Woolums.+Gendered+Avatar+Identity

=Woolums, Viola. "Gendered Avatar Identity."= [|Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy// 16.1 - Fall 2011. Web.]

**Abstract**
"Gendered appearance in //World of Warcraft// is of particular interest because it seems to infiltrate interactions between individuals without serving a functional purpose within the game itself. It provides an opportunity to look at avatar choice in environments that have a primary purpose aside from existing as an arena for creating identity, and possibly the opportunity to uncover some new insight into why individuals select avatar gender the way they do.

Argument
The purpose of this article is to explore gendered avatar choices within //World of Warcraft// (//WoW//). The author focuses only with gender in //WoW//. According to the author, gendered appearance in //WoW// is of particular interest because people seem to be choosing certain gendered avatars solely for the purpose of the game rather than for interaction with other players. It provides an opportunity to look at avatar choice in environments that have a primary purpose aside from existing as an arena for creating identity, and possibly the opportunity to uncover some new insight into why individuals select avatar gender the way they do. The author argues that some females tend to stay away from choosing female avatars because of the stigma that comes with it (such as using flirting as a method to get ahead) while some males tend to choose the female in order to get ahead.The article explores the reasons behind certain individuals choices.

Key Passages
"On the most basic level, avatars are simply descriptions of a person used to represent them in online environments." ([|Gendered Avatar Choice])

"As soon as it was possible to graphically represent gendered bodies within online environments, it was done. Today some environments still provide their participants with a gender neutral avatar to choose, but these are often overlooked, possibly because of the desire for gender identification." ([|Gendered Avatar Choice])

"In my personal experiences—not only playing games online, but also speaking with others who do the same—certain tendencies are associated with the female gender no matter what the gender of the avatar. Textual communication that contains a large number of emoticons or is overly nice will generally be attributed to females." [|(Gendered Avatar Interaction])

"The problem is the notion of deception. Online environments lend themselves to the misrepresentation of identities simply because they are removed from real life. " [|(Gendered Avatar Interaction])

"These environments (although they may have numerous purposes) are specifically geared toward those individuals who want to play as their character rather than be represented by it. " [|(Significance of Gendered Avatars])

"... female players of female avatars do not seem to use the sexuality of their avatars to their advantage, but male players of female avatars sometimes do." [|(Significance of Gendered Avatars])

"There are two distinctly separate factors to a gendered online identity: the gendered appearance of the avatar itself, and the gendered identity put forth by the individual behind the avatar. These two factors exist separately, but they interact with each other in various ways to create many of the gendered issues surrounding avatars in online environments. " ([|Conclusion])

"The overarching problem here is that the tendency to stereotype has seeped into the internet. The problem with stereotyping is that it is not necessarily an accurate representation of traits, but also that the stereotypes themselves are applied liberally to a variety of individuals as though they had a collective identity." ([|Conclusion])

**Selected Works Cited**
Ducheneaut, Nicolas et al. (2009). Body and mind: A study of avatar personalization in three virtual worlds. London: Routledge. Retrieved January 2010, from @http://www.nickyee.com/pubs/Ducheneaut,%20Wen,%20Yee,%20Wadley%20-%20CHI%202009.pdf

Donath, Judith. (1998). Identity and deception in the virtual community. In Peter Kollock & Marc Smith (Eds.), //Communities in cyberspace//. Retrieved January 2010, from @http://smg.media.mit.edu/people/judith/Identity/IdentityDeception.html

Kolko, Beth E. (1999). Representing bodies in virtual space: The rhetoric of avatar design. //Information Society//. 15(3), 177-186.

Turkle, Sherry. (1995). //Life on the screen: Identity in the age of the Internet//. New York: Simon & Schuster.