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“Publish in English or It’s Game Over”: On English Linguistic Monopoly in Game Studies

Chapter of: Historiographies of Game Studies: What It Has Been, What It Could Be(pp. 671–696)

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Metadata
Title“Publish in English or It’s Game Over”
SubtitleOn English Linguistic Monopoly in Game Studies
ContributorSamuel Poirier-Poulin(author)
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.53288/0441.1.30
Landing pagehttps://punctumbooks.com/titles/historiographies-of-game-studies-what-it-has-been-what-it-could-be/
Licensehttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
CopyrightSamuel Poirier-Poulin
Publisherpunctum books
Published on2025-07-25
Long abstractResearch on diversity and inclusion in game studies has focused so far on issues related to gender, race, and sexuality. Issues related to language have generally been left unaddressed. Nevertheless, the language we use to express ourselves has a major influence on the way the knowledge we create is perceived and transmitted (or not) worldwide, and thus also generates situations of privilege and exclusion. Building on the concepts of linguistic monopoly and linguicism (i.e., discrimination based on language), this chapter proposes a critical reflection on the dominance of English language in game studies. It argues that linguicism occurs in this discipline and in academia more broadly (1) through the anglicization of research and the need for non-native English speakers (NNES) to publish and present their work in English in order to be read, cited, and recognized as contributors to game studies; and (2) through a gatekeeping process, especially within high-ranking journals, that makes it harder for NNES to publish their work due to the absence of linguistic support from publishing institutions and the emphasis these institutions put on so-called “good” English. These inequalities are reinforced by the myth that English is a neutral language that serves everyone equally well and leads to cohesion and community. This chapter ultimately aims to bridge the gap between research on linguistic monopoly in academia and the discipline of game studies, seeking to critically reflect on how game studies have been built and are still being built around English language.
Page rangepp. 671–696
Print length26 pages
LanguageEnglish (Original)
Contributors

Samuel Poirier-Poulin

(author)
PhD candidate at Université de Montréal
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5530-0145

Samuel Poirier-Poulin (he/him) is a PhD candidate in film studies at the Université de Montréal, Canada, specializing in the study of video games and gaming cultures. His doctoral research focuses on the representation and the affective experience of trauma in video games, drawing on affect theory and phenomenology of media. His other research interests include queer desires in visual novels, autoethnography, and multilingual scholarship. Samuel’s work has been published in several academic journals, including the Journal of Games Criticism, G/A/M/E: The Italian Journal of Game Studies, Synoptique: An Online Journal of Film and Moving Image Studies, Loading: The Journal of the Canadian Game Studies Association, and in the anthology Video Games and Comedy. Since 2022, Samuel has been the Editor-in-Chief of the game studies journal Press Start.