Game of Objects: vicarious causation and multi-modal media

• Main Author: Aaron Pedinotti
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: ScholarWorks @ UMass Amherst 2013-09-01
• Series: communication +1
• Subjects: Arts and Humanities; Continental Philosophy; Film and Media Studies; Philosophy; Television; Object Oriented Ontology; Vicarious Causation; Game of Thrones; A Song of Fire and Ice
• Online Access: http://scholarworks.umass.edu/cpo/vol2/iss1/2

This paper applies philosopher Graham Harman's object-oriented theory of "vicarious causation" to an analysis of the multi-modal media phenomenon known as "Game of Thrones." Examining the manner in which George R.R. Martin's best-selling series of fantasy novels has been adapted into a board game, a video game, and a hit HBO television series, it uses the changes entailed by these processes to trace the contours of vicariously generative relations. In the course of the resulting analysis, it provides new suggestions concerning the eidetic dimensions of Harman's causal model, particularly with regard to causation in linear networks and in differing types of game systems.