Games as anthropological objects of knowledge. An approach based on the Yugi-oh! Trading Card Game in Guatemala

Abstract

The entertainment industry has launched on the market various products for consumption. One of the gaming types uses decks of cards as a resource. From the observation of Yu-Gi-Oh! trading card game communities in Guatemala, it was possible to present a state of the art of the theoretical approaches that open up possibilities for the observation and analysis of these elaborated production spaces of meaning that connect global and local. The game, within the sociological tradition, was analyzed first as an object, within delimited time and space, outside of the everyday life. But the game’s contemporary theoretical approach puts itself at the core of the practices of any society. As a producer of symbols and practices in which the tension between spontaneity and control play a vital role, the game is defined as a form of action. If the game is a form of action and its practice is a producer of meanings and behaviors, the products of the entertainment industry must be addressed both from the consumer communities of gamers, located on networks and territories, and from the game producers.