The Essence of Collective Effervescence: a Neo

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THE ESSENCE OF COLLECTIVE EFFERVESCENCE:

A NEO-DURKHEIMIAN CONCEPT IN THE VIRTUAL WORLD

MICHAEL W. TRASK

Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts (Sociology)

Acadia University Fall Graduation, 2014

This thesis by MICHAEL W. TRASK was defended successfully in an oral examination on September 4th, 2014.

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Dr. Rachel Brickner, Chair

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Dr. Jacques Goulet, External Reader

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Dr. Anthony Thomson, Internal Reader

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Dr Ann Marie Powers, Supervisor

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Dr. Zelda Abramson, Head/Director (Acting)

This thesis is accepted in its present form by the Division of Research and Graduate Studies as satisfying the thesis requirements for the degree Master of Arts (Sociology).

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I, MICHAEL W. TRASK, grant permission to the University Librarian at Acadia University to reproduce, loan or distribute copies of my thesis in microform, paper or electronic formats on a non-profit basis. I, however, retain the copyright in my thesis.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my wife and boys for being a remarkable source of inspiration and of understanding through this process. Additionally, I would like to thank Dr. Ann Marie

Powers and Dr. Tony Thomson for their remarkable insight, for being my academic parents, and for their advice. I would also like to thank the people who took part in the research process, without you this wouldn't have happened.

Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... IV

ABSTRACT ...... VII

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ...... 1

CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODS ...... 6

INTERVIEWS ...... 6

MMORPG'S ...... 10

VIRTUAL INTO THE REAL ...... 13

HISTORY ...... 15

STARTING OUT ...... 17

AVATAR CREATION ...... 18

VIRTUAL LAW ...... 21

FIRST DAY IN MMORPG ...... 22

PROGRESSION ...... 24

DYING...... 25

SOLO ...... 26

GROUPING ...... 27

THE GUILD ...... 27

CHAPTER 3: THEORETICAL LITERATURE ...... 29

COMMUNITY ...... 29

SOLIDARITY ...... 41

SOCIAL ACTION ...... 44

CHAPTER 4: RITUAL ...... 49

RITUAL ...... 49

DURKHEIM ...... 50

GOFFMAN ...... 51

COLLINS ...... 54

CHAPTER 5: RAIDING ...... 57

CHAPTER 6: ANALYSIS ...... 60

COMMUNITY ...... 60

SOLIDARITY ...... 64

SOCIAL ACTION ...... 66

RITUAL ...... 68

CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSION ...... 74

GLOSSARY ...... 78

APPENDIX: SAMPLE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS ...... 80

REFERENCES ...... 81

Abstract

In Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG), the raid is a ritual carried out by a group of individuals called a guild, all within the confines of a virtual world. In most cases, clear boundaries are drawn to separate the members of one group from the larger community; in some cases, however, the lines between “us and them” blur, allowing guilds to compete for the sacred items or the prestige of progression.

Successful raids bring forth feelings of achievement, solidarity, and anticipation of the next raid. An unsuccessful raid leaves its participants with feelings of uncertainty about their role within this setting. When players make mistakes, these are quickly corrected during raids by leaders who coordinate the event. Although the social action within the ritual of these communities takes place in a virtual setting, it elicits real feelings within its participants; yet limited academic research has gone into this unique and new form of computer-mediated ritual. Users from across the world interact through computerized means. While this interaction is not face to face, this new frontier appears to facilitate the creation of strong communities and solidarity within its membership. This thesis will examine whether Durkheim’s concept of collective effervescence is present in this virtual world to create such communities.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

For the past decade, the virtual worlds of the Massively Multiplayer Online Role

Playing Game, or MMORPG, have taken the world by surprise, and MMORPG has become one of the most successful genres within the video game industry. There are currently over 20 million active subscriptions within the world of MMORPGs, with dozens of active environments to explore (Geel 2013). The recent release of Blizzard

Entertainment’s World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria expansion sold 2.7 million copies within the first week of its release and now claims over 10 million subscriptions

(Blizzard Entertainment 2012). The unique difference between MMORPGs and other video game genres is that MMORPGs contain persistent virtual environments with which users interact through an avatar. These virtual worlds are described as “synthetic worlds” by Edward Castronova (2005:11), who sees them as “an expansive, world-like, large-group environment made by humans, for humans, and which is maintained, recorded, and rendered by a computer.” These vast, expansive virtual environments allow users to congregate from all across the globe and participate together in the solving, in a sense, of complex puzzles. This coming together is achieved through the creation of an online community, composed of “guilds” or “clans,” which facilitate the group membership online.

Although I have actively participated within MMORPG since 2000, and rely on the experience I have had in different games and genres, it was the study of social theory that sparked my interest and desire to research these online worlds. I was intrigued by the way these online groups, which exist in this new social cyberspace, are

formed and maintained. The structure of these MMORPGs is ultimately organized to facilitate group formation through the advancement of each player’s character by completing quests with others. End-game content is engaged through larger, more defined groups, typically found within the formation of guilds that progress through

“raiding” content. Raiding brings people together from all over the world and from different walks of life; it is, in essence, a difficult puzzle that requires the active participation of a large number of people.

It is not the commercial success of MMORPGs that I wish to inquire about within this thesis but rather the idea that community can exist and thrive within a synthetic world; the idea that strong friendships and bonds can be forged without individuals ever meeting face to face; and the idea that solidarity can be produced through the process of raiding. There are many facets to this research which I could have chosen to focus upon. Among them are issues of identity and the formation and creation of that identity with avatars; the role of gender; the consequences of gaming in the everyday world of 'real' life, etc. However, in the interests of clarity and specificity, I mention some of these issues periodically, but the focus remains on the meaning of community in this synthetic world.

Chapter Two outlines the research methods I’ve employed for this thesis. Using a snowball sample method from members of the guild “Night Masks,” I conducted seven interviews over the course of a year. Since my own participation in the games is an integral part of my discussion of them, I also used authoethnography to inform my discussion of the MMORPG’s, which is presented in detail. I provide an in-depth outline of MMORPG; for a glossary of gaming terms, see page 78. What sets the MMORPG apart

from other games? First, the MMORPG typically contains an expansive, persistent environment that can be accessed by means of a computer and Internet connection. To enter the game’s environment, a person must create a character, or avatar, to act as the user’s virtual body, allowing it to interact with the structure of the world and the other players. Second, a unique feature of these games is that there is no end. These games aren't your usual board games within a virtual space; they are a space within which a person devotes much time and attention to fine tuning and acting through their avatar, a place where people are getting married, holding memorial services, and creating, destroying, and developing friendships.

In Chapter Three, I review theoretical literature on the sociological concepts of community, solidarity and social action. Studying these three key concepts will facilitate a better understanding of this new frontier. The birth of the Internet has facilitated the creation of communities that exist purely in a virtual space. Within the MMORPG, these spaces, which began as pure text chat, have grown to include graphical interfacing that allows people to assume control of a virtual body; and with a virtual body, they can explore and interact with this new frontier.

In Chapter Four, I review the theoretical concept of ritual and how its meaning has changed over time. Both Durkheim and Goffman see ritual as a “mechanism of mutually focused emotion and attention producing a momentary shared reality, which thereby generates solidarity and symbols of group membership” (Collins 2004:7). I will then focus on the raid in Chapter Five and examine it as a particular ritual found within the worlds of MMORPG. In a raid, up to 24 players mutually focus their attention and perform particular functions, and, depending on the outcome of the raid, experience

either a collective effervescence or an uncomfortable collective stillness. The raid is carried out from the comfort of the player’s home in front of a monitor; the emotional energy generated by the urgency and forced co-operation of the raid transcends virtual reality. Microsociologist Randall Collins (2004:47), who followed in the footsteps of

Durkheim and Goffman, developed a theory of Interaction Ritual Chains, stating that

“rituals are constructed from a combination of ingredients that grow to differing levels of intensity, and result in the ritual outcomes of solidarity, symbolism, and individual emotional energy.”

In Chapter Six, I provide an analysis of the interview data obtained, comparing the theoretical concepts of Chapters Three and Four and applying them to the virtual world. The concept of ritual is dependent on the community in which it appears. I will argue that the worlds of MMORPG do contain thriving virtual communities with unique rituals that have the ability to generate solidarity. By applying real-world social concepts to the virtual world of MMORPG, it is my hope that making connections between the real and virtual worlds provides a better understanding of this virtual social phenomenon.

My conclusions are the topic of Chapter Seven. The virtual worlds of the

Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game platform have facilitated a curious social happening: the game has allowed millions of people to enter into a virtual and persistent space, and, through an on-screen avatar, to socialize and commune through computerized means. According to Castronova (2007:32), since the first graphical online world game was launched in 1996, “new 3D virtual worlds have been appearing at about the rate of Moore's Law – doubling every two years or so.” That being said,

what is it that draws people into these worlds, and what takes place within them? What other medium gives people the ability to create a new identity, free from blemish, with anonymity; to start the same way everyone else starts; to begin with nothing and progress their avatar through the game’s content, fostering rich social interaction with other players; and to reach a point in the game where a large group of people join together from all over the world and collectively participate in online battles?

Chapter 2: Research Methods

This thesis has been informed by my own participation in MMORPG's. As such, it is partly autoethnographic. The rest of the data was obtained through online interviews.

I've employed the method of autoethnography in hopes that it will provide the reader with an insight into the inner circle of the raiding sub-culture and the workings of the ritual of raiding. The goal of choosing the autoethnographic method, according to

Carolyn Ellis is: 'evoking emotional experience to readers... giving voice to stories and groups of people traditionally left out of social inquiry' (Ellis 2004:30). Throughout the research I was actively involved within Everquest 2's virtual world of Norrath and used this experience to help frame my interview questions and to interpret some of the data.

As such, while most of the data comes from the interviews conducted from Everquest 2, the data is not exclusive to this game only.

Interviews

For this thesis I conducted seven interviews, using the snowball sample method, from the Everquest 2 guild I was a part of at the time of this research. I felt that sampling from within my own guild would be useful for the thesis because the guild was actively participating in raids. Snowball sampling begins with one initial contact to interview, and the interviewer then asks the initial interviewee to refer him or her to another contact to interview, and so on (Esterberg 2002:93). The interviews contained a total of 18 semi-structured questions (16 main questions and two sub-questions), which helped facilitate further questions while the interview was taking place. As

Perakyla and Ruusuvuori note, “By using interviews, the researcher can reach areas of reality that would otherwise remain inaccessible such as people’s subjective 6

experiences and attitudes” (Denzin and Lincoln 2011:529). Employing open-ended questions within the interview helped facilitate discussion that could be difficult to acquire by other methods. The questions within the interview were open-ended and structured to allow the interviewee to elaborate and expand on the response (see

Appendix).

The interviews themselves were conducted and recorded through the voice-over

Internet program, Ventrillo. Each interview was approximately one hour in duration.

Consent forms were scanned and returned by email with the interviewees’ signatures.

To protect players’ anonymity, I have changed their names for the purposes of this research. The interviews provided a wealth of information on the inner workings of guild operation, game mechanics, and the act of raiding, as well as some interesting comparisons between the settings of the real world and the virtual world.

I will introduce the participants (all of whom have been given pseudonyms) in the research to give some background on the players who drive the online characters.

Keep in mind that I did not get into issues related to socio-economic class, race or gender, although I know these variables might be useful in future research. For the purposes of this thesis, I focused on the ages and length of participation in the games because I am interested in issues of social solidarity and the concept of collective effervescence.

My first interview was with the leader of the guild to which I belonged at the time of the research. Matt is a 35-year-old male who lives in Michigan. He began his adventures in gaming with the early predecessor to the MMORPG, SubSpace, followed by other popular MMORPG titles such as Asherns Call, Star Wars Galaxies, and

Everquest 1 and 2. He was introduced to MMORPG through his friends and describes himself as a hardcore player, playing 20–30 hours a week. It was through Matt’s recommendation that I interviewed Rebecca, an officer in our guild.

Rebecca is a 50-year-old female who lives in Minnesota and began playing the

MMORPG Everquest 2 with her husband when it was released in 2004. Her husband,

Dale, who is also 50, was another person I interviewed. It is interesting to note that

Rebecca and Dale began an online friendship (she was in California, while he was in

New York) through a chat program that Rebecca moderated, and their friendship blossomed into marriage. Dale began playing single-player RPGs such as Might and

Magic, which led to interest in the online worlds of Guild Wars, Secret World, Conan,

Lord of the Rings Online, and Elder Scrolls Online. Both Rebecca and Dale commented on enjoying the friendships they have created through playing MMORPG. They both typically spend 20 hours a week playing Everquest 2.

John, a 34-year-old male from Ontario, began playing Magic, a trading-card game, in high school where he would meet with friends once a week to play. John’s first

MMORPG was Everquest 1, to which he was introduced by the same group of friends.

John plays Everquest 2 for 15–20 hours a week when he is not working and considers himself a casual player. He enjoys the storyline/lore and the raiding content of

Everquest 2.

Richard, a 68-year-old male from Arkansas, was introduced to MMORPG through his sons, who played Everquest 1. Richard met his future wife in 2006 while playing the

MMORPG Vanguard; his wife is also a current member of our guild in Everquest 2 and

immigrated from Poland to be with Richard in 2007. Richard said he really enjoys meeting people throughout the world, and he plays 20 hours a week.

Janice, a 43-year-old female from Tennessee, first began playing MMORPGs with

Everquest 1 after she was introduced to it by her husband. Along with her desire to raid, Janice has had a keen interest on the crafting/decorating side of the game. She has also facilitated the creation of a crafting channel to assist anyone, regardless of guild affiliation, in the pursuit of crafting. Janice considers herself a social/casual player, spending 15–20 hours a week playing Everquest 2.

The final interviewee was Brian, a 22-year-old male from Pennsylvania. Brian began playing MMORPGs at the age of 13, when his older brother introduced him to

Everquest 2. Brian’s play time varies while he is in school, but typically he spends 14–

21 hours a week playing Everquest 2. Throughout this interview, Brian spoke of his own “coming of age” within an MMORPG, stating that it had been “a huge part” of his life. “I’ve grown up in this game,” he said.

The interview process for this research was new to me. It was my first experience of doing social research that was not face to face. Even though I did not meet the interviewees in person, the interviews themselves went relatively smoothly. The only issue that arose was due to user error with the recording software. The interviews provided solid information into MMORPG guilds and raiding, as well as information on the creation of virtual friendships. In the following chapters, I will incorporate my theoretical findings with the interviews I conducted over the past year.

MMORPG's

These places, while being physically different from the Earth, are not socially different from it. All the standard patterns of human social, economic, and psychological functioning seem to translate directly into the new space. A glimpse of daily life in a typical synthetic world should illustrate both how strange and how normal these proskenia are: new stages that host age-old human dramas. (Castronova 2005:29)

Many people often draw a dichotomy between the ‘real’ world and the ‘virtual’ world of online. However, in many ways this is illusory. The online world of gaming often mirrors the everyday world of social relationships and it is because of this that I wanted to examine sociological concepts in this ‘brave new world.’ While at times I discuss the ‘real’ world, I am simply trying to demonstrate how the two worlds, while held separately in much of the literature to date, do collide and influence each other.

However, the primary focus herein is the world of online gaming.

Imagine having the ability to interact and adventure with your favorite storybook or movie-franchise characters; to meet with people from around the world forging friendships in the process; to explore vast, visually stunning lands steeped in lore and myth – all without leaving home. The virtual worlds of the Massively Multiplayer Online

Role-Playing Game (MMORPG), a sub-genre of the Massively Multiplayer Online Games

(MMOGs), have seen a remarkable increase in popularity and a steady virtual migration of people’s attention since their introduction in the late 1990s (Castronova 2007:32).

World of Warcraft, one of the most commercially successful MMORPGs, had over 11 million subscribers as of 2008 (Ivan 2008). Other sub-genres of the MMOG include

MMORTS (real-time strategy) such as Age of Empires and Company of Heroes, MMOFPS

(first person shooter) such as Planetside 2 and America’s Army, Simulators such as The

Sims Online, Social MMOGs such as Second Life, and Sporting MMOGs. While the

MMORPG is typically seen as just a game that people play for enjoyment, a number of curious social happenings are at work within its worlds. Within this chapter I will explain what MMORPG is, how it differs from other games, its effect on our real life, and its structure.

The MMORPG contains a virtual, persistent world in which players can interact with one another through an avatar and progress through the game’s content; and players have hundreds of worlds to choose from. Various genres include Fantasy, Sci-Fi,

Horror, Historical and Real Life, which are fused together and brought to life through a personal computer and an Internet connection. Titles such as World of Warcraft, The

Lord of the Rings Online, Star Wars: the Old Republic, Dark Age of Camelot, City of

Heroes and Everquest have become household names within the online gaming community and in our own wider culture. MMORPGs are remarkably different from other MMOGs and video-game genres in a number of ways.

First, as the name implies, the MMORPG platform allows for a large number of players to enter the game at the same time. In most cases, depending on the population of the game, its developers will use a number of different servers to handle the large player base, and these servers may even be broken up into geographical regions.

Hundreds of players can enter this virtual world at the same time and interact with other player characters and computer-generated characters. The persistence of the

MMORPG’s virtual world means that the world will continue whether the player is in the game or not, weather and sun/moon cycle included.

Second, MMORPGs typically have a leveling system (the ability to grow stronger by obtaining levels) and a class-based system (in which different classes perform

various roles, as structured by developers, within the particular MMORPG). While classes of characters, and further sub-classes, vary from one MMORPG to the next, they are naturally formed around the same themes or “holy trinity” of tank (whose role is to take damage for the group), healer (who heals other characters who are hurt), and DPS

(“damage per second”: the one who inflicts damage) within combat. Outside of combat, the MMORPG allow players to take a variety of roles and professions. For example, a person may engage in 'tradeskilling' (ability to craft or refine various items) as a profession, enabling him or her to earn an in-game income. As Kelly (2004:26) notes,

“...beyond these common themes the professional possibilities are as wide as they are in the real world.” Players also have the ability to create a number of alternative characters (“Alts”), allowing them to explore numerous combinations of class and profession.

Third, perhaps one of the most distinctive features within MMORPG is the concept that it never ends and continues on through the “expansion.” Expansions are customarily designed to supply the current world with additional content (new zones) by adding an increase of level/ability cap, by introducing a new character class and new items, or by implementing a new game mechanic. These expansions are the lifeblood of any MMORPG and make the experience never ending. An example of this on-going feature can be found within the virtual world of Everquest 1. The virtual world that is

Norrath, which initially consisted of three continents, grew substantially with the release of its first expansion, Ruins of Kunark, which not only added a new continent but a new race (the Iksar), and increased the level cap, dungeons and high-level areas

(DeMaria and Lipscombe 2009:119). From Ruins of Kunark to Call of the Forsaken,

which was released in October 2013, Everquest 1 has seen the release of 20 expansions over its 16-year run. This notion of “never ending” has kept the evolution of MMORPGs going strong and has had real-life effects on the players and our own “real-life” society.

Virtual into the Real

The popularity of the virtual world has led to its influencing our own real world: politically, socially and economically. One of the first MMORPGs to garner commercial success in 1998 was Everquest 1. It was banned by a federal court in Brazil, which asserted, “These games subvert public order, and are seen as an attack against the democratic state and the law against public security” (Modine 2008). South Korea has imposed mandatory curfews between 12am and 8am to curb the amount of time children under 16 spend playing online games (Floyd 2012). Considered the most wired country in the world, South Korea also shows a domestic market value of online gaming at $3.7 billion (Jin 2011), where more than 30% of the population play regularly.

Gamers are treated as rock stars, and TV channels are dedicated to broadcasting people playing the popular MMOG Starcraft. Recently it was discovered that virtual worlds were becoming a haven for money laundering and terrorism financing around the world (Irwin and Slay 2010). The political impact of MMORPGs will continue to unfold as technology changes and grows.

Virtual transactions are being turned into real-life currency, and “plat farming”

(the art of gathering in-game currency to sell for profit) has become an offshoot of the

MMORPG industry, catering to those who wish to buy virtual currency. Virtual currency is being bought and sold in real time, and while this practice is against the End-User

License Agreement (EULA) of the game (punishable by ban), it is an extremely

profitable business. Companies have sprung up with the sole purpose of currency

“farming,” where employees go to work and play the game. As Pearce (2009:39–40) notes on currency farming factories in China, “Here low-wage laborers, usually young men, live and work in barrack-style, spending their days playing World of Warcraft and gathering virtual currency, which their employers then trade on the black market for real-world currency.” These businesses are also in the market for other services. You don’t want to start at level one with no items? No problem! Players can search the

Internet for character auctions (characters already established which are for sale), power-leveling services (a company takes over your account and levels your character while you are offline), as well as currency exchange (known as “plat farming” or

"botting" – see above). While the practice of “botting” or “plat farming” is illegal and against the EULA, it doesn't diminish the high demand for services that essentially give a player the upper hand. Some MMOGs and MMORPGs have implemented player- created services that have led to the ability to generate personal wealth within the virtual world. Second Life, for example, a Real Life genre MMOG, has structured the game to allow and actually encourage people to operate a virtual business and own virtual plots of land which can be bought and sold on-line. Tom Boellstorff (2008:8), who has conducted extensive anthropological research on Second Life, notes, “Over

US$1,000,000 of economic activity was occurring daily.” MMORPGs have been following suit, allowing people to create items and submit them to a player-made auction house facilitated by the developers.

MMORPGs have been called addictive and accused of causing tarnished relationships, job losses, and suicide. The case of Shawn Woolley, a 21-year-old man

who committed suicide in 2002, was one of the first reported suicides allegedly resulting from an addiction to Everquest 1. According to reports, Liz Woolley, his mother, “...found him at his apartment. He had shot himself at his computer. On the screen was the online game, Everquest” (Kohn 2002). Another tragic story is of a man named Seungseob Lee, who spent 50 hours straight playing Starcraft and collapsed at the Internet café “before going into cardiac arrest and dying in the local hospital”

(Curran 2013). While these negative stories sell news, a bit of digging is required to find the more uplifting and positive stories around MMORPG. For instance, there is the story of a 12-year-old boy who “survived a moose attack by feigning death, ‘just like you learn at level 30 in World of Warcraft’” (Cavalli 2007). Seeing the enraged moose, the boy simply pretended to die and was saved by an action found in many MMORPGs. While the effects of this new virtual world within the MMORPG are apparent, their effects on our real lives will continue to unfold as more research is conducted. Having touched on some real-life effects of these MMORPGs, I will now look at where and how such games were created.

History

The MMORPG was born through a merger of table-top role-playing games, such as Dungeons and Dragons (D & D), and the MUD (Multi User Domain). In D & D, players construct and create their own characters by selecting various attributes (Wisdom,

Agility, Charisma, etc.), which are essentially qualities that they would like their character to embody. Players make moves based on scenarios put forth by a Dungeon

Master (DM) or Game Master (GM), who directs the narrative of the game; action is

determined by the rolling of dice (Taylor 2006:21). This type of participatory storytelling, which has evolved over human history from cave paintings to the replaying of epic battles using toy soldiers, met the virtual with the creation of MUD1 by Roy

Trubshaw in 1978 with the assistance of Richard Bartle in 1979 (Cherny 1999:5). With advances in computing, the assembly of participants was brought into the virtual setting; people could now sit in their own homes and connect with people through their monitors. As Clark and Scott (2009:15) note, “In many ways games like D & D got people envisioning designs, but computers made this adventuring all the more easy.

Computing power gave the game designers the blank slate that they needed for testing innovative ways to have these experiences.”

The traditional MUD was strictly text based with no graphical interface; movement and actions were achieved through commands typed on the keyboard.

Commands such as “get,” “look,” “north” and “south” facilitated action, enabling the players to interact with the environment of the MUD (Taylor 2006:22). People who had access to the Internet at this time were able to connect to remote computers that hosted the MUD. One of the original creators of MUD1, Richard Bartle (1985:86), states that the

MUD “improves on the basic concept of an adventure game by such an extent that it just has to be the way computer games are going in the future.” The rise in popularity of the

MUD and advancements in computing led to the creation of the first graphically based

MMOG, Meridian 59, in 1996, in which users could see the world around them (Pearce

2009:10). Ultima Online in 1997 (Corneliussen and Rettberg 2008:4), followed by

Everquest 1 in 1999 (Cuddy and Nordlinger 2009:97), laid the foundation for the

MMORPG, with Everquest 1 becoming the first to achieve commercial success.

According to Cuddy and Nordlinger (2009:97), “Academics, the press, game developers, we were all astonished by 250,000 players that gathered in Norrath to play a game that foreshadowed the future of PC gaming.” Having given a brief history of how the

MMORPG came to be, I will now explain in more detail what an MMORPG is and how it is played.

Starting Out

To experience the world of MMORPG, players are required to purchase the initial software and install the game on a PC that is connected to the Internet. Until recently, few MMORPGS were free to play; players had to pay upwards of $30 for the initial software and a monthly subscription fee of up to $15 to access the game. Nowadays, free-to-play has become the norm, with options to pay for various services and upgrades. The free-to-play model first appeared in late 2012 within the popular

MMORPG Star Wars: The Old Republic, and this has set the standard for others to follow

(Business Wire 2012). Whether the person decides on free-to-play or not, more perks are customarily offered to those who subscribe to the monthly fee; the decision on the purchase of the MMORP comes down to the role the person would like to play.

Typically, there are two different types of MMORPG, and these revolve around combat styles: Player versus Player (PvP) and Player versus Environment (PvE).

Players may choose a PvP style of MMORPG, in which players engage in combat with one another, or PvE, in which the element of killing players has been removed, and non- player characters (NPC) are the focus for progression through the game. Some

MMORPGs have facilitated server-specific designations solely for PvP or PvE. Others

have implemented designated areas and arenas/battlegrounds in which a player can experience PvP in a PvE environment (and vice versa). The decision of the PvP or PvE style of play is at the discretion of the player in most cases. Generally, the selection of which MMORPG to play will come from the player’s own desire and taste, and with a multitude of titles to choose from, the variety of roles is virtually endless.

Avatar Creation

When first entering an MMORPG, the player creates his or her avatar. The avatar essentially becomes the vessel or image of the player. According to T. L. Taylor

(2002:41), “Through Avatars, users embody themselves and make real their engagement with a virtual world.” Avatar creation begins with choosing your race, alignment (good, neutral, or evil), and gender. Gender, while available as a choice, has

“no bearing on internal game mechanics apart from making the character visually different” (Yee 2001:8). MMORPGs typically include a number of different playable races, from robust Ogres and Barbarians to feeble Gnomes and Halflings. Each MMORPG will have its own playable races which is generally based on the games folklore. Before a player chooses a race, it is wise to have an idea of what class type and attribute selection are afforded to that race. For instance, the Barbarian class make excellent tanks, receiving bonus attributes to strength and stamina, but lack mental prowess. As

Beck and Wade (2005:56) note, “Like D&D, the MMORPGs simulate human society by providing multiple players with a rigid list of quantifiable traits to choose from and complex rules to govern their interactions.” Attribute points usually include strength, stamina, agility, intelligence and wisdom and will assist the player in choosing the class.

Alignment can play a large part of an MMORPG experience. Players choosing to align themselves with a particular faction or city might not be welcome in different parts of the virtual world. Upon choosing race and gender, the player has the ability to customize the facial and bodily features, and this customization can be extremely detailed depending on the mechanics of the particular game. Once all this is complete, the player chooses an adventure class, which will determine how the game will be experienced and which role the avatar will assume within the game’s dynamics.

Typically, MMORPGs follow the same basic structure or “holy trinity” – tank,

DPS, or healer – when it comes to class creation and attribute or skill system. As

Bainbridge (2013:110) describes,

The tank stands toe-to-toe with the enemy, wearing heavy armor to protect against the enemy’s attack, monopolizing the enemy’s attention while doing a modest amount of damage in return. The DPS (damage per second) role requires an avatar to stand outside the range of the enemy’s attacks and shoot arrows, bullets, or magic spells to do more damage to the enemy. The healer also stands at a distance, but using healing spells to counteract the damage done to the tank.

This class-based trinity essentially makes up the structure of combat mechanics, and the trinity’s basic principle translates into how combat operates. The tank draws the mob’s attention (having “agro”), and while the mob’s anger is focused on the tank, he or she loses hit points while being damaged by the mob’s combat abilities (mob =

“mobile” enemy NPC). The healer replenishes the hit points of the raid members by casting beneficial healing or shielding spells. The DPS reduces the mob’s hit points to zero by casting detrimental and debuff spells. This template is found throughout the various genres of MMORPG that include a combat element.

Generally, most MMORPGs have a structured system of adventure archetypes, classes and/or subclasses. Everquest 2, for example, has four basic adventure archetypes (expanding the 'trinity'): Fighter, Mage, Priest, and Scout. It has 12 classes: 19

Warrior, Brawler, Crusader, Sorcerer, Enchanter, Summoner, Cleric, Shaman, Druid,

Rogue, Bard and Predator. It also has 24 subclasses: Berserker, Guardian, Bruiser,

Monk, Paladin, Shadowknight, Wizard, Warlock, Coercer, Illusionist, Necromancer,

Conjurer, Templar, Inquisitor, Defiler, Mystic, Fury, Warden, Swashbuckler, Brigand,

Troubadour, Dirge, Ranger, and Assassin.

Each subclass has its own unique abilities and lore. Generally speaking, however, each is a subclass of the three designated class-roles. Fighters take most of the damage and fight the enemy mob at close range; the priest heals; and the mage and scout provide damage or DPS and “buffs and de-buffs” (beneficial and detrimental spells) from a ranged location. The final step in the avatar creation is choosing a name and a server to join.

Now that the avatar has been customized and a virtual role chosen, the player must name his or her avatar. While most MMORPGs provide a name-generating service, choosing a name can be met with roadblocks. Safeguards have been applied to most

MMORPGs to protect against offensive avatar names. Speaking from my own personal experience, my avatar, Vanillagorilla, once received a personal message from another player stating that they were reporting me because they had felt my name was racist.

While I was never contacted directly by a Game Master (GM), I was interested to see how someone could react to a name. Swear words or combinations of words containing them might be flagged as inappropriate. Words that represent a deplorable action are also flagged; the word “rape,” for example, cannot be used in any context (and even

“Grapeape” would be flagged). A name will also be rejected if it is already being used. A

great deal of academic research has gone into the creation of the avatar, as found in the works of T. L. Taylor and Celia Pearce.

After naming the avatar, the player’s next step is to select a server. Choosing a server can ultimately depend on whom you want to play with and when. Most

MMORPGs offer a choice to play on an American, European, or Asian server based on geographical locations. There may also be a number of servers within each location, with varying population sizes. One of the main reasons for choosing a server in a different location would be playing time. If the player works a night shift and lives in the

United States, for example, a server in Europe may provide a better choice for a player base. Alternatively, transfers from one server to another may be accomplished by submitting a request to the game company.

Virtual Law

To maintain harmony within the MMORPG, Game Masters (GMs), who are employees of the game company and who are essentially the virtual-world police, ensure law and order is kept within the virtual world. The final step required to enter the virtual world is agreeing to the End-User License Agreement (EULA) set forth by the company. The EULA is an agreement between the player and the company that develops the particular MMORPG. As Pearce (2009:40) states, “Most EULAs state that the company has full ownership of all intellectual property generated by players.” The

EULA essentially suspends the rights in real life of the avatar; by agreeing to the EULA, a player confirms that the virtual laws of the particular MMORPG will be in place. The rights you enjoy while sitting at your computer screen appear within the EULA to some

degree. Limits on abuse, racism, and abusing exploits within the game are just a few of the virtual laws that are agreed upon by clicking the “I accept” box. GMs have unique abilities that go beyond what a player can do. They can teleport players around the world, they can issue suspensions or bans if and when the EULA has been violated, and they may offer assistance in some instances. Petitioning is the method of communication for having your issue heard by the game developer, which is in-game mail sent directly to the company. GMs are essentially the virtual world law enforcement; they have been given super avatar powers and control within the game.

First Day in MMORPG

We may find ourselves alone as we navigate virtual oceans, unravel virtual mysteries, and engineer virtual skyscrapers. But increasingly, when we step through the looking glass, other people are there as well. (Turkle 1999:643)

Dropped into this vast new world, the players experience an adjustment period as they become accustomed to the various game features, such as communication with others, combat abilities, the economy, and in-game commands. This can be quite daunting, depending on the structure of the game’s user interface (UI) and whether it is user friendly. Upon entering the virtual world for the first time, players are generally greeted by a welcome screen followed by a brief tutorial. Common in most MMORPGs, new player areas are designed to allow players to acquaint themselves with the game mechanics and are usually free from harm. Everyone who enters the game begins at the same starting point (usually with very little); starting items found within the avatar’s inventory routinely include a type of weapon, food and drink, and possibly a piece or two of clothing or armour. Interaction, text communication and access to the game

options are all accessed through the UI via mouse and keyboard commands. Regarding

UI design, the objective of the developers is to create a UI that “would allow for more intuitive use on the part of naive users” (Shields 1996:162). Making the virtual world easier to navigate and interact with, the UI is forever being modified and changed as

MMORPGs evolve.

The avatar’s communication window will include various types of chat text.

Open-channel text is text that other avatars within the vicinity will see, whereas closed- channel text is achieved through sending a direct text to another player. The UI appears on the player’s screen and is essentially the command centre for the player’s avatar.

Communication between other players traditionally has been achieved through text messages that appear in a chat box. The game comes with a structured method of communication between other players and with the community at large. For example, a

“tell” or “whisper” command is a private method of text between two players.

Commands such as “say” or “group” will be seen only by those within your immediate vicinity or within your group. Commands such as “level chat” or “out of character” allow a player to interact with the virtual world at large, whereby everyone can read the text and respond. With advances in technology, MMORPGs have implemented in-game voice, which allows players to speak directly to one another via a microphone. Sony Online has taken this a step further with their MMORPGs and implemented “SOEmote,” which allows the player’s camera to track facial features in real time and superimpose them onto the player’s avatar, creating a realistic emotional feel. Times have changed since the days when I used to prop the telephone to my ear and attach it to my head with a head band.

Beginning at level one, the new player advances in level by completing quests offered by game NPCs (non-player characters), or through general combat, gaining experience points (XP) and rewards (loot). Quests may be accessed through the avatar’s quest journal, or particular NPC, and loot is granted upon quest completion. Also, loot items and/or coin typically drop from the defeated mob, allowing the player to obtain currency and gain wealth. Most MMORPGs include some type of banking or storage system to hold items obtained while questing and killing mobs. Some have implemented a housing system that allows the avatar to take up residence within the

MMORPG. Cities throughout the MMORPG world may contain various accommodation for sale or rent, whereby the owner can have his or her own personal space and grant access to whomever they choose. Usually the avatar will begin with some type of container to carry items, loot, and coin on their person. As they progress, inventory spaces can be expanded by purchasing bigger bags, allowing the player to spend more time questing. Generally, MMORPGs contain some sort of broker or merchant service through which the player can sell his or her loot. Some have gone so far as to add large auction houses or bazaars in which a player can offer an item for a price and allow it to sell on the virtual world’s open market.

Progression

Typically all MMORPGs have a similar structure of character advancement through the completion of quests or missions. In their World of Warcraft Reader,

Corneliussen and Rettberg (2008:167) state that quests are “tasks that the player is asked to perform, and are one of the ways in which game play is structured in World of

Warcraft.” Adventure experience is achieved through combat and quest completion, allowing the player to advance through the game’s content while increasing in level.

Quests usually follow game lore or a storyline and typically involve killing mobs

(essentially an evil NPC that will attack you), or completing some other task such as delivering an item. Another form of experience available in most MMORPGs is

“tradeskill” experience. Tradeskilling professions offer the player the ability to master a particular skill through the crafting of items. Various tradeskill professions exist in the different MMORPGs, from cook to alchemist, and from tailor to blacksmith. Some players choose tradeskilling over adventuring, turning their crafting abilities into a business. It adds a nice dynamic to the virtual world: instead of killing, you can create.

Dying

Dying in an MMORPG is typically remedied by reviving. The avatar is returned to a “spawn point” (safe location where the character appears), an area within the

MMORPG world where the avatar has bound his or her essence or soul and that is typically free from danger. Some classes have the ability to resurrect or return life to another player and even themselves. When a player’s avatar dies, penalties may be incurred in the form of experience points being removed, armour or gear being damaged, or other detrimental effects being placed on the avatar when it is brought back to life. Menders, NPCs who repair players’ gear, can be found throughout cities and towns; they generally charge a small fee to repair damaged equipment and weapons.

While a player is subject to penalty for dying, this is commonly viewed as a small inconvenience within the game and happens quite often. Developers have eased much

of the frustration by eliminating “corpse runs” in some MMORPGS. In early MMORPGs such as Everquest 1, a player who died would be teleported back to their bind point and then, without weapons and armour, would have to run back to their corpse to loot it. As

Rowlands (2012:24) notes, “Because characters tend to die in hostile settings, this can make the whole endeavor rather precarious.” Certain classes had the ability to summon corpses or give consent to a group member to physically drag the body. Other options were introduced later on in Everquest 1, such as the rescanning box, which remedied the headache of trying to recover your corpse in a difficult area.

Solo

The goal at the beginning is to level up your character through solo questing and earning XP and loot in the process. Generally MMORPGs begin with the avatar completing various solo quests, “gearing up,” “camping,” “grinding XP,” and learning the game mechanics. Experience points are rewards that lead to the increasing of attribute points and levels; and in order to progress within the MMORPG, players will seek out opportunities to gain these points. As Kelly (2004:27) notes, “Every time you cast a spell, build a forge, heal a friend, or tame a monster, you gain XP.” This period of adjustment, the solo stage, is essential for understanding the various commands and abilities. At a certain point, players will need to find other players to form groups to complete more difficult quests and tasks that require more bodies. According to White

(2010:233), “As the new player progresses through the early levels and gains an understanding of the ethos and culture of the game, she may start to form relationships

with other players, which can occur as she asks for help and advice or as she becomes skilled enough to help others.”

Grouping

Grouping is one form of interaction within the game through which players get to meet other players and interact with them, essentially forming a team. Grouping is a small, temporary group of people, two to six avatars, who collectively work together in the completion of a quest. Taylor (2006:37) describes groups as “formal teams that co- operate to kill monsters and share experience and items from the kills.” Built into the coding of most MMORPGs is a function that helps a player who is looking for a group by generating a group automatically when the function is enabled. Grouping is a way of cutting your teeth within the MMORPG world and learning the dynamics of the game.

Groups are also a place to earn reputation within the MMORPG community, whether good or bad. Groups are temporary, in that when the task is completed and loot distributed, the members generally disband. Grouping with the same people over time can lead to the creation of a guild or a clan (a larger grouping of people) through the building of trust and friendship.

The Guild

Guilds are “a group of players that decides to play together for a period of time exceeding the length of one playing session” (Verhagen and Johansson 2009:1). While groups are short-lived by definition, a more permanent grouping is known as a guild. A guild or clan (a clan is typically associated with FPS games) is a community within the

larger MMORPG community. Players join guilds for a number of reasons. The guild is usually a collection of like-minded individuals and can vary in terms of objectives.

According to Nardi (2010:15), “Guilds become more important as players gain interest in certain of the more challenging activities in the game or in leveling quickly by grouping with others.” There are various types of guilds within MMORPGs: these include guilds dedicated to raiding end-game content and following world progression competitively; guilds that promote a more family-friendly environment, helping new players learn the ropes and completing quests through grouping; and guilds that focus on tradeskills or crafting professions.

Different MMORPGs have various guild structures, but they usually follow a hierarchy, led by a leader and/or officers who are followed by members and recruits.

“Guild leaders or an executive committee of officers arbitrate disputes, plan organized campaigns, and distribute loans, armor, and weaponry” (Rettberg in Corneliussen and

Rettberg 2008:33). Each guild has its own rules and regulations, about applying and obtaining membership, which is developed by the guild’s leadership. These regulations are created by the players and usually relate to the type of guild. In some MMORPGs, guild halls and houses have been made available by the developers to allow a guild’s players to congregate in a central location and display their achievements.

Chapter 3: Theoretical Literature

In sociology, an object of research is usually difficult to sum up in one concept.

The true nature of social research evolves through theoretical readings and hands-on interaction with the researched object. As the research proceeds, a number of patterns emerge. I therefore believe it is important to start at the roots of sociological themes and concepts and track their history and growth over time. My particular object of research for this master’s thesis is the virtual worlds of online gaming. In examining them, I have turned to the writings of Toennies, Durkheim, Weber and others. Looking at their concepts of community, solidarity, social action and ritual will help me to apply these concepts to those virtual worlds. Community is the group of individuals; solidarity is the glue that holds the group together; social action gives us understanding of its meaning; and ritual helps reinforce, or destroy, the bonds that hold communities together. Technology has given us the means to perform, congregate, and behave socially within the world of cyberspace; therefore, it is important to revisit the theoretical concepts of these four themes. It is my hope that, through this research, the curious social happenings occurring in the relatively new and spatially limitless arena of the Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game will be taken seriously.

Community

Community, as a concept, is continuously changing and has been defined in a number of ways in social science. According to Peter Hamilton, “As early as the mid-

1950s an enterprising American sociologist had uncovered more than 90 discrete definitions of the term in use within the social sciences” (Hamilton in Cohen 1985:7).

Communities of the past may have identified the idea of family units as the branches that form the community as a whole. The Agora (meeting place), in the days of Ancient

Greece, was the area where social interaction took place. Physical proximity played a crucial role in traditional society, with clear boundaries between communities. The evolution of community has come to include spaces in which physical proximity has been facilitated through computerized means, allowing the community members to gather in cyberspace. Community brings with it distinction, similarities among its members, and differences from other communities.

Ferdinand Toennies, the German social theorist, has a keen interest in social structure and the “inner ties of the different behavior patterns” within his theory of

Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft (Salomon in Cahnman 1973:37). In his writings he outlines two different types of social grouping or structures: Gemeinschaft

(community) being the smaller group (kinship/familial ties) and Gesellschaft (society) as the larger, overall grouping. Within these two social groupings, relationships between the members are either together – individual actions that benefit the whole, are based on necessity, and are organic and natural – or separate and are based on association, whereby individual actions are based on exchange, and personal connection is separated. Toennies’ approach is to look at two very “opposed but complementary” types of social organization: one group that is based on a feeling of belonging, the other based on deliberation and assessment (Cahnman 1973:2).

Within his theory of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, Toennies outlines three forms of a social entity: social relationships, social collectives and social corporations.

Toennies' concept of the social relationship “involves a will to enter into or maintain a relationship which is recognized as something intrinsically valuable or useful”

(Cahnman 1973:55). In this sense the social relationship occurs only when two or more people become acquainted or engaged in friendship or fellowship through individual will. Cahnman (1973:56) explains a social collective as “multitudes of individuals who, because of common natural or psychic qualities are regarded as a unit or whole, like racial or linguistic groups; they become social collectives insofar as the individuals or members recognize them as existing entities and in thought and action manifest a will to maintain and preserve them.” A social corporation, or association, can be viewed as an organized entity with an individual will, which in turn imposes that will on its members. In other words, a social corporation is thought to be an artificial person which has a will of its own and can enforce this will by means of natural persons who act as its organs” (1973:56). These social entities may be classified as Gemeinschaft or

Gesellschaft depending on the will of the group.

Toennies (1971:76) describes this “will” as: “The social will, or body, is a whole whose parts are human individuals, that is, beings endowed with reason.” Cahnman says that Toennies speaks of the unity of human beings, and their social relationships, as containing either an “essential” or an “arbitrary” will. Within these two types, essential will can be viewed as “all willing that is congenial to the nature, or the character, of the individual,” while arbitrary will “is the rational will which distinguishes between end and means” (Cahnman 1973:52). For Toennies, Cahnman

states, “Man's initial outlook and attitude, or his essential will, is based on communal, or shared, feelings, such as liking, habituation and memory.” He goes on to say, “All that is required of arbitrary will is that it is unhesitatingly directed toward desired end”

(Cahnman 1995:92). Within essential will there is no separation of means and end; it comprises an organic whole, as the individual wills are undifferentiated. Within arbitrary will, there is a clear separation between the means and the end; the will, freed of its constraints, is free to pursue its desired ends by any means possible.

Concerning Gemeinschaft, Toennies (1971:69) states, “The very existence of

Gemeinschaft rests in the consciousness of belonging together and the affirmation of the condition of mutual dependence which is posed by that affirmation.” He goes on to declare, “All forms of external community among men comprise the possibility, even the probability, of an internal, or intimate, community (communion), and may thus be conceived of as a potential Gemeinschaft of those united in it” (1971:67). Within

Gemeinschaft, members are united through common interests, views, beliefs, and work.

This grouping of people generally has a goal toward which everyone within the group works. According to Baum (1975:45), Gemeinschaft is “derived from family life... It precedes deliberation and choice. One is born into the community and accepts it as part of the natural order.... Gemeinschaft is the human community where people grow up and live in reliance on one another, where they are more aware of their common bond than of their own individuality.” Relations are intimate and strong, and mutual bonds are forged through interaction within all areas of daily life. In Toennies’ words (1971:67), within Gemeinschaft “(Relationships) become dear through custom, habit or in the line of duty.” The personal connections between the members are reinforced through the

commonality of the group’s goal and attainment of that goal through living, working and being together.

Within Gesellschaft, the larger social grouping sees the strong interdependence on others is replaced by a more superficial dependence. Toennies (1971:77) sees

Gesellschaft developing in the modern city, “dominated, as it is, by the exchange of merchandise whose subjects are free individuals; separated from the material matrix of communal life and thought, they pursue their own ends.” The city represents the highest and most complex form of social life, as opposed to the natural community of village life. This emergent grouping sees the solidarity associated with gemeinschaft erode within its membership. The focus is no longer the group as a whole completing the goal, but the growth of the individual goal and the bonds that the individual forms to obtain his or her goal. Toennies (1971:78) states that, within Gesellschaft, “all individuals are equal insofar as they are capable of engaging in exchange and entering into contracts... The trading, lending, enterprising individuals, as capitalists, are the masters and active subjects of Gesellschaft, using the working ‘hands’ as their tools.” The individual relationships found within the Gesellschaft, mechanical in nature, stand in stark contrast to the genuine, organic, close connections found within the Gemeinschaft.

The terms “organic” and “mechanical” with regards to social grouping are also found in the writings of Durkheim, the next theorist I discuss in understanding community.

French sociologist Emile Durkheim writes extensively on human communities and their evolution from traditional to modern, with a focus on the “interaction between social structure and consciousness” (Thompson 1982:40). His writings in The

Division of Labour centre on the premise that as a division of labour becomes more

complex, the consciousness of the group shifts from a collective nature to a more individual one. As Fenton (1984:50) notes, “The master process in social evolution was the progressive elaboration of the division of labour, the major consequence was social and structural differentiation.” In a time in which the religious institutions and traditional societies are being overrun by modernity, and the industrial revolution is expanding rapidly, Durkheim focuses his studies on these groups with a keen interest in social relationships, solidarity and the moral fabric that hold its members together. He insists that,

social relationships “give rise to” or “necessarily involve” moral conceptions of these relationships. The moral qualities of human life reside in the inescapably social character of human life. We live in association with others, we derive our essentially human qualities from our association, and in truth the life of the “individual” is inconceivable outside the context of participation in a social world which is not simply an aggregation of individuals. (Fenton 1984:233)

Within The Division of Labour, Durkheim believes that these social relationships comprise a conscience collective or collective consciousness, which can be analyzed in terms of its volume (degree to which attitudes are held in common), intensity (extent of intellectual or emotional hold over the group), rigidity (of defined beliefs and associated social practices) and the content of the beliefs and values (Giddens 1972:5). The conscience collective is Durkheim’s constant between the two forms of social solidarity he identifies: mechanical and organic. While this concept is similar to Toennies’ idea of

“essential will” and “arbitrary will,” Durkheim’s interest is the proverbial glue that holds people together within society’s development of the division of labour. In

Durkheim’s (1966:129) own words, mechanical and organic solidarity are really just

“two aspects of one and the same reality, but none the less they must be distinguished.”

Similar to Toennies’ Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, Durkheim’s mechanical solidarity can be viewed as the dominant characteristic of a traditional society, whereas organic solidarity can be seen as modern society. Both theorists reviewed and commented on each other’s work. As Cahnman (1973:240) states, “Mechanical solidarity refers to the external fact of social constraint,'' which induces a strong sense of solidarity and conscience collective, while "Gemeinschaft is derived from the internal reality of essential will.” According to Durkheim, “(Gemeinschaft) is an undifferentiated and compact mass that can only move together and whose movements are directed by that mass itself or by one of the elements of which it is composed and which is supposed to represent it” (Cahnman 1973:241). In contrast, Durkheim sees Gesellschaft as the members of the group being “...essentially separated in spite of all uniting factors”

(1973:243). Both theorists have similar views on the subject: Toennies believes that a group contained an essential and shared (gemeinschaft) will or arbitrary and individualistic (gesellschaft) will; Durkheim studies the division of labour and the change in the conscience collective.

Within communities that are bound together by mechanical solidarity, the conscience collective tends to be high-level in volume, intensity, and rigidity, and its content is religious in nature (Giddens 1972:6). The ties within these communities tend to be strong as long as the consciousness of the group is greater than any individual consciousness. The division of labour is much simpler in groups where mechanical solidarity is prevalent, the communities are smaller in size, and the relations are regulated by a shared system of beliefs (Shortwell 2013). As the division of labour expands within societies that are characterized by mechanical solidarity, the

differentiation of relationship leads to a separation of sameness and the beginnings of organic solidarity. The growing complexity of the division of labour within modern society gives way to a new organized form.

Within communities that are formed around an organic division of labour, the degree of volume, intensity, and rigidity is low as it shifts to a more individual form. No longer is the conscience collective based on similarities but on individual differences. As

Durkheim (1966:131) states, “The more this region (individual consciousness) is extended, the stronger is the cohesion which results from this solidarity (organic). In effect, on the one hand, each one depends much more strictly on society as labour is more divided; and, on the other, the activity of each is as much more personal as it is more specialized.” Organic solidarity is “a form of cohesion based upon relationships of exchange, within a differentiated division of labour” (Giddens 1978:28).

After reviewing the classical concept of community developed by Toennies and

Durkheim, I would like to review a more contemporary view on community within the writings of Anthony Cohen. Where Toennies’ theory focuses on phenomenological sociology – that is, the phenomenon that occurs within the structure – and Durkheim looks at group structure within the division of labour, Cohen looks for the meaning and culture applied to a community through an anthropological lens.

Cohen, a British social anthropologist, interprets the concept of community from a cultural standpoint. Rather than looking at the structure of community, which has been explained through Toennies and Durkheim, Cohen instead looks for meaning and symbolism to help explain the concept. As Cohen (1985:16) states, “Culture, constituted by symbols, does not impose itself in such a way as to determine that all its adherents

should make the same sense of the world.” Largely influenced by Clifford Geertz, Cohen begins to define culture as “the webs of significance.” As Geertz (1973:5) states,

“Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of significance that he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.” Cohen (1985:17) sees within Geertz three interrelated principles:

1. “culture is created and continually recreated by people through their social interaction, rather than imposed on them as a Durkheimian body of social fact”; 2. “being continuously in process, culture has neither deterministic power nor objectively identifiable referents (laws)”; and 3. “it is manifest, rather, in the capacity with which it endows people to perceive meaning in, or to attach meaning to social behavior.”

Culture is therefore a concept that is important in the explanation of the anthropological concept of community.

Cohen sees community as members of a group who have something in common with one another; and that common thing is singularly different from what members of different groups might have in common. Divisions between different communities facilitate the drawing of boundaries to protect their communal identity. Cohen sees the boundary as the element that embodies discrimination; the boundary envelops the identity of the community (1985:12). The boundary marks the beginning and end of a community and also denotes a meeting ground for other communities. The boundary encases the symbols of the community and must also be protected with vigilance if the community is to survive. Boundaries exist in a multitude of places: physical boundaries exist and are usually clearly seen (examples of these include both natural and constructed boundaries); symbolic boundaries exist within the minds of the members and must be understood through their meaning.

Community, as Cohen (1985:15) puts it, “is that entity to which one belongs, greater than kinship but more immediately than the abstraction we call ‘society’... It is the arena in which people acquire their most fundamental and most substantial experience of social life outside the confines of the home.” Community then can be seen as an area where members learn to be social, acquire culture and meaning, and forge friendships and bonds. This collective group, which exists outside the family, comes to carry and embellish a collective consciousness through symbolic components. The symbols of the community are found within the boundaries and are not only a repository of the community knowledge, but a reference point in understanding the community that is being studied.

Benedict Anderson (1983:15), in his extensive writings on nationalism and nationhood, speaks of a nation as an “imagined community.” “It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.” Despite the fact that the members of the imagined community, or nation, will never meet all of the other members face to face, there is a congenial bond through their membership within the group. Anderson sees these imagined communities as both limited, as found within national borders, and also sovereign due to the fact the concept of the nation was “born in an age in which Enlightenment and Revolution were destroying the legitimacy of the divinely-ordained, hierarchical dynastic system.” Like

Cohen’s views on boundaries, Anderson (1983:16) sees the boundary as where the national membership ends, and “beyond which lie other nations.” The idea of the nation, or imagined community, is viewed as being part of a group, regardless of

differences in social standing. Members share, in general, the same values, norms and freedoms as other community members. “The nation is always conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship. Ultimately it is this fraternity that makes it possible...”

(1983:16).

Since the advent of the Internet, the concept of community has grown to include new, virtual spaces in which overcoming the barriers of physical proximity is facilitated through a computer, as users connect from the comfort of their homes. This virtual community is a curious new concept that is still awaiting a seminal modern theorist to place it into the theoretical meat grinder. Howard Rheingold, visiting lecturer at

Stanford and author of many books on the virtual world, makes an interesting point:

“All questions about community and cyberspace point to a similar kind of transition that might be taking place right now, for which we have no technical names.” Although

Rheingold mixes up Toennies and Durkheim within The Virtual Community, he concludes, “It is far too early to tell what the tools of social psychology and sociology will help us make of the raw material of group interaction that proliferates in cyberspace” (2000:54).

American anthropologist Thomas Malaby writes about and has conducted extensive fieldwork within the virtual realm of the online community. According to

Malaby (2006:144), “Some of the largest and most visible online communities to date are the persistent, open-ended, graphically intensive, and three-dimensional environments know variously as MMOGs (massively multiplayer online games),

MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role-playing games), and virtual worlds.”

Malaby spent two years conducting extensive fieldwork within the virtual world of the

game Second Life. He also had access to the creators of the game and conducted a number of interviews at the Linden Lab company headquarters, which is documented in his book Making Virtual Worlds. As of February 2008, Second Life had over 600,000 active member accounts, which is remarkable considering it had approximately 13,000 when Malaby conducted his fieldwork in December 2004 (Malaby 2009:3). As Malaby

(2009:2) notes on these progressive virtual worlds:

Virtual worlds require less of an introduction by the day as they have risen dramatically to prominence in a number of quarters. They are characterized by their use of Internet connectivity to provide a persistent, open-ended, and shared three-dimensional space in which users can interact, typically via avatars (virtual bodies that move about and act inside the world). Second Life, launched in June 2003, stands in contrast to many of the other well-known virtual worlds (World of Warcraft, Everquest II, Lineage II) in that it has no established and universal game objectives.

These new virtual worlds have exploded onto the scene over the last ten years, facilitating a virtual migration, as Castronova warns. Economics Professor Edward

Castronova also writes extensively on what he calls “synthetic worlds” and their impact on society. What he once deemed to be a niche market has grown at the rate of Moore’s

Law to include, at a minimum, ten million active registered users within dozens of synthetic worlds as of 2005 (Castronova 2005:3). He conceives of the virtual worlds online as an uncharted and untamed new frontier, which is not only experiencing a large migration of people’s attention but is also leading a new type of boundary to negotiate between the real and virtual communities (Castronova 2007:7). It would seem then that virtual communities within these virtual worlds would be distinguished by similar boundaries, whether on the screen or within the minds of the virtual members.

Echoing the frustrations of Rheingold, Castronova (2005:283) states, “We do not know enough about why people use these worlds, how their interaction with AI

influences their thinking, and how their behavior is affecting the environment in the outer world.” One thing is certain with regards to these new communities, as Sociologist

Zygmunt Bauman (2001:13) notes, “Distance, once the most formidable among communal defenses, lost much of its significance. The mortal blow to the ‘naturalness’ of communal understanding was delivered, however, by the advent of informatics: the emancipation of the flow of information from the transport of bodies.” The ability to transport identity into a space where others commune has certainly called for sociologists to conduct research into the effects of this change in time/space.

Having explored a brief evolution of the concept of community, which included theories of structure, communities within the mind, communities of meaning, and communities of space and time, I would like to focus now on the concept of solidarity as the mucilage that binds the member to the group.

Solidarity

Just as the concept of community has evolved over the years, so has that of solidarity. Defined as “a combination or agreement of all elements or individuals, as a group; complete unity” (Friend and Guralnik 1960:1388), the term solidarity can be seen as ties that bind people together. As Steinar Stjerno (2004:1) notes, “Early social philosophers and sociologists in the nineteenth century observed that traditional feelings of togetherness and social bonds were torn apart in the process that gave birth to modern society, and they saw solidarity as a means for social cohesion and integration.” As society has transitioned from a traditional to a modern setting, the term that would have initially been used when referring to traditional kinship has developed

a more universal application. An example of this change would be the various agreements and associations created between nation states, crossing boundaries that normally would be secured. “Political or religious affiliations are a further expansion in the identification of the self with others” (2004:16).

Within his book Solidarity in Europe, Stjerno (2004:16) provides an excellent outline of four aspects of solidarity: “What is seen as the basis or foundation for solidarity? What is the objective or function of solidarity? How inclusive is it? How strong is the collective orientation – to what degree does it allow for individuality and individual freedom?” These four aspects, when applied, help provide insight into the degree of solidarity within a particular group. They also provide a way of showing how solidarity is configured within a group. The ultimate goal of solidarity, according to

Stjerno, is to “realize certain personal interests that are not possible to attain without establishing a relationship to others” (16). He notes that solidarity can be used to increase influence and strength with other parties as well as to constitute a goal in itself to be part of a community with others. In part, Stjerno draws his conception of solidarity from Emile Durkheim, for whom solidarity is of interest within his extensive writings.

Within The Division of Labour, Durkheim (1966:37) poses the following question: “Why does the individual, while becoming more autonomous, depend more upon society? How can he be at once more individual and more solidary?” Durkheim is curious as to what is the essence that holds groups of individuals together. Durkheim believes that “social solidarity – the beliefs and institutions that hold together – defines people’s existence and moral sensibility” (Tucker 2002:117). If one examines

Durkheim’s work, this interest can be found throughout. His dichotomy of mechanical and organic solidarity within The Division of Labour provides us with a model to measure a conscience collective. Within Suicide, Durkheim focuses his attention on the extreme opposite of social solidarity, as Collins (1994:184) notes: “the case where the social bonds are so weak that the individual finds life meaningless and forcibly removes him/herself from it.” Within his writings in Elementary Forms of Religious Life,

Durkheim’s main concern is to find the “causes upon which the most essential forms of religious thought and practice depend” (Durkheim in Swain 1964:8).

But what is necessary for solidarity? Anthony Giddens (1978:28) points out, “An embracing moral consensus is indeed a necessary condition of social solidarity.”

Drawing on Durkheim, Giddens looks at how solidarity is appearing in the modern age.

Traditional societies have grown to become individual nations, and through modernity the concept of social solidarity has emerged. This social solidarity “always and everywhere necessitates the existence of a strongly formed consensus universel, or unity of moral belief” (1978:27). Rather than seeing the growth of individualization within society as a means of separation, Giddens’ theory of reflexivity refers to societies as becoming more reflective. As Stjerno (2004:300) notes, “reflexive modernization refers to the expansion of social reflexivity and means that to an increasing extent the individual must reflect upon the relationship and interdependence with others.” As society has evolved from traditional to modern and we have become more individualized, Giddens maintains, the bonds of solidarity have taken on a universalistic appeal. According to Giddens, “In the domain of interpersonal life, opening out to the other is a condition of social solidarity; on the larger scale a proffering of the ‘hand of

friendship’ within a global cosmopolitan order is ethically implicit” (Beck, Giddens and

Lash 1994: 107).

American Sociologist Michael Hechter (1987:17) calls Durkheim “the quintessential theorist of the phenomenon, the members of solidary groups act in ways that are consistent with collective standards of conduct, or norms, because they are obligated to do so.” Hechter himself claims that group solidarity is a function of two separate factors: “first, the extensiveness of its corporate obligations, and second, the degree to which individual members actually comply with these obligations.” He goes on to note that “the greater the average proportion of each member’s private resources contributed to collective ends, the greater the solidarity of the group” (Hechter

1987:18). So it would seem apparent that the more the group members comply with extensive group obligations and put their own resources into supporting the group, the higher their attainment of solidarity. Specifically, solidarity requires what is defined in sociology as social action. In the following section, I discuss the writings of Max Weber, particularly his writings the definition and constitution of social action.

Social Action

Having explored the concepts of community (as the grouping of individuals) and solidarity (as the strands that hold the group together), we can examine how the concepts of both social action and ritual can explain the underlying meaning of an action. Social action cannot be viewed as completely random (devoid of meaning). By understanding the meaning attached to the action and discovering the patterns that develop, such as those found within ritual, one can begin to understand what is taking place.

German social theorist Max Weber conceives social action as the central subject matter within his writings on sociology (Roth and Wittich 1968:24). Considered one of the seminal minds within sociology, Weber speaks of action as that in which “the acting individual attached a subjective meaning to his behavior – be it overt or covert, omission or acquiescence.” He goes on to state that action is only social “insofar as its subjective meaning takes account of the behavior of others and is thereby oriented in its course” (1968:4). As Cohen notes, “(Weber) defines almost every aspect of the natural environment and the human condition from the actor’s existential point of view”

(Cohen in Turner 2000:76). From Weber’s writings, we can infer that human action must contain meaning, consideration of others, and orientation (its direction and purpose) in order to be called social action.

Weber outlines the orientation of social action as being of four different types.

The first type of social action Weber calls instrumentally rational, which involves calculation of means in the achievement of an end. This type, Weber notes, is

“determined by expectations as to the behavior of objects in the environment and of other human beings; these expectations are used as ‘conditions’ or ‘means’ for the attainments of the actor’s own rationally pursued and calculated ends” (Roth and

Wittich 1968:24). The second type, value rational, Weber sees as an action whereby the end is pursued for its own sake. Some examples of this form of action can be found within “a religious call, personal loyalty, or the importance of some ‘cause’ no matter in what it consist,” and it “always involves ‘commands’ or ‘demands’ which, in the actor’s opinion, are binding to him.” Weber's third type of social action, affectual action, represents the action of emotional or feeling states. Examples of this type of action can

be found within intimate relationships, family and friendships. This type of action is

“determined by the actor’s specific affects and feeling.” The fourth and final type of social action, traditional action, Weber sees as “determined by ingrained habituation.”

Weber notes that traditional action, “is very often a matter of almost automatic reaction to habitual stimuli which guide behavior in a course which has been repeatedly followed” (1968:25). These four classifications of action can also be seen as a scale of rational behaviour. As Gerth and Mills (1946:56) note, “(Weber) rated as the most

‘understandable’ type those actions which are in the nature of rational expediencies….

Less ‘rational’ actions are typed by Weber in terms of the pursuit of ‘absolute ends,’ as flowing from affectual sentiments, or as ‘traditional.’” Having outlined Weber’s concept of social action, I turn now to his writings on the social relationship as it pertains to social action.

Following the four types of social action, Weber introduces the concept of social relationship. In his own words, “[The term] ‘social relationship’ will be used to denote the behavior of a plurality of actors insofar as, in its meaningful content, the action of each takes account of that of the others and is oriented in these terms” (Roth and

Wittich 1968:26). What Weber is saying is that when two or more individuals mutually orient meaningful social action, a social relationship is present. He goes on to expand the definition to include seven elements: 1. forms of content include the varied natures of friendships, competition, conflict and exchange; 2. meaning must be appropriate to the relationship, or, as Weber notes, “meaning imputed to the parties in a given concrete case”; 3. meaning doesn’t have to be the same for all parties who are mutually oriented, for example one’s social relationship to the state; 4. social relationships can be

fleeting in character with varying degrees of permanence (1968:28); 5. relationships may change over time, and the subjective meaning then becomes either the bonding of solidarity or a conflict of interest; 6. if the social relationship is consistent, it leads to the formation of maxims (rules to adhere to); 7. in terms of loyalty and a sense of duty, actors in these relationships are expected to act in accordance with the relationship as it pertains to its continuance.

Social relationships bring out stable patterns and maxims from the repeated recurrence of a social action, which leads me in Chapter Four to a review of the concept of ritual: a mechanism that maintains group solidarity through social relationships and meaningful actions.

According to Toennies (2001:17), “The relationship itself, and the social bond that stems from it, may be conceived either as having real organic life, and that is the essence of Community [Gemeinschaft]; or else as a purely mechanical construction, existing in the mind, and that is what we think of as Society [Gesellschaft].” Turning to

Durkheim, and his contrasted dichotomy of mechanical and organic solidarity, we can discern the variations of group solidarity through a community’s division of labour.

More modern theorists see community as the stage at which individuals become social, and the concept has been expanded to include virtual spaces and interaction. The concept of solidarity is traditionally used in Durkheim’s work with the measuring of a group’s “conscious collective” and it represents the bonds of a group. Hechter shows us that when a group’s individual members meet its rules and obligations, solidarity is high. Neither communities nor solidarity can exist without meaningful social action

taking place, and looking into the writings of Weber sheds light on why people group together.

The purpose of Chapter Three has been to outline the concepts of community, solidarity, and social action and how they have evolved over time. Ritual, which I elaborate on in Chapter Four, is an equally important mechanism of generating solidarity through social action. Ritual has been traditionally associated with the sacred but has grown to include the everyday secular world. Technology has allowed the boundaries of space and time to be crafted into worlds that exist in a virtual reality, allowing individuals to congregate online through mediated means. Within guilds, the dynamics of one particular virtual ritual, the raid, has the ability to either produce cohesion and group solidarity or bring out incongruity and discord that can lead to a guild's demise.

Chapter 4: Ritual

For most of human history, shared “entertainment” was couched in the context of a religious celebration and/or social narrative. Even village storytelling was to some extent ritualized and clearly reflected existing social values. Durkheim’s notion of “collective effervescence” was based on the idea that society is founded upon rituals designed to allow us to share interpretive experiences in order to bring us together. The contemporary social sciences interest in the phenomenology of experience also ties to the relationship between our embodied reactions, feelings, sensations, and interpretations of those experiences in a coherent framework co- created by a community. (Doran 2007)

Ritual

The concept of ritual also has a variety of definitions from various sociological fields. Anthropologists such as Bronislaw Malinoski and Alfred Radcliffe-Brown, following in the footsteps of Arnold van Gennep, are “insistent that ceremonies (or rituals) needed to be examined in their entirety and in the social setting they were found in” (Kimball in van Gennep 1960:vi–vii). Van Gennep sees the ritual process as a means for individuals to progress through “rites of passage,” ceremonies that facilitate the transformation of place, state, social position or age of the individual to pass from one life stage to the next. Victor Turner (1982a:201) notes, “Anthropologists usually call religious practices ‘ritual.’ ...Rituals celebrate or commemorate trans-human powers which, though invisible, are regarded by believers as the first and final causes of natural and cultural phenomena.” Turner (1982b:79) defines ritual as “prescribed formal behavior for occasions not given over to technological routine, having reference to beliefs in invisible beings or powers regarded as the first and final causes of all effects.”

Though the concept of ritual has evolved over time, by looking at the writings of

Durkheim, Erving Goffman, and Randall Collins I hope to better understand and track its transformation.

Durkheim

Within the writings of Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Durkheim (2001:3) sets out to understand and study the most “primitive and simplest religion currently known.” Durkheim defines religion as a “unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things … beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a church” (1964:47). Through his analysis of religion as a social phenomenon, he speaks of “collective effervescence” appearing during religious ceremonies or rituals, which increases as the ceremony progresses (Durkheim 1964:218). In his quest to analyze the functions of religion through the primitive Totemism of the Australian

Aborigines, Durkheim sees that out of these effervescent situations, or states, religious ideals seem to be born (1964:218). Gerd Baumann comments on the writings of

Durkheim on ritual and how ritual is to be “viewed as crystallizations of basic values uniformly endorsed by communities that perform them with a view to themselves, ultimately to create and confirm their cohesion as communities” (Baumann in de

Coppet 2000:113).

Durkheim (2001:11) defines ritual as “ways of acting that are generated only within assembled groups and are meant to stimulate and sustain or recreate certain mental states in these groups.” He describes the progression of this collective effervescence in this way:

Commencing at nightfall, all sorts of processions, dances and songs had taken place by torchlight; the general effervescence was constantly increasing... Feeling himself dominated and carried away by some sort of external power which makes him think and act differently than in normal times, he naturally has the impression of being himself no longer. (Durkheim 1964:218)

Durkheim’s contribution to the understanding of early forms of religion not only lays the foundation for the sociological study of religion and ritual but also paves the way for the discipline to grow. “What Durkheim did was to turn these ideological claims into a theory of how prerational solidarity is generated: the mechanism of ritual, most clearly exemplified in religion, but that by extrapolation can be found underlying other areas of social life” (Collins 1994:204). Theories with a more microsociological focus, with regards to ritual and social interaction, were soon drawn up by other more modern social theorists such as Erving Goffman and Randall Collins.

Goffman

Canadian-born social theorist Erving Goffman sees ritual being played out in everyday social interaction between two or more individuals. Goffman, as noted by

Collins, defines ritual as a “mechanism of mutually focused emotion and attention producing a momentary shared reality, which thereby generates solidarity and symbols of group membership” (Collins 2004:7). Rather than seeing the structure as forming the foundation of society, Goffman looks at daily interaction, or performance, between people as the basis of society, noting that this performance or interaction contains within it the official values of the particular society. According to Goffman (1959:35),

“To the degree that a performance highlights the common official values of the society in which it occurs, we may look upon it, in the manner of Durkheim and Radcliffe-

Brown, as a ceremony – as an expressive rejuvenation and reaffirmation of the moral

values of the community.” Interaction in this sense can be viewed as a vessel whereby values and norms of a society are expressed and maintained. Branaman explains interaction rituals, which Goffman describes as “rituals focused especially on affirming the dignity and self worth of the self, [and that] parallel the religious rituals in

Durkheim’s analysis whereby social solidarity is produced” (Branaman in Elliot and

Turner 2001:95). From Durkheim we see that ritual is the basis for the continuance and reaffirmation of religious beliefs. Goffman takes ritual from the sacred and applies it to the secular, giving us the concept that ritual is found within everyday social interaction.

Goffman thinks of the world as a stage on which face-to-face interaction is a place for the “self” or individual to assume dramaturgical roles within society. Goffman

(1967:31) writes that his meaning of “the self” represents two different definitions: “the self as an image pieced together from the expressive implications of the full flow of events in an undertaking,” and “the self as a kind of player in a ritual game who copes honorably or dishonorable, diplomatically or undiplomatically, with the judgment contingencies of the situation.” As with Goffman’s theatrical representation of life, the

“self” has both a front stage and a back stage. Speaking of the front stage, which requires the presence of at least one other person, Goffman (1959:22) notes that it is “that part of the individual’s performance which regularly functions in a general and fixed fashion to define the situation for those who observe the performance.” The front stage is a place where the management of impressions is important to the actor so as to make himself or herself more appealing to others. The back stage represents a place and time in which the individual is no longer in the presence of others. This private area is a

place where the individual may practice impression management for future roles; it is also a place where the individual’s front is dropped.

In interaction rituals, Goffman speaks of the maintenance and preservation of

“face.” The term “face” “is an image of self delineatation in terms of approved social attributes – albeit an image that others may share, as when a person makes a good showing for his profession or religion by making a good showing for himself” (Goffman

1967:5). All participants within society employ this concept of “face” or self through interaction with others. Goffman (1967:6) states, “One’s own face and the face of others are constructs of the same order; it is the rules of the group and the definition of the situation which determine how much feeling one is to have for face and how this feeling is to be distributed among the faces involved.” Ritual social encounters would then seem to imply not only the stage on which the group rules are acted out and defended, but also that the interaction can be seen as a place to practise individual face work. “The general capacity to be bound by moral rules may well belong to the individual, but the particular set of rules which transform him into a human being derives from requirements established in the ritual organization of social encounters” (Goffman

1967:44). Goffman sees in Durkheim’s work what happens in everyday face-to-face interaction. As Turner and Stets (2005:27) note, “What Durkheim saw as the origin of religion became, in Goffman’s hands, the basic structure of all face-to-face interaction.”

Following up on the writings of Durkheim and Goffman, Randall Collins sets forth a model of patterned social interaction, by means of ritual, that has the ability to gauge emotional energy.

Collins

American social theorist Randall Collins (2004:xii) describes a successful ritual as a “highly focused, emotional entrained interaction which is apportioned to the individuals, who come away from the situation carrying the group-aroused emotion for a time in their bodies.” Feelings of connectedness and group solidarity are produced through these ritual activities and ceremonies, with the result of bringing people together and solidifying social bonds. While this energy is initially felt by the individual, it goes beyond and outside the individual to encompass the collective feeling of those within the assembled group. The concept of collective effervescence has been revisited recently by Collins, within his theory of Interaction Ritual Chains (IRC), to describe a shared emotional energy that is produced through an assembled group.

Following in the footsteps of Durkheim’s Elementary Forms and Erving

Goffman’s theory of Interaction Ritual, Collins’ model of Interaction Ritual Chains begins as a theory of situations rather than of individuals (Collins 2004:3). By using the mechanisms developed by Durkheim in Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Collins attempts to show how variations in the intensity of rituals, brought about through collective effervescence, lead to variations in social membership patterns (Collins

2004:XI). As Collins (2004:4) states, “My analytical strategy (and that of the founder of interaction ritual analysis, Erving Goffman) is to start with the dynamics of situations; from this we can derive almost everything that we want to know about individuals, as moving precipitate across situations.” Situations within assembled groups replace the religious ritual functionality, which is the focus of Durkheim’s writings, within Collins’ own model of Interaction Ritual Chains.

While Durkheim does not develop a formulated model for the production of this emotional energy (collective effervescence) per se, Collins sets forth two key mechanisms, from within Durkheim’s research, which are essential in the production of collective effervescence, shared action and shared emotion. “Once bodies are together, there may take place a process of intensification of shared experience,” which

Durkheim calls collective effervescence, “and the formation of collective conscience or collective consciousness” (2004:35). According to Collins, the first mechanism of

Durkheim’s model is “shared action and awareness" (2004:35). Further, “If the communication established between them is to become a real communion, that is to say, a fusion of all particular sentiments into one common sentiment, the signs expressing them must themselves be fused into one single and unique resultant”

(Durkheim 1964:230). This fusion awakens a collective feeling that permeates throughout the assembled group. The second mechanism is “shared emotion” (Collins

2004:35). “When arrived at this state of exaltation, a man does not recognize himself any longer. Feeling himself dominated and carried away by some sort of an external power which makes him think and act differently than in normal times, he naturally has the impression of being himself no longer” (Durkheim 1964:218). This heightened state projects a mutual feeling of solidarity within those who are present. Building on

Durkheim’s research, Collins develops his own theory of Interaction Ritual Chains to further explain the feelings generated by an assembled group though ritual.

Collins’ theoretical model of Interaction Ritual Chains, he outlines four ritual ingredients that are essential to the production of collective effervescence, or emotional energy: 1. group assembly, 2. barrier to outsiders, 3. mutual focus of attention, and 4.

shared mood. The results of these ingredients, which produce emotional energy, culminate in four ritual outcomes: 1. group solidarity, 2. emotional energy, 3. symbols of social relationship, and 4. standards of morality (Collins 2004:48). Within the first ritual ingredient, Collins states that “bodily co-presence is essential.” He goes on to further state, “Without bodily presence, it is hard to convey participation in the group and to confirm one’s identity as a member of the group” (Collins 2004:54). The second element required is a boundary between those taking part in the ritual and those on the outside.

This creates a clear distinction between who is included and who is excluded. The remaining two elements involve mutual focus of attention and shared mood, which tend to “reinforce one another through rhythmic entrainment” (Allan 2006:102). With technology growing at a rapid rate, the issue of co-presence as an essential element needs to be revisited, which I do in the conclusion.

Chapter 5: Raiding

Raiding is a unique feature of the MMORPG. Many groups of players mutually focus their attention on a common object – a raid mob or boss – and by working as a team, progress through the game’s content. “Raiding, at its most basic, simply magnifies the group dynamics of the Holy Trinity and scales it up to include much larger groups of up to fifty-four gamers at once” (Rowlands 2012:95). Depending on the raiding structure of the particular MMORPG, the number of individuals and group size and makeup will vary.

Raids are generally organized through guilds but can also be set up server wide, forming from within the general population of the server. Pick-up raids tend to operate as places where people can experience raiding for the first time. The pick-up groups, or

PUGs, which form raiding parties tend to be impersonal and composed of unfamiliar characters. Guild raids tend to be more structured and personal, as the individuals involved in a raid are members of the guild. It can be seen as the equivalent of a virtual sports team, insofar as mutual dependence and trust through performing are paramount. As Nardi (2010:55) notes, “In a raid, as in a sporting contest, the outcome can turn on the smallest mistake or advantage. A spell cast a moment late can kill a player or wipe a raid. A player hanging on by a few points of health can still battle to victory.” Members of the raid force depend on one another to perform their specific duties and roles to ensure success.

Raiding can take place daily, as one finds in hardcore raiding, where players are expected to attend and perform for many hours each raid. Hardcore raiding can entail up to 30 hours a week of raid time. Often, outside the raid time, these players will spend

time practising their skills and researching their class. Raiding guilds will typically have an area within their guild hall where members will practise their combat abilities on training dummies and fine tune their character’s abilities. Another avenue to help players master their class is through forums and websites dedicated to the particular

MMORPG. Within the hardcore environment, competition with other guilds and progression are commonly the driving factor. More casual raiding guilds have more relaxed requirements and typically raid up to 10 hours a week.

Both raid leaders and raid members take steps before, during and after the raid to facilitate success in both material gain and status for the individuals within the guild

(killing mobs and getting loot), but also to ensure group solidarity and harmony.

Material items, which are initially won by a player, help the guild as a whole progress through raiding content. “Dragon Kill Points,” or DKP, is a method or system to track attendance and distribute rewards. DKP can be viewed “as a system common amongst raiding guilds, [in which] characters with poor attendance records were given the lowest priority when bidding on the gear dropped in any particular raid” (Rowlands

2012:46). While customarily each guild has its own reward system, the system varies from guild to guild but generally has some sort of merit for attendance.

Raids usually take place at a scheduled time, for a period of three or more hours, which is normally at the discretion of the guild authority. Before a raid, players will ensure they have the proper equipment, food and drink, and temporary potions (these grant an increase to the player’s abilities for a duration), for both the game and real life.

Raiders can expect to be sitting for long periods of time while the raid is taking place, so it is important to make sure the player has adequate real-life sustenance. Raid guilds

will generally have an intermission, or “afk break,” to allow the players to use the washroom, snack and stretch.

Raids can be found in instance-based dungeons or within the open world of the

MMORPG. Within instance-based raiding, the raid force is translocated, or “zoned,” into a separate area, or dungeon, away from other guilds and the community at large. This type of raiding gives the raid a fixed boundary between the raid and the outside, beyond which only members of the raid are allowed access. That does not mean that other guilds must wait for the space to become available; rather, guilds wishing to raid within an instance-based dungeon will be allotted their own instance. Although the boundaries cannot be crossed within the instance-based dungeons, this is not the case for the

“contested mob.” Contested mobs can be found throughout the world of the MMORPG and are fair game to those brave enough to engage. This type of raid will generally bring out a number of raiding guilds, competing amongst each other, with the boundary accessible to all.

Sociologically, the raid is essentially a ritual that facilitates cooperative social action, or “ways of acting,” within a group of individuals. While action is taking place, the raid has the ability to sustain or diminish certain mental states within the group involved. In the following chapter, I will provide an analysis that combines the theoretical concepts discussed in the previous chapters, along with data from the interviews, in their application to the virtual worlds of MMORPG.

Chapter 6: Analysis

Throughout this chapter, I will argue that the virtual worlds of MMORPG, while synthetic in nature, facilitate real-world social phenomena. Castronova (2007:35) states, “The game system allows human-to-human interactivity comparable to that of the real world.” Evidence of this interactivity abounds within MMORPGs: a player could happen upon a virtual wedding while traversing the vast landscape, attend a virtual memorial of a player who has passed in real life, or even rise to command a virtual army of real-life players and lead them into battle. What is taking place is not just a game; it’s not just interacting with game mechanics. Within MMORPG, economies flourish; communities, language and culture are created; prestige, power and reputation are sought after; and strong bonds of friendship are forged between players within this new societal dimension. By connecting the concepts of community, solidarity, social action, and ritual to the virtual world, I hope to shed light on this curious social happening.

Community

The theoretical concepts of community are clearly evident within the virtual worlds of MMORPG. Community as a group of like-minded people united through common interest, work, beliefs and custom is found within the writings of Toennies and

Durkheim. In the work of Anderson, we find communities existing within the minds of their members, where locality and physicality matter only within the notion of a national or other physical boundary. Cohen speaks of boundaries and of members of a community having something in common with one another, where that commonality is

different from that found in other communities. The elements found within these different approaches to the concept of community can all be found within the virtual worlds of MMORPG.

Looking at the dynamics of community within MMORPG, we can see the guild, in most cases, as the Gemeinschaft, in that the guild acts as a familial unit in which individual actions benefit the whole; it is mechanical and based on tradition. The

Gesellschaft, or larger society, exists outside the guild, facilitating commerce outside the guild. Rebecca, a 50-year-old female, elaborates on the idea of the guild as a familial unit. “There’s sort of a family genre about it. It’s that you get close to these people. You spend 20 hours a week with them, you get to know them, you talk about your personal life.” Another interviewee, Brian, a 22-year-old male, amplifies his experiences within guilds, stating:

The vast majority of my experiences in guilds has always been about people who seem to legitimately care about each other, and it was, it was refreshing, it was like having people who were like, almost a support group in times of trouble, or friends. It was great!

Brian further states, “These people were people who taught me about the game, who talked to me like ‘Hey how’s your family?’ You know, it was like I was a part of a group of people who actually cared about me.” This virtual community would then seem to reflect elements of what both Toennies and Durkheim see as community.

When a person first enters an MMORPG, there is a steep learning curve as the player becomes accustomed to the user interface and the culture of the virtual world.

The player will seek social relationships of value within the virtual world. Relationships grow as the player interacts with temporary group mates and the larger society of the particular virtual world. Joining a guild can offer a number of benefits to the new player.

A guild offers a safe place to learn the ropes, a larger social network within the game, and a guild tag above the avatar’s head denoting membership and in-game status.

Typically, casual or family-friendly guilds will draw new players into their ranks, because their goals are tailored to educating newer players who are looking for a group membership.

When a person joins a guild, the avatar will display the guild name above their head, symbolically denoting their association and membership within the particular community. Guilds themselves come to act as unique agents – entities encompassing more than the sum of their members – in the broader game community. As Taylor

(2006:45) notes on guilds, “That guilds themselves might become valuable actors in the community shows the ways not only individual players, but more formal organizations, make up an integral part of the game space.” The guild “tag” is one such instance in which group membership is displayed for all to see.

A shared belief structure can be found within a charter of rights and rules, which is typically posted on a guild’s website and outlines what is expected from members.

The charter represents the beliefs and understandings of the guild as a whole. In general, the charter and guild practices are safeguarded by the members, and action is usually taken when rules have been breached. Intensity and attitude levels will depend on membership compliance and group obligation; if the guild is progressing through content without a lull, then the attitude and intensity will likely be high.

The virtual world is also full of boundaries, both physical and virtual. Sitting down to play the MMORPG involves crossing a liminal threshold from “real world” to

“virtual world” by accessing a virtual body. Crossing this boundary is limited to those

who can afford the equipment and connection. As the avatar traverses different zones, boundaries are marked by a title screen that appears on the monitor, informing the person that he or she is about to enter a new zone. Physical boundaries prevail as mountain ranges, oceans and lakes create barriers within this virtual setting.

Community boundaries within MMORPGs are established when joining a guild.

Looking at the larger society outside the guild community, within a particular

MMORPG, is as simple as looking at your screen within the game. All MMORPGs have implemented a chat system to facilitate communication on various levels. General channels, channels that broadcast to the server, allow for transactions to take place as well as other impersonal services. This is where members are actively recruited to guilds, open grievances are aired, general game questions are answered, and the selling of loot occurs. It was fascinating to note, through the interviews, how people felt about associating with people who were not members of a guild. John, a 34-year-old male, notes,

Ah, it would definitely be closer and easier with actual guild members cause you’re all part of the same group. Whereas other times, say you go and get a group not from the guild, it’s the same as completely random people, you have no idea what you are dealing with. Whereas at least in the guild, you get a sense of how people may or may not be.

Matt, a 34-year-old male, and guild leader at the time of the interview, also states, “I don’t communicate with almost no one [sic] outside the guild, unless I am trying to bring them inside my guild.” It would seem then that being united through membership within a guild is important, and that the virtual society in general can be used to add members, facilitate pick-up groups, and for economic exchange. If a player does not want to break membership ties but wants a particular item, the world channels within the society of the MMORPG facilitate this through the broadcasting of loot rights. Some

guilds form under the banner of the selling of loot rights (SLR), which generates a virtual income for the players involved. It is also interesting to note that within the

Gesellschaft characteristic of the MMORPG, there are Gemeinschaft-type communities

(guilds) that will associate with one another even though they may be in different guilds. These types of communities usually communicate with one another through specific channels, for example a class-specific channel or a crafting channel.

While the guild can be viewed as the Gemeinschaft, or the community in general, unique circumstances will bring out Gesellschaft, or society, qualities within a guild.

Highly competitive guilds will likely attract those interested in obtaining end-game loot, regardless of the sense of community felt. An example was brought to light through the interview process. “I was heavily into the crafting community and people were heavily with helping each other out and communicated through a ‘crafting channel’” (Janice).

The crafting community is comparable to small-scale commerce, typical of the modern world and gesellschaft relationships. Both Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft can be found within the virtual worlds of MMORPG.

Solidarity

The concept of solidarity can be found coded within the architecture of MMORPG design. Interdependence with others is what drives the formation of the communities found within guilds. The foundation of solidarity, which is established through friendship and agreement, leads to the creation of these virtual communities. When starting out in an MMORPG, a character will soon realize that in order to achieve personal goals, they must establish relations with other players. These bonds are

typically reinforced though ritual, which I will elaborate below, and a common purpose

(increasing in level, obtaining gear, etc.). The common purpose, which is exemplified through guild membership, is exclusive to only those people who are members, and usually excludes members from other guilds.

For Stjerno (2009), the basis or foundation for solidarity can be found in each individual’s desire to enter into this space within the virtual world , to participate within the game’s structure, which is where meaningful virtual friendships are first formed. Virtual bonds within online communities have the remarkable ability to mirror real-life bonds of friendship. Richard, a 68-year-old male, contends that the bonds of this virtual community are as strong as the bonds of real life. He states:

The guild community are closer friends to me than most people in real life. I go to church and stuff and you see people at church and I don't have a whole lot of outside contact, I don’t go out partying with people like that or out to eat a lot, a couple my brothers I see quite a bit outside but that’s it. Besides my daughter, I don’t see a lot of people, outside of church or something.

When I posed the question to John, “Would you feel comfortable meeting these people in real life?” he replied, “Oh most definitely. I don’t even talk to my neighbour. I see her maybe once a month. There’s a bunch of people around here that are pretty good

[within the guild].”

With the basis for solidarity found within the fellowship and accord of the participants, the virtual object or function for this solidarity would be to progress collectively through the MMORPG’s content. In order to progress through the content of the MMORPG, groups of people will need to be formed. This formation of groups over time is what leads to the creation of guilds, the virtual community. Different guilds have different rules and regulations regarding exclusiveness and individual member freedoms. Some guilds have strict grouping and raiding policies, whereby the member

is required to join guild groups and guild raids. Other guilds have a more relaxed approach and allow their members more freedoms, such as joining groups with other people outside the guild, inviting a non-member to a raid, or providing crafting services to others. Some guilds frown on their members raiding with other guilds, on non-raid nights for example. This type of activity can cause discord, as strategies for progression

(or the proper way to kill a monster) are usually adhered to with vigilance.

These virtual bonds of solidarity would seem apparent within the guild communities found in the worlds of MMORPG. The collective obligation can be found within each guild’s desire for progression, as Matt notes:

Some guilds are just coasting through, and there’s other guilds that are, like well this one, that actually want to succeed. It's far better when you're actually getting stuff done. Because once people start getting frustrated it’s so hard to keep them together. I don’t know, you just put forth a certain amount of effort and then you see people that just don’t seem to care, it just irks ya and you start thinking why am I even here?

The obligation of the individual members to come prepared, to group and raid events, shows courtesy to other members and the guild as a whole. Members are usually expected to display their guild name above their head, denoting membership to outsiders. Members are also expected to help out other members when help is required.

Compliance depends on how strictly the guild rules are enforced and how strongly the obligation is felt within the ranks.

Social Action

Social action is another concept that can be applied within the virtual worlds of

MMORPG. Weber sees action as being social, “insofar as the acting individual attaches a subjective meaning to his behavior” (Roth and Wittich 1968:4). When a person starts out in an MMORPG, leveling and character equipment are usually the main goals. By 66

grouping with other players, the user has the ability to reach his or her goal and develop social relationships through mutually oriented action. Co-operative social action is at the very heart of the MMORPG and can be found within the environment’s group and guild structure. That is not to say that, as a person enters into the MMORPG, co-operative social action will necessarily take place. In fact, as Matt notes,

At first, I didn’t feel like I was a part of the unit. I was personally trying to achieve things but as I played and developed, I felt a part of the team and that my actions were a part of it and I relied on those people daily and specifically more so than random people by quite a bit... But what kept me playing longer were the personal interactions that were involved and the time it took to develop that team chemistry, that's what keeps me playing.

As people become more accustomed to their surroundings and to the game, in general they will look for a more permanent group, which can be found within a guild. The social relationship within a guild can be rewarding and can bring with it a sense of loyalty and duty. Matt further elaborates on what the guild relationship means to him:

As a member you may look at yourself individually and what I can do specifically...where the results went from individual to what all of us combined can do and what was better for the larger amount of people and not just the one person and that’s where it became really serious for me.

Weber’s four types of social action are also prevalent within MMORPG.

Calculating instrumental rational action can be found both within guilds and in the

MMORPG society at large. An individual can look to the larger society for the accomplishment of his or her ends through pick-up groups or raids. Buying items through the general chat channel can be seen as an example of this phenomenon.

Individuals may join a guild with the sole intention of accomplishing a difficult task, regardless of the feeling states of the overall group. But, in general, the guild setting is where players will find both rational and emotional action. Guild action is typically up to the guild leader and officers, who can change over time. Usually guilds within

MMORPG will seek the betterment of their guild as a whole, whether through

progression raiding or just daily grouping. Matt, the guild leader at the time of the interview, elaborates on the action that takes place within a guild:

Oh, one of the feelings that I try to describe when I describe this game to people that have no idea what I play, and I want to let them know instead of just saying I play a video game and I kill monsters and click buttons, is I try to say a lot of people in the military might understand when you’re working with a large group of people to accomplish something and you’re trying to make an execution of it, you know you’re trying to execute something and it requires the actions of so many different people.

What is interesting to note about social action within the virtual worlds of

MMORPG is that it takes place without ever meeting in person. This can mean that social relationships made within this space, as in the real world, can be fleeting or have varying degrees of permanence. All a person has to do is turn off the computer to exit the virtual world. Mistakes made by members of a group or guild will affect the outcome and can result in conflict. Conflict is at the very heart of the game, but it is something that guild management tries to keep at bay within its ranks. Managing conflict within guild ranks can be a daunting task, since it entails managing the online actions of many people and keeping everyone satisfied. Guilds will typically put in place a charter of obligations, rights and regulations that state the direction of the guild.

These rules are there to safeguard the integrity of the guild and to protect its members, and they symbolically stand for what the guild represents. Therefore, when action is taken against the guild, the rules are usually protected with vigilance to ensure guild harmony and fellowship.

Ritual

Durkheim speaks of a “collective effervescence” that is produced through ritual, cultivating a dominant group feeling. The specific feature of this emotional energy that

is of interest to my research is the generation of solidarity with those who take part in the ritual activity or situation. Could Durkheim’s idea of collective effervescence be present within the virtual world and become the basis for solidarity within it?

Durkheim sees the ritual as a mechanism to produce collective effervescence within primitive religions. While I do not claim that this new arena of collective social activity is a religion as Durkheim understands religion, there are elements within MMORPG rituals and rites that are of religious origin. As Durkheim (1964:35) states, “Religion is more than the idea of gods or spirits, and consequently cannot be defined exclusively in relation to these latter.” As noted by author R. V. Kelly 2 (2004), MMORPGs contain religious elements, “They [MMORPGs] also provide a wealth of rituals – everything from the ‘buffing’ cycle (magical characters putting strengthening spells on themselves) to the daily cashing in of loot and refueling with food. And you learn these rituals quickly because you’re scolded or ridiculed when you violate the taboos” (Kelly 2004:91).

Erving Goffman sees ritual in everyday social interaction, where people assume a role based on their environment and their perception of the others involved. Ritual interaction takes place throughout the virtual worlds of MMORPG, but perhaps the most clear example can be found within the action of raiding. In fact, the raid is essentially a ritual, with clearly defined roles, actions, and expectations of its participants.

Interaction in this case is facilitated through electronic means. Carlton University professor Rob Shields has written extensively on the history of virtual space and the interaction that takes place there. Rather than seeing technology as a source of separation from social interaction, Shields argues that technology mediates presence.

He states that technology “makes the distant and foreign, present and tangible.” He goes

on to note, “The simple technology of text on a computer screen has allowed the

Internet to become a medium in which users may develop a palpable sense of others’ bodies” (Shields 1996:5). What is interesting to note is the evolution of the concept of ritual from preliterate and largely religious in nature to the mundane and everyday social interaction. Through the anthropological lens, ritual has expanded to include everyday, micro-sociological, virtual interaction and computerized behaviour. Not only have the physical, geographical boundaries of ritual been eliminated through media interaction, but the ability to transport virtual identities online to virtual worlds has offered a new arena that begs for sociological investigation.

The preservation of face is also present during the raiding session. When actions taken during a raid lead to mistakes or missteps, the raid leader will quickly command adjustment to correct the wrongdoing. Calling people out, and ruining face, may lead to members feeling disheartened. When I posed the question “Can you tell me about some negative aspects of raiding?” to Dale, a 50-year-old male, he responded:

Singling people out for not performing in front of other raid members, because obviously they are trying to encourage that person to do better, but I don’t necessarily agree with that approach. I think it’s much better if, you know, corrections are made, even if they are on the spot, but done directly to the person but not meant to embarrass them or whatever.

During a raid, members are expected to perform the duties of their particular class.

What Dale was elaborating on was the breaching of expected behaviour and how it is remedied during the ritual process. When mistakes are made during a raid, leaders will typically send a private message to the player to let them know of a breach. Although some leaders take it upon themselves, as in Dale’s case, to call the person out in front of all the members during the raid, this decision would not appear conducive to building solidarity.

Just as with Collins’ ritual ingredients of boundary and bodily co-presence, the raid force assembles in an area that is not accessible to those who are not part of the raid. Not all members of the guild or clan may be included within the ritual; some may sit it out if there is not enough room. There is in fact a clear barrier or boundary that is not accessible to those who are not part of the raiding party. As Durkheim outlines in the ceremony of the Warramunga, of the two tribes, only the Uluuru are allowed to take part, while the Kingilli must prepare and watch (Durkheim 1964:217). Like the members of the Uluuru, it is only the members of the raiding party who are allowed to join in the ritual of the raid. Out of the first two ingredients, only bodily co-presence is missing. What is unique about this situation is that an avatar, or player-created character, is projected onto the screen while the physical body of the player is not present. These avatars have the ability to communicate with one another, offering many of the same features as a physical body, including body language and mood. As well as the visual aspect of the player being projected onto the screen and assembled with the other raid members, programs have been developed to allow player to speak with one another through a voice program.

Members of the raid force have individual duties that they are expected to perform in order to have a successful ritual. The raid members mutually focus their attention on successfully taking down the mob in the hopes that it will reward the raid with a treasure chest. The shared action and awareness, as in the Durkheimian model, is present: all players in the raid are acting as a cohesive unit, their responsibilities are known by those in attendance, and there is the expectation that they will perform their assigned duties. As Collins (2004:48) outlines in his ritual ingredients,

These ingredients feed back upon each other... persons become more aware of what each other is doing and feeling, and more aware of each other’s awareness, they experience their shared emotion more intensely, as it comes to dominate their awareness.

This is where the generation of collective effervescence is most prevalent. The

excitement builds as the raid goes on, reinforcing solidarity and the relationships

among members.

When the ritual raid is successful and the zone or area is cleared, the collective

energy permeates throughout the raid members. As Matt states,

Yeah, it becomes meaningful, extremely meaningful and throughout the raid, the intensity I think varies and ah in certain situations when we are encountering something where it becomes important and your actions become even more important I think that’s the peak of when people actually feel together and united and that’s where I get that largest rush. The feeling of, this is my team and we accomplished it, you know. It’s hard to explain, I guess.

This is the essence, through collective effervescence, that Durkheim called collective

consciousness or shared emotion. The ritual outcome of a successful raid, as in Collins’

model of IRC, enhances group solidarity and produces a feeling of belonging. The raid

members feel emotional energy that brings a feeling of confidence and enthusiasm.

Rebecca also expresses an emotional feeling brought out through the action of raiding:

I think the only reason why I’m still in Everquest 2 is because of raiding. It’s where you have a group of people who are all going after the same task of beating the mob and getting to work together and accomplishing the goal and getting better as a player, getting that prize of the loot and that joy and high that you get from accomplishing something. That adrenaline rush.

Matt echoes Rebecca’s feeling and gives an excellent description of the raiding process:

Um, the raiding itself, I found the whole aspect of getting nervous of the situations you’re in and how you have to rely on other people and then when it comes up to you and when you have to secure a certain kind of position and move and do something or click on something and if you don’t, then everyone fails and it’s on you. That feeling is intense at times and it can be exhilarating at times and can be positive in that or a rush that you like, that I like.

The members feel as though they are part of the collective, respecting other members of

the raid and feeling proud of being a part of that particular guild. This leads to the

members treating the guild as something sacred (Collins 2004:49). After the raid force

defeats the object that was targeted, the reward makes the raid force stronger. On the other hand, when the raid is unsuccessful or a mistake is made, there is a breakdown within the group’s solidarity, and the collective effervescence is low or does not appear.

Chapter 7: Conclusion

When we think of someone playing a video game, we might envision a person lost to the outside world and isolated at home with his or her attention focused on a computer screen. This person may appear as “the gamer stereotype of the awkward yet obnoxious loner who is great at dealing with virtual people because he never deals with real ones”

(Beck and Wade 2004:55–56). Yet the advent of the Internet has allowed people from across the globe to congregate within virtual worlds. Gamers are now more apt to become part of this new community and forge friendships that would have been otherwise impossible. My interest in this thesis has been to understand the world within the game and the social relationships that develop. Consequently, many sociological concepts developed to understand structure and interaction in society are useful for understanding participation in on-line games. Collins claims that bodily presence is essential to the production of collective effervescence. He states, “Bodily presence makes it easier for human beings to monitor each other’s signals and bodily expressions” (Collins 2004:64). Although I agree with Collins that being physically co- present may make it easier, I would argue that the ritual of raiding that takes place in a virtual realm has the ability to generate solidarity through Collins’ model of IRC, given that a virtual body can essentially perform physical bodily expressions, and technology allows vocal communication. According to David Holmes (1997:233), “the emergence of this virtual realm, or ‘cyberspace,’ results in a stronger form of social solidarity at a global level because of the connectivity that becomes possible, while at the same time there is a rapid disappearance of an easily discernible common culture.” Scholar Bryan

Turner, who has written extensively on sociology and the body, views this new venue of

virtual reality as a platform to take note of. As Turner (1996:6) states, “The information superhighway and virtual reality will bring about new ways of conceptualizing the body in relation to time and space, offering both new opportunities for democratization and authoritarian control of the human self as an embodied agent.”

Advances in technology, which first allowed us to print messages through the printing press, then to vocally communicate through the invention of the telephone, and now to digitally project a visual body through means of an avatar, have allowed us to remove the barrier of physicality and bodily co-presence. It is interesting also to note that Collins (2004:64) does see the ability of technology to facilitate bodily presence: “If nervous systems could become directly entrained at long distance, the effects would be the same as bodily presence.” Collins does not elaborate on the schematics of entraining participants, but I offer the example of the MMORPG as a first approximation.

Collins’ model of IRC explains how a collective emotional energy is produced through a series of ingredients within an assembled group. Peering through the microsociological lens, as Fine (2005:1287) notes, “Collins argues that interaction rituals produce emotional energy, the gathering of which is a central motivating force for individuals.” Raiding is just one element, within the game itself, in which feelings of solidarity may occur and group connections form. Through shared action and awareness, a shared communal emotion is felt by those who are participating. It is my belief that actions performed in a virtual setting can and do produce real feelings of belonging, which can be just as intense as those found in the physical realm, or “real life.” Online gaming would appear to contain functional elements akin to religion in that they bring people together, and through the shared experience of a raiding group,

bonds are formed. According to Mark S. Cladis, in the introduction of the Cosman translation of Durkheim's Elementary Forms of Religious Life, “Durkheim sought to identify the functions of religion, law, and other institutions. Religious beliefs and rites, he held, function to strengthen the bonds of social solidarity” (Durkheim 2001:XXXII).

Within the worlds of the MMORPG, it would seem that the function of the raid is not only the acquisition of sacred items, but also the formation of social bonds through the gathering and participation of digitally crafted avatars.

This research suggests that solidarity is being produced through virtual means, but it may not have the degree of permanence of real life. People who play MMORPGs can turn off the computer to make the virtual world disappear. From my own experience, MMORPG guilds typically survive as long as people have an interest in participating. Lull times in hardcore raiding guilds can and do lead to a guild dissolving if raids are not successful. The ritual element of raiding within the MMORPG is paramount to these guilds that rely on the production of solidarity, through raiding success, for their continuance.

Even though the virtual worlds of MMORPG are created of nothing more than computer-generated graphics, this new social space has the ability to house real communities, complete with situations that either create solidarity or extinguish it.

Contained within its matrix is a culture, complete with meaningful social action and ritual. This thesis examines a small part of a large new world. Future research might include further inquiry into the affects of the virtual world on real life participants, examine how avatars are intertwined with social identity, or perhaps develop some new sociological concepts which could aid analysis. The communities of the MMORPG

are growing, and at this new virtual frontier, sociology is happening and merits social study.

Glossary

AFK: Away from keyboard. Indicates that the player is not at the keyboard. Agro: The ability to generate and hold hate and aggression to get the mob’s attention. Alt: Alternative character. Another character, as opposed to a “main” (main character). Buff: Beneficial ability placed on self or teammate (e.g., shielding, increase in stats). Camping: The act of sitting in the area of a mob. Typically done by waiting for a mob to respawn, then killing it. DPS: Damage Per Second. Refers to the amount of output combat damage a class can generate. Debuff: Detrimental ability used on the mob to remove beneficial abilities. Expansion: New content added to the current MMORPG. Typically released on a yearly basis. EULA: End User Licensing Agreement. Contract between the player and the game publisher outlining liabilities and regulations. FPS: First Person Shooter. Popular genre of video game. GM: Game Master. Similar to a game master in tabletop role playing, a game master is like a benevolent dictator within MMORPG. As company employees, these special players solve disputes, issue suspensions and bans, and are in charge of general policing of the MMORPG’s virtual world. Grinding: The act of repetitive killing, usually in reference to achieving XP as quickly as possible. This technique is used to acquire rare items or to grind for XP or currency. Group: Temporary grouping of individuals with a task or quest to complete. Guild: Clan or group of members found within the worlds of MMORPG. Semi- permanent. Healer: Light-armour-wearing character, combat class, who is responsible for replenishing hit points, casting beneficial spells and resurrecting fallen foes. Instance Zone: Area within the MMORPG’s world that is accessible only by individual group or raid. The area is inaccessible to outsiders. Mage: Cloth-wearing character, combat class, who typically uses spells to cast damage and debuffs. High attributes in mental prowess. MMOG: Massively Multiplayer Online Games. Online games with the ability to hold thousands of players. MMOFPS: Massively Multiplayer Online First Person Shooter. “Planetside 2” is an example of this genre.

MMORPG: Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. MMORTS: Massively Multiplayer Online Real Time Strategy. Turn-based strategy game. Examples of MMORTS include “League of Legends” and “Age of Empires.” Mob: Mobile Object Block, monsters; term derived from MUD, meaning computer- controlled mobile character (NPC). MUD: Multi User Domain. Predecessor to MMORPG. Text-based, pre-graphical game in which players connected to a central server. NPC: Non-Player Character that is computer controlled with scripted action and dialogue. Overland Zone: Area within the MMORPG world that is open and accessible to all players. PC: Player Character. Character that is controlled by a player and whose actions are determined by a player. Player Killing: The ability to kill other player characters in combat. Scout: Light-armour-wearing character, combat class, who can typically inflict both ranged and melee damage. Scouts tend to have high attributes in dexterity and agility, granting them the ability to have high DPS. SLR: Selling Loot Rights. The ability to sell items directly to the server population through means of an auction channel. Spawn Point: The area in which an avatar is brought back to life. Usually a safe area. Raid: See Chapter Five Raid Boss: Difficult mob that requires many players to kill. Specially named mobs that, when defeated, drop sacred items that are coveted by the members. Tank: Heavy-armour-wearing character, combat class, who typically takes most of the damage output from an encounter mob. High attributes in hand-to-hand combat. XP: Experience Points. Progression points increase a player’s level. UI: User Interface. The buttons and commands used to operate the player’s avatar.

Appendix: Sample Interview Questions

1. Where are you from?

2. How old are you?

3. When did you first start playing MMORPG genre of games?

4. What MMORPG game or games do you currently play or have played in the past?

5. What drew you to that genre of game?

6. What type of player would you describe yourself as? (Play style, Time played etc.)

7. How much time daily/weekly do you spend within the game?

8. When you are not within the virtual world of MMORPG, do you find yourself thinking

about the game?

9. What has been your experience, both positive and negative, within the virtual worlds of

MMORPGs?

10. Are you currently, or have you in the past, been a member of a “clan” or “guild” within

an MMORPG? If so do you, or did you, feel as though you were a member/part of

that “guild” or “clan?”

11. Have you ever held rank within a guild or clan? If so what were your duties and

responsibilities?

12. Do you feel an emotional attachment to your character/avatar?

13. How would you feel if your character or avatar was deleted?

14. Have you ever met someone outside the game that you met while playing? If so, what

was that experience like?

15. What has been your experience raiding within MMORPGs?

16. What does the game mean to you?

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