Under the Hood: An (Auto) Ethnographic Study of How White Adolescent Males Critically Engage with Race in Grand Theft Auto V

Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V) is emblematic of the public controversies that associate video games with violence, misogyny, and damaging depictions of race and gender. However, it is also a layered referential and self-reflexive text that roundly critiques US culture, including the pernicious complicity of media on issues of identity. GTA V is the third best selling video game in history, and primarily targets white adolescent males, but its effects on the attitudes and behaviors of its chief consumers are virtually unstudied. Furthermore, the tendency for schools to keep controversial games at a distance may neglect a need to better equip adolescent boys with the tools to critically consume the complex media in which they are immersed. This doctoral dissertation employs a postcolonial lens and documents a month-long qualitative study where a high school class of ten white adolescent boys played GTA V while in a formal instructional context that encouraged them to critically reflect on their gameplay. Although they viewed the game through the lenses of gender, masculinities, violence, and hegemony, my research specifically reports on how they engaged with representations of race and racialized places in the elaborate urban simulation. The participants were positioned as co-researchers and trained in basic ethnographic methods, and the fieldnotes and filmed videos of their play were synthesized in autoethnographic accounts of their experiences. Data was also gathered from pre- and post-surveys, filmed classroom sessions, a private Facebook group, the counter-hegemonic media they produced, and their notes and videos.

The investigation revealed that participants naturalized racial stereotypes and problematic connections of race and place. And, the instructional approach was found to provoke a greater awareness about discriminatory depictions of race in the game and, in some cases, media at large. Some also become aware of their own tendencies to appropriate commodified forms of blackness. Finally, their discourse and views were found to be largely shaped by media, highlighting the need for a greater emphasis on media literacy in schools.