Join us as we welcome Dr. Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal for our first Visual Cultures Workshop!
This talk asks what it means to depict non-capitalist systems in video games. Borrowing insights from Marxist transition debates—a series of disagreements over how, why, and when feudalism gave way to capitalism—and by analyzing grand strategy video games like Crusader Kings III (Paradox Interactive, 2020), I ask how changes in a politico-economic system are (or can be) played in games. In doing so, I explore what we may learn from such games about historical, technological, and epistemological models of social transitions, and how we might know if/when we ever find ourselves in a post-capitalist world.
Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal is Ruth and Paul Idzik Collegiate Chair in Digital Scholarship and Assistant Professor of English and Film, Television, and Theatre at the University of Notre Dame. He researches and teaches about the aesthetic and politico-economic entanglements of our technological cultures. His award-winning writing appears, or is forthcoming, in Critical Inquiry, Configurations, American Literature, and Design Issues, among other venues.