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In accepting this challenge, this article theorizes the historical phenomenon of abstract board games whose nonrepresentational board design and formal rules have transmitted with little change over millennia and across vast expanse. A theoretical framework is outlined for understanding abstract board games\u2014a modular ontology of abstract board games and a typology of player meaning-making in abstract board games. It is argued that the reproducibility and transferability of abstract board games as self-sufficient and reliable formal systems that players share independently from culturally specific meanings and materials may contribute to their dispersal. It is in this interaction between the cross-cultural\/reliable and local\/variable semantic structures of abstract board games that game studies from a historical or archaeological perspective may meet literary and social science perspectives. <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/1555412020914722","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,3,31]],"date-time":"2020-03-31T11:09:47Z","timestamp":1585652987000},"page":"499-518","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":11,"title":["Making Sense of Abstract Board Games: Toward a Cross-Ludic Theory"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"16","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2453-5689","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Sandra","family":"Danilovic","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Wilfrid Laurier University, Brantford, Ontario, Canada"}]},{"given":"Alex","family":"de Voogt","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Drew University, Madison, NJ, USA"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,3,31]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.9783\/9780812201048"},{"key":"bibr3-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.7551\/mitpress\/5334.001.0001"},{"key":"bibr5-1555412020914722","first-page":"122","volume-title":"The game design reader: A rules of play anthology","author":"Caillois R.","year":"2006"},{"key":"bibr6-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1111\/aae.12040"},{"key":"bibr7-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/106939719803200204"},{"key":"bibr8-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1080\/21594937.2017.1382990"},{"key":"bibr9-1555412020914722","volume-title":"The art of computer game design: Reflections of a master game designer","author":"Crawford C.","year":"1984"},{"key":"bibr10-1555412020914722","volume-title":"Games of thrones: Board games and social complexity in Bronze Age Cyprus","author":"Crist W.","year":"2016"},{"key":"bibr11-1555412020914722","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Crist W. 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