Abstract
The concepts of ‘nature’ and ‘naturalness’ are contrasted with numerous opposites: technology, civilisation, the city, art, artificiality and affectation. These concepts point to different forms of culture and each establish specific relationships with nature. Using the materiality, contexts and game-play of board and party games, the project examines which constructions of nature, as well as which relationships between nature and its opposites, are explored in these media. The aim is to use this analysis to gain an understanding of the popular cultural content of this material cultural form and of the specific genre. Based on selected examples from the sub-collection of eco board games in the board and social game collection of the German Games Archive in Nuremberg, as well as collections of contemporary reception media, an exemplary history of the reception of the concept of ‘nature’ is reconstructed. By juxtaposing these with contemporary discourses and contextualising them accordingly, the aim is to highlight the diverse constructions of nature and their respective antonyms. In a first step, the entire sub-collection is situated at the macro-level within the field of board and social games. This involves examining the scope and nature of the collection, potential gaps in the collection, the perception of the genre, and the perspectives of the collectors. In a second step, building on this macro-level perspective and its historical-discursive context, selected games are analysed at the micro-level. The focus here is on the individual game systems, their rules, and the game-play associated with them. As devices that metaphorically simulate life-worlds and visions of the future, and which, through their rules, open up or exclude certain courses of action, board and party games make specific constructions of nature and their relationship to cultural orders legible. In this way, different positions and lines of development can be documented in their chronological and thematic diversity and related to the collection as a whole. The project aims to highlight and historically contextualise long-term trends in the popular cultural reception of nature and culture within the mass medium of board and social games.
Status
Running