Just Playing Around: Play and the human experience

Written By Art Now Thus

Written by Hina Siddiqui, Neurodivergent Storyteller exploring Transmedia, Gaming, working with Education, Experience-creation and Community-building

 

A friend and I often argue about the deteriorating quality of play in urban spaces. He laments about how commercial and capitalist interests are removing all instances of muddy, green and wild things and I talk about how access to green spaces - to space of any sort actually - is a privilege, and economics, disability, caste/class - all of it has historically affected how and who gets to do what in a given space. Yes, we essentially are saying the same thing, but approaching it from different angles.

Play is an essential part of the human experience. No, this is not just my opinion or a universal platitude. It is something researchers have observed, catalogued and concluded over the years. In fact, play is not just limited to humans, it is a lived experience among all sorts of animals. I mean, if you’ve not awwed over videos of big cats faking surprise at mock attacks by their cubs - essentially engaging in play - have you even been on the internet?

 

The histories and philosophies of play have been documented for a long time too. Leela is a Sanskrit word that translates more or less to the concept of play. It has been a part of intellectual and cultural discourse in sub-continental tradition since at least the 4th century. For context, this is also the era which gave us the Kamasutra, so it’s perhaps not surprising that a lot of Indian traditions of play include erotic play, sex and other sundry courtship activities.

 
Krishna playing with the Gopis. Artist Unknown. Image Credit: The Walters Art Museum. 
For a far more risqué artwork on play, by Ravi Verma no less, check out this Google Arts and Culture Link. Also, the only reason the Ravi Verma image is not the cover art on this article is because I couldn’t find a version of it under creative commons, not because we’re prudes or anything.

But, I digress. 

As per the Upanishads, play is the source of creativity, abundance and divine bliss. I don’t particularly know what divine bliss is, to be honest, but apparently, it has something to do with the fact that Indic philosophy considers life, the universe and everything to be the result of the cosmos and the physical world to be playing around. 

Play is a ritualized form of creative expression. It may be unstructured, but even the most open-ended forms of play have rules and systems, even if those rules are only understood by the people playing in the moment, and never truly formalized. If you’ve ever had a fake tea party with anyone, you’ll know what I am talking about. So it’s no surprise then that play itself has been used as ritual. And the more ritualized a form of play, the more formal its rules and regulations, the more sports-like it becomes. Consider the Olympics, the original ones from ancient Greece, not the fun/controversial stuff we partake in today and the gladiator games of ancient Rome. But even older than those is the Mesoamerican ball game, called ōllamalīztli in the Nahuatl language, known as Pok a Tok to the Mayans, Tlachtli to the Aztec and immortalized in film, the Road to El Dorado. And no, I do not know how to pronounce most of that, except maybe the Mayan one. This game was considered a sacred battle between the Sun, the Moon and the other Stars, recreating the age-old struggle between light and dark. The game was played during religious festivals and according to some records, the ritual ended with the beheading of the losing team. The game managed to survive colonialism, somewhat. As ulama it is still played, minus the human sacrifice  - by people in Mexico and Belize. There’s even a World Cup. This is what the game looks like now. And if pictures don’t do it for you, check out this 2019 video where the game was played at the archaeological site of Teotihuacan, Mexico. 

Modern Ulama match. Photo Credit: Ambergris Today
 

For most of recorded history, though don’t quote me on this one, there were no real designated play-spaces. I mean, there were arenas, gymnasiums, pools, parks etc, sure. But these weren’t spaces designated specifically for play. Until the 19th century came along, screaming, “But think about the children!” One of the biggest features of the 19th century was - any guesses? That’s actually a bad question, because depending on where you are and what you hold dear, the answer to that could be anything from the Abolishing of Slavery (1833), to the First War of Independence (1857), to Women first getting the Vote (1838, the Pitcairn Islands). But for the purposes of this article, I am talking about the Industrial Revolution. 


Somewhere in the midst of the invention of the steam engine and all those factories springing up pell-mell, people went from ‘send that little child into the narrow greasy space to change the sprockets’ (yes, that’s a Snowpiercer reference, but joke’s on you, Snowpiercer was actually referencing the Industrial Revolution, hah!) to ‘we need to create child-specific spaces’. If for nothing else, to keep the immigrant children off the streets in order to make way for Carl Benz’s latest invention. The very first playgrounds for children were imagined by the same guy who gave us the kindergarten model for early childhood education - Friedrich Froebel. Kindergarten literally means a garden for children to play and learn in, as you can see in the image below.

 
Unidentified kindergarten from the book, Los Angeles, c.1900. Image Sourced from: Architecture of Early Childhood website
 

According to this article on The Brief History of Playgrounds by playground designer Naomi Heller, “Froebel recognized the importance of a stimulating environment and how it could positively impact children (Pound, 2011). Promoting the value of free and nature play, he emphasized the need for contact with natural materials such as sand and water.” 

And thus was born the concept of sandboxes. Dr Marie Zakrsewska took this concept from Berlin to Boston, spreading sandboxes across the American continent and leading to the formation of the Playground Association of America, which firmly believed in the concept of the model playground, based on the following features: 

  • separate play sections and athletic fields for boys and girls

  • shelters, toilet/bathing facilities, shaded spaces, garden plots, and swimming pools

  • the “four S’s”: swings, seesaws, sandboxes, and slides

  • merry-go-rounds, and other twirling contraptions

But all of this was soon to go to - pardon my French - shit in the 20th century with the advent of war, where equipment from children’s playgrounds was literally dismantled and the metal sold for scrap to feed the military-industrial complex. 

In 1938, Dutch historian Johan Huizinga was one of the first people to write about play from the cultural lens in his book Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play Element in Culture (from the Latin homo for human and ludere for various activities that can be constituted as the act of playing or practising). Huizinga talks about how all human activity is rooted in “the primaeval soil of play.” He also goes on, at length, about how the march of progress has smothered the instinct to play “As a civilization becomes more complex… the old cultural soil is gradually smothered under a rank layer of ideas, systems of thought and knowledge, doctrines, rules and regulations, moralities and conventions which have lost all touch with play.” It is interesting to note that he was writing this in the Netherlands, pretty much on the cusp of the Second World War. One can almost imagine the changes he was observing around him that made him take such a deep look at play, especially since, before that, he was mainly writing about the Aristocracy and the Renaissance. 

It’s also nice to note that a lot of the better-known research today in to play-patterns and playwork is rooted in some spectacular work done in Europe after the Second World War. Because the war essentially trashed Europe and a lot of effort was being put into rebuilding cities. And some of the things they considered were playgrounds and public spaces. In the aftermath of a blitzing like the world had never seen, children were often found playing in bombed-out buildings and burned houses. And instead of pulling them out of there and shunting them into safer environs, people like Carl Theodor Sørensen, a Danish landscape architect collaborated with Hans Dragehjelm, a school teacher to create Skrammellegepladsen Emdrup - essentially a junkyard for children to engage in what they called risky play - where children can tackle challenge on their own terms and make decisions in low-supervision environments (note the distinct lack of adult presence in the image below?).

The first examples of an adventure playground "Emdrup", opened by Carl Theodor Sørensen in Denmark. Photo Credit: SVEN TÜRCK / VISDA
 

Probably Relevant Side-Note: I’d ship them. Sørensen and Dragehjelm. Even though I have mixed opinions about shipping real humans, but since they are more historical figures at this point than actual people you can encounter, I am giving myself a generous pass on this indiscretion. Point being, can you imagine the wholesome possibilities? Dashing young architect who takes a shine to a shy, local school teacher, both of them fighting for the rights of children, against the backdrop of war. Like this would be the Danish queer narrative I’d propose for the Oscars!

And back again in the Netherlands, you had Aldo Van Eyck, who developed hundreds of playgrounds in Amsterdam in the effort to rebuild the city after the war. His spaces were remarkable for being unfenced, even when located in the middle of the city - illustrated his firm belief in the “construction of our environment according to creative laws”.

Then of course there was Margery Gill, or Lady Allen if you will, a British landscape architect and children’s welfare pioneer, otherwise known as the Godmother of Play. Much like Dr Marie Zakrsewska, Lady Allen built on Sørensen’s ideas to create a model for adventure playgrounds. She was also the first to extend the concept of risky play to children with disabilities. You can read more about her and her truly ground-breaking work in this field in this article: ‘children are more complicated than kettles.’ the life and work of Lady Allen of Hurtwood by Penny Wilson, a playworker in London’s adventurer playgrounds and watch some astonishing archival footage of children with disabilities playing in adventure playgrounds.

 

In the 60’s, you had Isamu Noguchi - sculptor and creator of the renowned Noguchi Coffee Table, among other splendid things. He dedicated years of his practice to create play spaces for children in America who saw “playgrounds as a primer of shapes and functions; simple, mysterious, and evocative; thus educational.” In the 70’s you have the Singapore Housing & Development Board looking at playgrounds as “one way local cultures and national identity could be explored using the physical landscape.” Led by landscape architects and urban designers - Khor Ean Ghee and Maria Boey Singapore’s HDB facilitated the creation of playgrounds that became monuments. Like the iconic dragon playground at Toa Payoh, playgrounds in Singapore were designed to help people moving to the city retain a sense of communal connection and identity - by incorporating local legends, creatures from literature and themes resonant with local history.

Dragon Playground at Toa Payoh, designed by Khor Ean Ghee. Photo Credit: Justin Zhuang via Flicker under the Creative Commons licence (CC BY-NC 2.0)
 

I wanted to wrap this article up with a bit of my local context. But like a lot of things, research or even musings into playspaces, patterns of play and playgrounds from the subcontinent are ridiculously hard to find. This despite the fact that the earliest known toys in history come to us from Indus Valley sites. I was able to find a couple of academic articles. The first was this comparative study Perceptions of Parents and Teachers in India on Play and Child Rights by Usha Ajithkumar Malayankandy. Done through descriptive comparative survey methodology, here are some of the observations of this study: 

  • Play is so important to optimal child development still parents perceive it as a reward to be given after the child has completed her/his study 

  • Most parents perceive play as a spare time activity. They also feel that children have to stop playing at some stage and grow up. 

  • Few teachers make provisions for learning through play.

  • Majority of the teachers perceive play as a reward to be given at the end of work.

  • Teachers think that rigid schedules, inadequate space and overprotective parents interfere with play.

Another was a 1999 study by Meera Oke et al looking at patterns of play among children in low SES neighbourhoods in Mumbai and Baroda, which concluded, unsurprisingly that “Children snatch their time and space to play by restructuring the content of their play to the context and innovating upon whatever is available to them. …The spaces which provide maximum opportunity for innovation, such as slums and construction sites are not particularly safe for children and the safe environments provided by the adults such as parks aren’t particularly stimulating. The challenge is to create play spaces that are safe, inexpensive and yet with scope for innovation and fun, fostering the spirit of playfulness in childhood.”

Given this lack of insight from the academics, I reached out to my community to share some images of the spaces they played in as children and what they consider play now and where they play as adults. Here are some of those:

Luv Mahtani, musician and founder of Ukulele with Luv, shares images from his childhood - the overgrown playground at his school, which was possibly less for play and more for letting the imagination run wild. And the more structured playground at Manas Resort, where he is pictured on a sea-saw-swing thing with his sister.

Probably Relevant Play Tip: Luv has new batches for his ukulele courses coming up. Fill out this form to register your interest.

Probably Relevant Vacay Tip: Manas Resort still exists and now has a petting zoo and an organic farm. Though I am guessing the room rents are quite a lot more than when the picture above was taken. Nonetheless, give it a dekho if you are looking for a pet-friendly getaway.

Nishita Zakariah, storyteller and co-founder of Art Walks Mumbai, shares these images of play spaces she frequents in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai and Pimple Saudagar (PCMC).

Probably Relevant Play Tip: Art Walks Mumbai is back in action! You can sign up for their curated walks or have one designed for you on their website here.

Gautam Rayakar, photographer, filmmaker and content creator, the friend mentioned at the start of this article, shares this image of a playground in his society where he still plays football and badminton.

 
 

Trishla Talera, artist, arts leader and founder of TIFA Working Studios, talks about playing in art and nature. Her playspaces include home, Empress Garden, TIFA and the hills around Pune. 

Probably Relevant Fun Fact: Empress Garden was established way back in 1830, and even today is home to over 150 different trees and a 5 acre plant nursery. With lockdown restrictions easing off, maybe it is time to revisit this favourite play space that has room for everyone - from squealing children, amorous youngsters as well as nanas and nanis. They have also recently launched a Terrace Garden Design Course - very accessible and in-depth. And though the first cohort is well on the way, you might want to keep an eye on the website for future courses.

Probably Relevant Side-Note: Our very own Ragini rescued a pupper from right outside Empress Gardens a few months ago. She babysat the 25-day old cutie till it got adopted to a furever home in Mumbai with the help of animal rescuer Devi Sheth. Devi is keen to bring more attention to animal adoption and you can get in touch with her for the same on her Instagram.

Also, the next time Ragini’s mad at me, I know what to send her!

Anywho, here are some pictures of the upper who is now a handsome boy all grown up, to make your day a little brighter: 

 

This article, like most things nowadays, has gone on for a bit. Just like play and spaces for play have gone from being de facto aspects of life to philosophical considerations to architectural and educational concepts. And as the tides come and go, the average individual’s access to open space and unstructured playtime recedes more and more. Children’s playspaces are increasingly being relegated to concrete parking lots. Adult playspaces have long degenerated into drinking holes with pricey menus and loud music. And in-between spaces are becoming more and more regulated by builders, religious and political interests and if nothing else, Residential Welfare Associations. Access to green and open spaces is becoming largely contingent on the ability to pay your way.

And to a large extent, we are letting it happen. 

Why we are doing so, is probably the subject of another full-length article, and something we could get into at a later date perhaps. Over some mojitos. But what I can leave you with for now, is a question. 

What can we do about it? 

We’d love to hear your thoughts on play, your experiences with playing and any ideas you have to bring play back to our communities. 

Until the next time, play away! 

 
Art Now Thus
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