Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix
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0:16 - 0:18I want to talk about games for a change.
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0:18 - 0:20When we think of games,
there's all kinds of things. -
0:20 - 0:24Maybe you're ticked off, or maybe,
you're looking forward to a new game. -
0:24 - 0:25You've been up too late playing a game.
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0:25 - 0:27All these things happen to me.
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0:27 - 0:28But when we think about games,
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0:28 - 0:31a lot of times we think
about stuff like this: -
0:31 - 0:34first-person shooters, or the big,
what we would call AAA games, -
0:34 - 0:36or maybe you're a Facebook game player.
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0:36 - 0:37This is one my partner and I worked on.
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0:37 - 0:41Maybe you play Facebook games,
and that's what we're making right now. -
0:41 - 0:42This is a lighter form of game.
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0:42 - 0:45Maybe you think about
the tragically boring board games -
0:45 - 0:47that hold us hostage
in Thanksgiving situations. -
0:47 - 0:51This would be one of the tragically boring
board games that you can figure out. -
0:51 - 0:53Or maybe you're in your living room,
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0:53 - 0:55playing with the Wii with the kids,
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0:55 - 0:58and there's this whole range of games,
and that's very much what I think about. -
0:58 - 1:01I make my living from games,
I've been lucky enough to do this -
1:01 - 1:05since I was 15, which also qualifies
as I've never really had a real job. -
1:05 - 1:09But we think about games as fun,
and that's completely reasonable, -
1:09 - 1:11but let's just think about this.
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1:11 - 1:13So this one here,
this is the 1980 Olympics. -
1:13 - 1:15Now I don't know where you guys were,
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1:15 - 1:16but I was in my living room.
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1:16 - 1:18It was practically a religious event.
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1:18 - 1:21And this is when the Americans
beat the Russians, -
1:21 - 1:23and this was...
Yes, it was technically a game. -
1:23 - 1:24Hockey is a game.
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1:24 - 1:26But really, was this a game?
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1:26 - 1:28I mean, people cried.
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1:28 - 1:31I've never seen my mother cry
like that at the end of Monopoly. -
1:31 - 1:33(Laughter)
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1:33 - 1:35And so this was an amazing experience.
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1:35 - 1:37Or, if anybody here is from Boston...
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1:37 - 1:41So when the Boston Red Sox
won the World Series -
1:41 - 1:43after I believe, 351 years...
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1:43 - 1:45(Laughter)
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1:45 - 1:47when they won the World Series,
it was amazing. -
1:47 - 1:49I happened to be living
in Springfield at the time, -
1:49 - 1:51and the best part of it was,
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1:52 - 1:54you would close the women's door
in the bathroom, -
1:54 - 1:57and I remember seeing "Go Sox,"
and I thought, really? -
1:58 - 2:01Or the houses, you'd come out,
because every game, -
2:01 - 2:03well, I think almost every game,
went into overtime, right? -
2:03 - 2:07So we'd be outside, and all the other
lights are on in the whole block. -
2:07 - 2:10And kids... the attendance
was down in school, -
2:10 - 2:13kids weren't going to school,
but it's OK, it's the Red Sox, right? -
2:13 - 2:16I mean, there's education,
and then there's the Red Sox, -
2:16 - 2:18and we know where they're stacked.
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2:18 - 2:19So this was an amazing experience,
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2:19 - 2:23and again, yes, it was a game,
but they didn't write newspaper articles, -
2:23 - 2:27people didn't say, "You know, really,
I can die now, because the Red Sox won." -
2:27 - 2:29And many people did.
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2:29 - 2:32So games, it means something more to us.
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2:32 - 2:34It absolutely means something more.
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2:34 - 2:36So now, this is an abrupt transition here.
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2:36 - 2:39There was three years where
I actually did have a real job, sort of. -
2:39 - 2:42I was the head of a college
department teaching games, -
2:42 - 2:44so, again, it was sort of a real job,
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2:44 - 2:47and now I got to talk about making them
as opposed to making them. -
2:47 - 2:50Part of the job of it,
when you're a chair of a department, -
2:50 - 2:52is to eat, and I did that very well...
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2:52 - 2:55And so I'm out at a dinner
with this guy called Zig Jackson. -
2:55 - 2:59So this is Zig in this photograph,
this is also one of Zig's photographs. -
2:59 - 3:00He's a photographer.
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3:00 - 3:05And he goes all around the country
taking pictures of himself, -
3:05 - 3:08and you can see here he's got
Zig's Indian Reservation. -
3:08 - 3:10And this particular shot...
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3:11 - 3:13This is one of the more traditional shots.
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3:13 - 3:15This is a rain dancer.
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3:15 - 3:17And this is one of my favorite shots here.
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3:17 - 3:20So you can look at this, and maybe
you've even seen things like this. -
3:20 - 3:22This is an expression of culture, right?
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3:22 - 3:24And this is actually
from his Degradation series. -
3:25 - 3:27And what was most fascinating
to me about this series -
3:27 - 3:30is just, look at that little boy there,
can you imagine? -
3:30 - 3:32We can see that's
a traditional Native American. -
3:32 - 3:34Now I just want to change that guy's race.
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3:34 - 3:36Just imagine if that's a black guy.
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3:36 - 3:39So, "Honey, come here, let's get you
a picture with the black guy." Right? -
3:39 - 3:41Like, seriously, nobody would do this.
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3:41 - 3:43It baffles the mind.
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3:43 - 3:46And so Zig, being Indian,
likewise it baffles his mind. -
3:46 - 3:47His favorite photograph...
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3:47 - 3:50My favorite photograph of his,
which I don't have in here... -
3:50 - 3:53Is Indian taking picture of white people
taking pictures of Indians. -
3:53 - 3:55(Laughter)
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3:55 - 3:57So I happen to be at dinner
with this photographer, -
3:57 - 3:59and he was talking
with another photographer -
3:59 - 4:01about a shooting that had occurred,
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4:01 - 4:02and it was on an Indian Reservation.
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4:03 - 4:05He'd taken his camera up there
to photograph it, -
4:05 - 4:07but when he got there,
he discovered he couldn't do it. -
4:07 - 4:09He just couldn't capture the picture.
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4:09 - 4:12And so they were talking back and forth
about this question. -
4:12 - 4:14Do you take the picture or not?
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4:14 - 4:16And that was fascinating
to me as a game designer, -
4:16 - 4:18because it never occurs to me,
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4:18 - 4:21should I make the game
about this difficult topic or not? -
4:21 - 4:23Because we just make things that are fun
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4:23 - 4:27or will make you feel fear,
that visceral excitement. -
4:27 - 4:28But every other medium does it.
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4:29 - 4:30So this is my kid.
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4:30 - 4:32This is Maezza, and when she was
seven years old, -
4:32 - 4:34she came home from school one day,
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4:34 - 4:37and like I do every single day,
I asked her, "What did you do today?" -
4:37 - 4:40So she said, "We talked
about the Middle Passage." -
4:40 - 4:42Now, this was a big moment.
Maezza's dad is black, -
4:42 - 4:45and I knew this day was coming.
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4:45 - 4:48I wasn't expecting it at seven,
I don't know why, but I wasn't. -
4:48 - 4:51Anyways, so I asked her,
"How do you feel about that?" -
4:51 - 4:53So she proceeded to tell me,
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4:53 - 4:56and so any of you who are parents
will recognize the bingo buzzwords here. -
4:56 - 4:59"The ships start in England,
they come down from England, -
4:59 - 5:01they go to Africa,
they go across the ocean... -
5:01 - 5:03That's the Middle Passage part...
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5:03 - 5:06They come to America, where
the slaves are sold," she's telling me. -
5:06 - 5:08But Abraham Lincoln was elected president,
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5:08 - 5:10and then he passed
the Emancipation Proclamation, -
5:11 - 5:12and now they're free.
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5:12 - 5:13Pause for about 10 seconds.
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5:13 - 5:14"Can I play a game, Mommy?"
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5:14 - 5:18And I thought, that's it?
And so, you know, -
5:19 - 5:23this is the Middle Passage,
this is an incredibly significant event, -
5:23 - 5:27and she's treating it like, basically
some black people went on a cruise, -
5:27 - 5:29this is more or less how it sounds to her.
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5:29 - 5:30(Laughter)
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5:30 - 5:33And so, to me,
I wanted more value in this, -
5:33 - 5:36so when she asked
if she could play a game, I said, "Yes." -
5:36 - 5:37(Laughter)
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5:37 - 5:40And so I happened to have
all of these little pieces. -
5:40 - 5:43I'm a game designer, so I have
this stuff sitting around my house. -
5:43 - 5:46I said, "Yeah, you can play a game,"
and I give her a bunch of these, -
5:46 - 5:49and I tell her to paint them
in different families. -
5:49 - 5:51These are pictures of Maezza
when she was... -
5:51 - 5:53God, it still chokes me up seeing these.
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5:53 - 5:55So she's painting her little families.
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5:55 - 5:57So then I grab a bunch of them
and I put them on a boat. -
5:57 - 6:00This was the boat,
it was made quickly, obviously. -
6:00 - 6:03And so the basic gist of it is,
I grabbed a bunch of families, -
6:03 - 6:05and she's like, "Mommy,
but you forgot the pink baby -
6:05 - 6:07and you forgot the blue daddy
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6:07 - 6:08and you forgot all these other things."
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6:08 - 6:10And she says, "They want to go."
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6:10 - 6:12And I said, "Honey,
no, they don't want to go. -
6:12 - 6:16This is the Middle Passage, Nobody wants
to go on the Middle Passage." -
6:16 - 6:19So she gave me a look that only a daughter
of a game designer would give a mother, -
6:19 - 6:22and as we're going across the ocean,
following these rules, -
6:22 - 6:24she realizes that she's rolling
pretty high, -
6:24 - 6:27and she says to me,
"We're not going to make it." -
6:27 - 6:29And she realizes,
we don't have enough food, -
6:29 - 6:30and so she asks what to do,
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6:30 - 6:33and I say... remember, she's seven...
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6:33 - 6:35"We can either put
some people in the water -
6:35 - 6:37or we can hope that they don't get sick
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6:37 - 6:38and we make it to the other side."
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6:40 - 6:42Just the look on her face came over...
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6:42 - 6:44Now mind you this is after a month of...
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6:44 - 6:46This is Black History Month, right?
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6:46 - 6:49After a month, she says to me,
"Did this really happen?" -
6:49 - 6:52And I said, "Yes." And so she said...
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6:53 - 6:54This is her brother and sister...
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6:54 - 6:57"If I came out of the woods,
Avalon and Donovan might be gone." -
6:57 - 6:58"Yes."
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6:58 - 7:00"But I'd get to see them in America."
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7:00 - 7:01"No."
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7:01 - 7:04"But what if I saw them?
Couldn't we stay together?" -
7:04 - 7:05"So Daddy could be gone."
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7:05 - 7:06"Yes."
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7:06 - 7:09She was fascinated by this,
and she started to cry, -
7:09 - 7:12I started to cry, her father started
to cry, and now we're all crying. -
7:12 - 7:16He didn't expect to come home from work
to the Middle Passage, but there it goes. -
7:16 - 7:18And so, we made this game, and she got it.
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7:18 - 7:21She got it because she spent time
with these people. -
7:21 - 7:24It wasn't abstract stuff
in a brochure or in a movie. -
7:25 - 7:28And so it was just an incredibly
powerful experience. -
7:28 - 7:31This is the game, which I've ended up
calling "The New World," -
7:31 - 7:32because I like the phrase.
-
7:32 - 7:35I don't think the New World
felt too new worldly exciting -
7:35 - 7:37to the people who were
brought over on slave ships. -
7:37 - 7:40But when this happened,
I saw the whole planet; I was so excited. -
7:40 - 7:43I'd been making games for 20-some years,
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7:43 - 7:45and then I decided to do it again.
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7:45 - 7:46My history is Irish.
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7:46 - 7:49So this is a game called "Síochán Leat."
It's "peace be with you." -
7:49 - 7:52It's the entire history
of my family in a single game. -
7:52 - 7:54I made another game called "Train."
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7:55 - 7:58I was making a series of six games
that covered difficult topics, -
7:58 - 8:01and if you're going to cover a difficult
topic, this is one you need to cover, -
8:01 - 8:04and I'll let you figure out
what that's about on your own. -
8:04 - 8:07And I also made a game
about the Trail of Tears. -
8:07 - 8:09This is a game
with 50,000 individual pieces. -
8:09 - 8:13I was crazy when I decided to start it,
but I'm in the middle of it now. -
8:13 - 8:14It's the same thing.
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8:14 - 8:17I'm hoping that I'll teach
culture through these games. -
8:17 - 8:19And the one I'm working
on right now, which is... -
8:19 - 8:21Because I'm right in the middle of it,
-
8:21 - 8:24and these for some reason
choke me up like crazy... -
8:24 - 8:26Is a game called
"Mexican Kitchen Workers." -
8:26 - 8:28And originally, it was
a math problem, more or less. -
8:28 - 8:30Here's the economics
of illegal immigration. -
8:30 - 8:33And the more I learned
about Mexican culture... -
8:33 - 8:35My partner is Mexican —
The more I learned that, -
8:35 - 8:37you know, for all of us,
food is a basic need, -
8:37 - 8:41and it is obviously with Mexicans, too,
but it's much more than that. -
8:41 - 8:43It's an expression of love.
It's an expression of... -
8:43 - 8:45God, I'm totally choking up
way more than I thought. -
8:45 - 8:47I'll look away from the picture.
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8:47 - 8:51It's an expression of beauty,
it's how they say they love you. -
8:51 - 8:52It's how they say they care,
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8:52 - 8:55and you can't hear somebody
talk about their Mexican grandmother -
8:55 - 8:57without saying "food"
in the first sentence. -
8:57 - 8:59And so to me, this beautiful culture,
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8:59 - 9:04this beautiful expression is something
that I want to capture through games. -
9:04 - 9:07And so games, for a change,
it changes how we see topics, -
9:07 - 9:11it changes our perceptions
about those people in topics, -
9:11 - 9:12and it changes ourselves.
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9:12 - 9:15We change as people through games,
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9:15 - 9:17because we're involved, and we're playing,
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9:17 - 9:18and we're learning as we do so.
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9:18 - 9:19Thank you.
- Title:
- Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix
- Description:
-
It's never easy to get across the magnitude of complex tragedies -- so when Brenda Brathwite's daughter came home from school asking about slavery, she did what she does for a living -- she designed a game. In this talk, he describes the surprising effectiveness of this game, and others, in helping the player really understand the story.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 09:30
TED Translators admin edited English subtitles for Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix | ||
TED Translators admin edited English subtitles for Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Gaming for understanding | Brenda Brathwaite | TEDxPhoenix |