The concept of Play

Everybody play and everybody have played in their childhood. It is indeed the logical path of every human and animal being. We start our lives with play behaviours which helps us forge tools to comprehend our relatives and surroundings. But what is the exact role of play ?

[Role of Play] Instinctively, as we play, we feel it is an entertaining and enjoyable activity. But for Huizinga, Play is not only a foolish moment of bewilderment, ‘It is somekind of ritual process which produces a transformative performance’. It helps ordering the state in the mind and ‘acts for health development and self-expression’ (Caldwell, 2011). The process allows sense of achievement while taking risks and questions social interactions. It can also help to educate about problems and conflicts solving, ‘it is both integration and differentiation, a sage place to try out’ (Caldwell, 2011). It creates the interface which makes possible relational, cultural and physical exchanges. It helps the child to develop a sense of identity, and position him in society. But playing is also an ‘act of creation’ as well as a performance of interpretation and abstraction. It helps oneself to escape the reality, creating an utopian and fantastic world. The logic is not consistent enough as way to embrace life as whole, a bit fantasy and dream is needed. For Huizinga, play retains a primary role of one’s personal and educational development. Huizinga also posits the 3 main characteristics of Play: voluntary, exceptional moment, timely spatial determination.

[Voluntary] Play is a voluntary activity part of the essential process of growing-up. It creates the opportunity to transition and connect with other individuals. Play provides a safe space which is universal and instinctive. Conferred by self-determination and free-will, it is the active action to emerge into a novel status of looseness and instability. It allows an experimental sensing and questioning of one’s environment and social relations. As a result, a child develops behavioural and emotional autonomy. The fact it is voluntary and an ‘internally motivated activity tends to make it more likely to be sustained over time’ (Tyssot, 1950). It allows, as Winnicott describes it, a Space for Potentialities which can be approached and gives visitors the responsibility to emerge into this act of Play. The voluntary factor also gives meaning to the playing process. It is a way to introduce decision-making choices in the developmental process as a transformative and powerful tools for the future adult. It is in itself not an end but more a mean to an end seeking its own purpose.

Fig. 2 - Play: an imaginative abstraction of reality (Source: De Spiegel)

[Special moment] Play is moment of looseness, based on a conception of reality. It creates a portal, exiting from ordinary life, allowing an imaginative interlude. It also is detaching from an ‘appetitive process, seeking an onlyfor-fun aim’ (Huizinga, 1950). Play is a way to abstract oneself from reality to submerge into a new world ruled by elected constraints, a simplified and abstracted representation of the existing. It ‘brings a temporary, a limited perfection’ (Huizinga, 1950). These rules allow the interacting individual to appropriate and shape his own imaginary, making it a safe place for experimental involvements (concept of sandbox). The actor ‘lies in between the antithesis of wisdom and folly’ (Caldwell, 2011). The experiencer is therefore authorized to cross the threshold of reality and interact only with the element he wants to address.

[Specific place and time] Play is usually practiced in particular places called playgrounds. It is also usually enjoyed in a precise window of time. This is mainly due to the fact Play needs to separate from ordinary life, and therefore needs a consecrated spot and schedule to initiate the ritual of transition. For Van Eyck, space and time were not consistent enough to define Play, he introduced the concept of place instead of space and occasion instead time. The duration of Play and the withdrawal from the imaginary world, is fixed by the player himself. Sometimes, an act of playing can be repeated in time. The repetition, unproductive task in the real world, is an important characteristic in the operation. It authorize to revive previous feelings while trying to interpret and control them.

[Play vs Game] The act of playing is mainly an individual process of oneself. The concept of game is actually resumed by social play. Board games, footballs and other collective activities are usually incorrectly described with the term play but game do suffer different properties from play. With the notion of game and social interaction the competitiveness factor adds-up. This now create the idea of an aim in the performance which perverts the act of playing. Indeed, in solitary play, winning had no inherent sense. The experimental action of confronting to yourself is also confiscated. The ‘cosmogonic nature of the questioning is also lost. What makes water run ? Where does the wind comes from? What is death?’ (Huizinga, 1950) All these questions are not asked anymore as you have another aim to achieve. The competitiveness and creation of groups also start involving other issues such as exclusion and prestige. This corrupts the naivety of the play-spirit .The rules are not fixed anymore by oneself, but imposed by the group, it creates new constraints. Winnicott also posits that play sometimes involves ‘sexual dualism, a female and male division’. Girls and boys are therefore separated to play with dolls on one side and football on the other side. It creates exclusion and sometime competition in between cis genders. An example could be the condition of women in the ancient Greek version of Olympics Games.

[Transitional Object] In Play behaviours, the interaction object (stick, fabric, plastic toy, ball ...) replace the role of the parental guidance. It is indeed the extension of the mother’s surveillance and security (Klein, 1953). It keeps the connection while the physical presence of the parents is distanced and accompany the player in the risky business of his experiences. It is the interface which allow play, made from a combination of the mind and the physicality of the object. ‘The physicality of the interface allow directness and facilitate awareness while maintaining the complexity and richness of the evolving system’ (Franovic, 2018). The object gets even more powerful if the abstraction of shape and material properties can evoke several meanings. The imaginative characteristic invoked, are then multiplied, they trigger several existing meaning and permit even more adaptative Play behaviours.

[Culture] The notions of Play is older than culture. In fact, it is the foundational component of culture. Indeed, civilisation was established with the help of interactions, some of them might have been instinctive Play interactions. Also, in a community of social players, the community of players which is shaped by the game, could start sharing and shaping a subculture. Physical, intellectual, moral and spiritual values raised in play made it to the cultural level of society.’ ‘At adulthood, the transformative factor of play is usually conveyed by cultural experiences (involving art, religion, or philosophy)’(Franovic, 2018).

For example, music emerged from play practices, as a voluntary acceptance and application of strict rules to create rhythms. Contemporary art, with its playfulness and questioning of the reality was also impulsed by play characteristics. It is an emergence of some kind of child innocence to represent the world.

[Architecting Play] To design a Playspace, some characteristics need to be taken into account. In order to create the intentional purpose inherent to the act of playing, an interactive system needs to trigger some interests toward its public. For this reason, the materiality of this interface should allow exchange and curiosity. The scale need to be appropriate for a comfortable interaction or it could limit the use. Once the interest is triggered, the explorative experiences need to be shapes. As Van Eyck described them, they should be non-proscriptive and imaginative, and allow a questioning and transformation of one’s personal behaviour. Van Eyck also posited that the place and moment to introduce the play tools are crucial. Lastly, the environment act as interface which question but an ever changing context could destabilize and frighten the user. In any case, the subjectivity of the interaction intrinsic of the player makes it hardly to predict nor interpret if a design would work or not.