This article studies the capaci-
ty of Early Modern puppets and video-
game avatars, two seemingly unrelated
objects of research, to produce and re-
produce gender discourses. Despite be-
ing made very differently, their wooden
and coded natures both participate in of
acts of aligning with and resisting
against existing ideologies. This is be-
cause puppets and avatars’ relation to
ideology does not depend exclusively on
the stories they contribute to tell; the
materiality of both cultural texts as well
as the puppeteers and videogame play-
ers themselves all contribute to the
reenacting and contesting of gender
discourse