Wagered Identity: Deviant Space & Performance in Poker
Patrick Konesko
Abstract
For much of the last century, Americans have had a fascination with poker. Numerous folktales and, later, movies have worked to entrench romanticized conceptions of the game within popular culture. With the rise of televised play, the innovation of embedded cameras that allow home audiences to follow each hand, and the addition of expert commentators, popular enthusiasm has exploded. At the heart of this phenomenon is the “Cadillac” of poker—no limit Texas hold ’em. It is this game, with its exciting action, quick “swings,” and its emphasis on the practice of bluffing, that has been central to recaptured popular imagination. Along with this emphasis on deception (or, perhaps, because of it) the game play of no-limit Texas hold ’em is built on complex displays of gender, race, age, aggression, and timidity.
These performances, I argue, are part of a densely layered network of restored behavior and manipulated metacommunication. Relying on an exploration of Foucault’s theory of “heterotopia,” I posit a framework through which to explore the performances at work in poker and, ultimately, to analyze the way in which the cornerstone of poker, deception, is articulated through a process of continually deferred negotiation. Ultimately, I explore the possibility that the “deviant” practices encouraged by poker do not remain confined to the casino, but instead go through a process of transference, normalization, and reincorporation into the status quo.
For much of the last century, Americans have had a fascination with poker. Numerous folktales and, later, movies have worked to entrench romanticized conceptions of the game within popular culture. With the rise of televised play, the innovation of embedded cameras that allow home audiences to follow each hand, and the addition of expert commentators, popular enthusiasm has exploded. At the heart of this phenomenon is the “Cadillac” of poker—no limit Texas hold ’em. It is this game, with its exciting action, quick “swings,” and its emphasis on the practice of bluffing, that has been central to recaptured popular imagination. Along with this emphasis on deception (or, perhaps, because of it) the game play of no-limit Texas hold ’em is built on complex displays of gender, race, age, aggression, and timidity.
These performances, I argue, are part of a densely layered network of restored behavior and manipulated metacommunication. Relying on an exploration of Foucault’s theory of “heterotopia,” I posit a framework through which to explore the performances at work in poker and, ultimately, to analyze the way in which the cornerstone of poker, deception, is articulated through a process of continually deferred negotiation. Ultimately, I explore the possibility that the “deviant” practices encouraged by poker do not remain confined to the casino, but instead go through a process of transference, normalization, and reincorporation into the status quo.
| etudesmay2016konesko.pdf |
