Anthropology 140: Games and Society
Course Description:
Games and Society is a new course that serves as an introduction to the place of games in human society.
This course examines several facets of this phenomenon, including: the anthropological foundations of why human beings play, what makes games distinctive as an arena for playfulness, to what extent games are used by human institutions to accomplish certain goals, and how games reflect and engage with other meaningful aspects of human life.
At the end of this course, you should have gained a broader understanding of why games command human attention and for what purposes they can be used, as well as to what extent they are sites for potent contests not only over who wins and loses, but even over meaningful identities and social action.
This class will be taught in lecture format, combined with some periods of discussion, media viewing, and other less formal engagement, including playing select games in small groups and creating your own games!
Course Details:
Anthropology 140: Games and Society
Section 001, Fall 2021 – Face-to-Face Course
CLASS MEETINGS: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 2:00 – 3:15 pm
CLASS LOCATION: Sabin 332
INSTRUCTOR: Thomas Malaby (he/him/his)
Email: malaby@uwm.edu Phone: 414-229-4175