At the edge of utopia

Gamer culture, neoliberalism and regulation of esports in Brazil

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15448/1980-3729.2023.1.43088

Keywords:

esports, neoliberalism, gamer culture, game studies

Abstract

This article discusses the controversy about Senate Bill n.º 383, which deals with the regulation of esports activity in Brazil. We analyzed the repercussions and conversation about the hashtag #TodosContraPLS383, a repudiation movement organized on Twitter in November 2019, in order to compose an argument that problematizes: a) the relations between the games industry and governance dimensions: b) how neoliberal discourse is assimilated by individuals within this culture. From ethnographic appropriation and using the software ATLAS.ti to collect and make sense of the data, we reconstruct a narrative that debates anti-regulation rhetoric exposing the neoliberal ideology that can be widely identified in the discourses about gamer culture.

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Author Biographies

Thiago Falcão, Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB), João Pessoa, PB, Brasil.

Doutor e mestre em Comunicação e Cultura Contemporâneas pela Universidade Federal da Bahia (UFBA), em Salvador, BA, Brasil. Professor da Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB), em João Pessoa, PB, Brasil.

Daniel Marques, Universidade Federal do Recôncavo da Bahia (UFRB), Santo Amaro, BA, Brasil.

Doutor em Comunicação e Cultura Contemporâneas e mestre em Cultura e Sociedade pela Universidade Federal da Bahia (UFBA), em Salvador, BA, Brasil. Professor da Universidade Federal do Recôncavo da Bahia (UFRB), em Cachoeira, BA, Brasil.

Ivan Mussa, Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB), João Pessoa, PB, Brasil.

Doutor e mestre em Comunicação pela Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), no Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil. Professor da Universidade Federal da Paraíba (UFPB), em João Pessoa, PB, Brasil. 

Tarcízio Macedo, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil; Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV), Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.

Doutorando em Comunicação e Informação pela Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), em Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil; mestre em Comunicação, Cultura e Amazônia pela Universidade Federal do Pará (UFPA), em Belém, PA, Brasil. Pesquisador da Fundação Getúlio Vargas, no Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.

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Published

2023-01-06

How to Cite

Falcão, T., Marques, D., Mussa, I., & Macedo, T. (2023). At the edge of utopia: Gamer culture, neoliberalism and regulation of esports in Brazil. Revista FAMECOS, 30(1), e43088. https://doi.org/10.15448/1980-3729.2023.1.43088

Issue

Vol. 30 No. 1 (2023): Single Volume

Section

Cyberculture

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