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Series:   Elements in Music since 1945

The Queerness of Video Game Music

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 July 2023

Tim Summers
Tim Summers
Affiliation:
Royal Holloway, University of London

Summary

Video game music is a significant site of queerness where normative demands are questioned, suspended or loosened. Games resist hegemonic musical logics, challenge musical value systems and use music to complicate essentialist notions of identity. This Element proposes three areas of queerness, each representing different relationships between 'queer design' and 'queer engagement', ranging fromunintentionally resistive to explicit engagement with identity. First, this Element examines musical structures that provide queer temporal alternatives to normative linear development, and interactive systems that reframe the power relationship between musical material and listener. Second, it considers 'retro' or 'chiptune' timbres that queer notions of technological progress to be improvements, rejecting chrononormativity. Finally, the Element discusses music that queers the self/other binary of identity. Games present ways of listening to, engaging with and understanding music that provide opportunities to challenge inherited assumptions and reductive or monolithic values, practices and identities.
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Keywords

queernesssexualitygendervideo games (and games, videogames)music
Type
Element
Information
Series: Elements in Music since 1945
Online ISBN: 9781009371421
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication: 03 August 2023

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The Queerness of Video Game Music
  • Tim Summers, Royal Holloway, University of London
  • Online ISBN: 9781009371421
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The Queerness of Video Game Music
  • Tim Summers, Royal Holloway, University of London
  • Online ISBN: 9781009371421
Available formats
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The Queerness of Video Game Music
  • Tim Summers, Royal Holloway, University of London
  • Online ISBN: 9781009371421
Available formats
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