Neocolonial Minecraft
Neocolonial Minecraft
Neocolonial Minecraft
Matthew Wills
February, 22, 2025
Summary
Minecraft, one of the best-selling games globally, has been praised for its educational value, yet scholar Bennett Brazelton argues it embeds settler colonial ideology. The game’s default white avatar arrives in an “untamed” land, echoing colonial fantasies. Players extract resources and kill “native” monsters—zombies, skeletons, and creepers—framing them as obstacles to empire-building. This promotes a sanitized view of extractivism, ignoring real-world histories of colonization, labor exploitation, and environmental destruction. Unlike Motherload, which critiques mining, Minecraft glamorizes it. Brazelton connects these themes to a broader gaming tradition, such as The Oregon Trail, which also perpetuates problematic colonial narratives.
Reference
Wills, M. (2025, February 22). Neocolonial Minecraft. JSTOR Daily. https://daily.jstor.org/neocolonial-minecraft/