached $6 billion dollars in 2000, and speculations put that number at closer to $8 billion dollars last year. In 2000 alone, over 280 million units were sold throughout the world. Experts estimate that sixty percent of Americans, approximately 145 million people, play video games regularly (Children Now, 2002). Various social commentators are talking about video games on talk shows, within chat rooms, popular and obscure magazines, and even academia. With rare exceptions, these critics tend to celebrate the game industry, making only brief mention of potential problems in its promotion of violence and misogyny. Although there are some exceptions, such as Kücklich (2003), the examination of race, power, and ideology within these games has not been a central concern. Video games offer millions (even billions) of game enthusiasts the opportunity to be become a professional athlete, a United States Marine, a member of an underworld criminal organization, or even a wrestling rapper. Games, despite claims of "horse play," offer insight into dominant ideologies, as well as the deployment of race, gender, and nationalism. From the privacy of one's home, game players are able to transport themselves into foreign and dangerous environments, often gaining pleasure through domination and control of weaker characters of color. Video games thus operate as a sophisticated commodity that plays on the desire of individuals to experience the other, breaking down real boundaries between 'communities' through virtual play, while simultaneously 'teaching' its players about stereotypes, United States foreign policy, and legitimization of the status quo, to name only a few. Scope Despite the huge popularity of video games, little work has been done on their appeal and effect. Many academics still tend to view video games as toys for kids, rather than sophisticated vehicles inhabiting and disseminating racial, gender, or national meaning. Moreover, a socially conservative agenda that focuses on the psychological links between games and violence further limits academic inquiries into video games. This article seeks to underscore the centrality of race to the construction and reception of video games, emphasizing the ways in which game...

In this essay, the author explores the absurdity of colorblind rhetoric within the discursive field of Kobe Bryant's rape trial. Specifically, in examining articulations on the Internet, television coverage, commentaries, and news reports, this article reveals how colorblind ideologies that dominate public discussions conflict with the racialized discursive utterances surrounding Kobe's arrest and ongoing trial. In exploring the reactions to accusations of rape against Kobe Bryant by both the mainstream media and White nationalists, this article repels the tendency to disassociate mainstream discourses surrounding race and sports from the more racially grotesque versions found among White nationalists. This article interrogates the context, text, and subtext of the racialized/gendered discourse of Kobe Bryant, situating this case study within the larger dynamics of racialized sports celebrity. It asks whether status as a celebrity athlete provides racial erasure and whether accusations of criminal misconduct not only reinscribe race but also erase celebrity.

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A fundamental contradiction anchors contemporary sport: for many, it exemplifies racial transcendence; yet racism continues to shape play, persona, and possibilities. For Black athletes, in particular, it opens a space of overdetermination, constraining representation and reception, while challenging their humanity. Following Joe Feagin (2009), this article suggests the white racial frame offers a means of accounting for and unpacking the persistent force of race in a society determined to be beyond—or better said, done with—it. Recent panics around Kobe Bryant center the analysis. A close reading of media coverage and fan commentary reveals a troubling discursive pattern of racialization and sexualization. Indeed, especially in online forums, this discourse actively seizes upon the All-Pro forward to rearticulate supposedly antiquated formulations of difference and reanimate the prevailing hierarchies anchored in them. Ultimately, popular reception and representation of Bryant exposes not only the persistent myths of black masculinity at the heart of the white racial frame, but also suggest the ways in which they make it impossible for African Americans (athlete or not) to transcend them, redeem themselves in a white world, or claim dignity and humanity.