O corpo no reino do simbólico: a construção contínua da subjetividade no game

Abstract

The present work deals with the relationship between the subject and video games, the ongoing construction of subjectivity and its intense relationship with games. The aim is to understand and define game ́s cultural significance. As the games industry continues to grow (SANTAELLA and FEITOZA, 2009), then arises the need of researches concerning their influence on society on the ways games are used either in the cognitive field (JOHNSON, 2005) or in the order concerning the psychic subject (VANIER, 2004). It is necessary to investigate games from their original image (HUIZINGA, 1938) to their actual performance on the subject / player, based on scientific references from Freud and Lacan and their discoveries regarding the imaginary construction of the subject. Language as well as play precedes us and the unconscious is structured as a language (LACAN, 2002). This "grammar" of the game (SAUSSURE, 2006) relates to the fact that all games have rules (CAILLOIS, 1990 / JUUL, 2004) to be followed as well as language does, an important play with words. The notion of the player as subject brings us to the unconscious and to narcissism in the digital age, its new ways of interacting (MCLUHAN, 1974) socially. An overview was traced from the "discovery" of subjectivity to its maturity. A relationship between the Cartesian cogito ("I think therefore I am", Descartes), the psychoanalytic multifaceted subject (SANTAELLA, 2003) and the action of signs was established. Finally, using the tool of Psychoanalytic Semiotics, the relationship between subjectivity and the game, World of Warcraft (WoW), released in 2004 by Blizzard, was analysed