Problematizing Cultural Appropriation

Cultural appropriation in game design represents an unavoidable ethical challenge that requires designers to balance pedagogical objectives with the preservation of cultural authenticity. By examining the integration of the Mexican Día de los Muertos festival into a serious game for children, it becomes clear that recontextualizing cultural elements inevitably leads to subjective interpretations. Designers must therefore maintain a critical awareness of how narrative choices influence player perception, as the act of design inherently shapes the ethical landscape of the final product.

Research involving children aged nine to eleven reveals that users do not passively consume cultural frameworks. Instead, they actively synthesize provided rituals with their own culturally situated tropes, such as religious fatalism, violence, and social status. This process demonstrates that children naturally engage in cultural appropriation by filtering foreign concepts through their existing emotional and social schemas. Consequently, the meaning derived from a game is often a hybrid of the designer’s intent and the player’s personal, media-influenced background.

To navigate these complexities, developers should prioritize the cultivation of cultural knowledge before initiating participatory design processes. Because appropriation is an inherent byproduct of cross-cultural interaction in interactive media, the goal should not be the total elimination of reinterpretation, but rather the development of a more sensitive, informed design practice. By acknowledging the developmental context of the audience and the inevitability of cultural blending, designers can better manage the ethical implications of their work while fostering meaningful engagement with diverse cultural traditions.