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Play Reconsidered: Sociological Perspectives on Human Expression
Understanding the significance of adult play in the life of modern societies
Within the social sciences, few matters are as significant as the study of human play--or as neglected. In Play Reconsidered, rather than viewing play simply as a preoccupation of the young and a vehicle for skill development, Thomas S. Henricks argues that it’s a social and cultural phenomenon of adult life, enveloped by wider structures and processes of society. In that context, he argues that a truly sociological approach to play should begin with a consideration of the largely overlooked writings on play and play-related topics by some of the classic sociological thinkers of the twentieth century.
Henricks explores Karl Marx’s analysis of creativity in human labor, examines Emile Durkheim’s observations on the role of ritual and the formation of collective consciousness, extends Max Weber’s ideas about the process of rationalization to the realm of expressive culture and play, surveys Georg Simmel’s distinctive approach to sociology and sociability, and discusses Erving Goffman’s focus on human conduct as process and play as “encounter.” These and other discussions of the contributions of more recent sociologists are framed by an initial consideration of Johan Huizinga’s famous challenge to understand the nature and significance of play. In a closing synthesis, Henricks distinguishes play from other forms of human social expression, particularly ritual, communitas, and work.
Within the social sciences, few matters are as significant as the study of human play--or as neglected. In Play Reconsidered, rather than viewing play simply as a preoccupation of the young and a vehicle for skill development, Thomas S. Henricks argues that it’s a social and cultural phenomenon of adult life, enveloped by wider structures and processes of society. In that context, he argues that a truly sociological approach to play should begin with a consideration of the largely overlooked writings on play and play-related topics by some of the classic sociological thinkers of the twentieth century.
Henricks explores Karl Marx’s analysis of creativity in human labor, examines Emile Durkheim’s observations on the role of ritual and the formation of collective consciousness, extends Max Weber’s ideas about the process of rationalization to the realm of expressive culture and play, surveys Georg Simmel’s distinctive approach to sociology and sociability, and discusses Erving Goffman’s focus on human conduct as process and play as “encounter.” These and other discussions of the contributions of more recent sociologists are framed by an initial consideration of Johan Huizinga’s famous challenge to understand the nature and significance of play. In a closing synthesis, Henricks distinguishes play from other forms of human social expression, particularly ritual, communitas, and work.
252 pages, Kindle Edition
First published July 11, 2006
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August 12, 2019
That a sociological phenomenon as pervasive as play has not attracted more attention is perplexing, except that play is understudied in many traditions; perhaps it is its pervasiveness; perhaps it is its perceived naturalness; perhaps it is that it is seen as an activity of children; perhaps it is all of these and more. This is not to say that play has been passed over – there is a long tradition of exploration drawing on the Dutch cultural historian Johan Huizinga whose 1936 Homo Ludens continues as the field’s foundational text. Anthropologists have explored why we play; psychologists have investigated play behaviours (arguably, psychology dominates the field); educationalists have considered play as a practice of learning; in my own work we’ve been exploring philosophical approaches to the study of play and playful philosophy. Amid all of this, a major gap has been in sociological studies of play (although there is a well-established sociological study of sport, which we might see as a form of highly regulated play). To think sociologically about play is to step away from the notion of behaviours to ask questions about patterns of interactions, to help us think about the conditions that allow play to exist and in more abstract terms to explore the quality of relationships between people and the conditions of their lives. These are the questions that shape Thomas Hendricks impressive and essential sociological exploration of play.
Hendricks draws on several of the key classical sociological traditions. He looks to the early Marx to develop ideas of labour as creative activity, reading sideways to consider ways that this notion of creative practice might inform explorations of play. Much of his discussion of the classics draws on three turn-of-the-century thinkers looking to Durkheim’s work on religion to discuss the ways play articulates to ritual practice and Weber to consider long run tendencies to rationalization as well as the related work of Norbert Elias and his model of a long-run tendency towards civility. While Durkheim & Weber are conventionally invoked in sociological theorising, he also explores work by Simmell drawing especially on his work on sociability and teasing out how this links to theories of underlying structures as seen in the anthropological work of Claude Levi-Strauss and ideas of performed identities and practices we see Veblen and in Bourdieu. He then weaves these notions together in his discussion of Goffman and the idea of social encounter. This final theorist-based chapter is especially rich, noting that Goffman is commonly invoked as theorist of performance, Hendricks instead emphasise the encounter aspect of those performances, but more especially Goffman’s work on frame analysis, developing a clear symbolic interactionist approach.
This approach then allows him to build a two-fold theory of sociological approaches to play drawing on arguments that play is both transformative and consummation. Drawing on these tropes, he then explores two dynamics centred on play’s comparison with work, ritual and communitas. In the first dynamic, turning on the rationale for action and the stance toward the world, consummation is contrasted with instrumentalism as a rationale, while transformative practice as contrasted with conformative practice when considering stances. He is at pains to stress that there are no clear, distinct demarcations between the four practices, but tendencies. The second dynamic focuses on modes of human interaction in each practice, that which is predictable or not, and contestive and integrative, again stressing tendencies. He draws this together to argue for understandings of play as an experience of form, as contest and as display. In doing so he critiques and evaluates models developed by Huizinga to build a much more rigorous sense of play as encounter and as expression – as we’d expect of a symbolic interactionist approach.
This is a rich and valuable exploration of the ways classic sociological theory can inform and be informed by play, as well as working as a significant extension of Huizinga’s foundational approach. Analytically rigorous this is a powerful case for taking play seriously as and in a sociological study, and as a case for considering the importance of symbolic interactionist approaches as a useful way to challenge many of the instrumentalist approaches in play studies whole avoiding the romantic dangers of play-for-itself-ness. One of the paradoxes of the approach, however, centres on the issue of transformation – in that play may be transformative, at least for the players, but symbolic interactionism’s principal weakness is with change, transformation over time. Part of the difficulty here is that because there is so little sociological work on play, Hendricks has, properly and understandably, drawn much of his evidence from sociologies of sport – a regulated and controlled form of play that is arguably becoming less and less play like as it is becoming increasingly socially and economically regulated; this tendency is difficult to unpack and account for in an encounter-based, expression oriented model.
This problem of transformation is a problem posed by and consequent to the power of Hendrick’s exploration. Good scholarly work poses challenges and questions, which is exactly what this does, while also building a powerful, rigorous and impressive case. A key text, even more than a decade after its first publication. Essential reading for play and for the sports studies scholars.
Hendricks draws on several of the key classical sociological traditions. He looks to the early Marx to develop ideas of labour as creative activity, reading sideways to consider ways that this notion of creative practice might inform explorations of play. Much of his discussion of the classics draws on three turn-of-the-century thinkers looking to Durkheim’s work on religion to discuss the ways play articulates to ritual practice and Weber to consider long run tendencies to rationalization as well as the related work of Norbert Elias and his model of a long-run tendency towards civility. While Durkheim & Weber are conventionally invoked in sociological theorising, he also explores work by Simmell drawing especially on his work on sociability and teasing out how this links to theories of underlying structures as seen in the anthropological work of Claude Levi-Strauss and ideas of performed identities and practices we see Veblen and in Bourdieu. He then weaves these notions together in his discussion of Goffman and the idea of social encounter. This final theorist-based chapter is especially rich, noting that Goffman is commonly invoked as theorist of performance, Hendricks instead emphasise the encounter aspect of those performances, but more especially Goffman’s work on frame analysis, developing a clear symbolic interactionist approach.
This approach then allows him to build a two-fold theory of sociological approaches to play drawing on arguments that play is both transformative and consummation. Drawing on these tropes, he then explores two dynamics centred on play’s comparison with work, ritual and communitas. In the first dynamic, turning on the rationale for action and the stance toward the world, consummation is contrasted with instrumentalism as a rationale, while transformative practice as contrasted with conformative practice when considering stances. He is at pains to stress that there are no clear, distinct demarcations between the four practices, but tendencies. The second dynamic focuses on modes of human interaction in each practice, that which is predictable or not, and contestive and integrative, again stressing tendencies. He draws this together to argue for understandings of play as an experience of form, as contest and as display. In doing so he critiques and evaluates models developed by Huizinga to build a much more rigorous sense of play as encounter and as expression – as we’d expect of a symbolic interactionist approach.
This is a rich and valuable exploration of the ways classic sociological theory can inform and be informed by play, as well as working as a significant extension of Huizinga’s foundational approach. Analytically rigorous this is a powerful case for taking play seriously as and in a sociological study, and as a case for considering the importance of symbolic interactionist approaches as a useful way to challenge many of the instrumentalist approaches in play studies whole avoiding the romantic dangers of play-for-itself-ness. One of the paradoxes of the approach, however, centres on the issue of transformation – in that play may be transformative, at least for the players, but symbolic interactionism’s principal weakness is with change, transformation over time. Part of the difficulty here is that because there is so little sociological work on play, Hendricks has, properly and understandably, drawn much of his evidence from sociologies of sport – a regulated and controlled form of play that is arguably becoming less and less play like as it is becoming increasingly socially and economically regulated; this tendency is difficult to unpack and account for in an encounter-based, expression oriented model.
This problem of transformation is a problem posed by and consequent to the power of Hendrick’s exploration. Good scholarly work poses challenges and questions, which is exactly what this does, while also building a powerful, rigorous and impressive case. A key text, even more than a decade after its first publication. Essential reading for play and for the sports studies scholars.
Displaying 1 of 1 review