Homo Ludens is a book originally published in Dutch in 1938 by Dutch historian and cultural theorist Johan Huizinga. It discusses the importance of the play element of culture and society. Huizinga suggests that play is primary to and a necessary (though not sufficient) condition of the generation of culture. The Latin word is the present active participle of the verb , which itself is cognate with the noun . has no direct equivalent in English, as it simultaneously refers to sport, play, school, and practice.
Contents
I. Nature and significance of play as a cultural phenomenon Play is older than culture, for culture, however inadequately defined, always presupposes human society, and animals have not waited for man to teach them their playing.Huizinga 1955, p. 1.
Huizinga begins by making it clear that animals played before humans. One of the most significant (human and cultural) aspects of play is that it is fun.Huizinga 1955, p. 3.
Huizinga identifies 5 characteristics that play must have:Huizinga 1955, p. 8–10. Play is free, is in fact freedom. Play is not "ordinary" or "real" life. Play is distinct from "ordinary" life both as to locality and duration. Play creates order, is order. Play demands order absolute and supreme. Play is connected with no material interest, and no profit can be gained from it.Huizinga 1955, p. 13.
Huizinga shows that in ritual dances a person 'becomes' a kangaroo. There is a difference in how Western thought expresses this concept and how "primitive" religions view this. Scholars of religion use Western terminology to describe non-Western concepts.
"He has taken on the "essence" of the kangaroo, says the savage; he is playing the kangaroo, say we. The savage, however, knows nothing of the conceptual distinctions between "being" and "playing"; he knows nothing of "identity", "image" or "symbol"." Huizinga 1955, p. 25. In this way Huizinga suggests the universally understood concept of play is more fitting to both societies to describe this phenomenon.
II. The play concept as expressed in language Word and idea are not born of scientific or logical thinking but of creative language, which means of innumerable languages—for this act of "conception" has taken place over and over again.Huizinga 1955, p.28
Huizinga has much to say about the words for play in different languages. Perhaps the most extraordinary remark concerns the Latin language. "It is remarkable that , as the general term for play, has not only not passed into the Romance languages but has left hardly any traces there, so far as I can see... We must leave to one side the question whether the disappearance of and is due to phonetic or to semantic causes."Huizinga 1955, p. 36.
Of all the possible uses of the word "play" Huizinga specifically mentions the equation of play with, on the one hand, "serious strife", and on the other, "erotic applications".Starting from his remark on Professor Buytendijk's use of the word "love-play", Huizinga remarks that in his own opinion "it is not the act as such that the spirit of language tends to conceive as play; rather the road thereto, the preparation for and introduction to 'love', which is often made enticing by all sorts of playing. This is particularly true when one of the sexes has to rouse or win the other over to copulating". Today one uses the word foreplay to describe this "love-play". Huizinga, 1955, p. 43.
Play-category, play-concept, play-function, play-word in selected languages Huizinga attempts to classify the words used for play in a variety of natural languages. The chapter title uses "play-concept" to describe such words. Other words used with the "play-" prefix are play-function and play-form. The order in which examples are given in natural languages is as follows:
GreekHuizinga 1955, p. 30. (3) — pertaining to children's games, — associated with the idea of the trifling, the nugatory, — for matches and contests.
SanskritHuizinga 1955, p. 30–31. (4) krīdati — denoting the play of animals, children, adults, divyati — gambling, dicing, joking, jesting, ..., vilāsa — shining, sudden appearance, playing and pursuing an occupation, līlayati — light, frivolous insignificant sides of playing.
ChineseHuizinga acknowledges the assistance of Professor Duyvendak 's "friendly help [which allows him] to say something about the Chinese expressions for the play-function". Huizinga 1955, p. 32. (3) (wán) — is the most important word covering children's games and much much more, (zhēng) — denoting anything to do with contests, corresponds exactly to the Greek agon, (sài) — organized contest for a prize.
BlackfootThe information on the Blackfoot language used by Huizinga comes from Professor Christianus Cornelis Uhlenbeck. Huizinga 1955, p. 33. See the book Montana 1911: A Professor and his Wife among the Blackfeet for further details behind this contribution of the Blackfoot Indian language to Homo Ludens. (2) koani — all children's games and also in the erotic sense of "dallying", kachtsi — organized play.
JapaneseHuizinga acknowledges the assistance of Professor Johannes Rahder, Huizinga 1955, p.34. Having identified a single word, Huizinga then goes on to explain that the matter is more complicated, Specifically, he mentions bushido (which was enacted in play-forms) and later asobase-kotoba (literally play-language — for polite speech, the mode of address used in conversation with persons of higher rank). (1) (asobu) — is a single, very definite word, for the play function.
Semitic languages la’ab (a root, cognate with la’at) — play, laughing, mocking, la’iba (Arabic) — playing in general, making mock of, teasing,Huizinga makes a point of noting that this Arabic word is used for the "playing" of a musical instrument, as in some modern European languages. Huizinga 1955, p. 35. la’ab (Aramaic) — laughing and mocking, sahaq (Hebrew) — laughing and playing.
Latin (1) — from , covers the whole field of playHuizinga then makes a point of noting that jocus, jocari does not mean play proper in classical Latin. Huizinga 1955, p. 35. The primary reason for making this point here is that later he shall note the disappearance of ludus to be supplanted by jocus in the emergence of the Romance languages.
III. Play and contest as civilizing functions The view we take in the following pages is that culture arises in the form of play, that it is played from the very beginning... Social life is endued with supra-biological forms, in the shape of play, which enhances its value.Huizinga 1955, p. 46.
Huizinga does not mean that "play turns into culture". Rather, he sets play and culture side by side, talks about their "twin union", but insists that "play is primary".
In this chapter, Huizinga highlights the antagonistic aspect of play and its "civilizing function". Using the research of Marcel Granet, Huizinga describes the festal practices of ancient Chinese clans, who incorporated various contests in their celebrations and rituals. These contests, in essence, divided the clan internally into what are known by anthropologists as phratriai, and these internal divisions become a social hierarchy, laying the groundwork for more "complex" civilizations.
When describing antagonistic relationships between clans (as opposed to internally), Huizinga mentions the practice of potlatch. He writes,In its most typical form as found among the Kwakiutl tribe the potlatch is a great solemn feast, during which one of two groups, with much pomp and ceremony, makes gifts on a large scale to the other group for the express purpose of showing its [the gift-giving group's] superiority.The potlatch is meant to be a frivolous, wasteful, even destruction display of superiority, and accounts are given of rival clans ruining their estates, killing their livestock and slaves, and even—in one instance—a spouse. Instances of this practice can be traced all over the world and throughout history, even in sacred texts; for example, Marcel Mauss claimed that "the Mahabharata is the story of a gigantic potlach" (quoted by Huizinga).
Tying his reflections on the potlach to his underlying thesis regarding play, Huizinga claims thatthe potlatch is, in my view, the agonistic "instinct" pure and simple. [All instances of the potlatch] must be regarded first and foremost as a violent expression of the human need to fight. Once this is admitted we may call them, strictly speaking, "play" -- serious play, fateful and fatal play, bloody play, sacred play, but nonetheless that playing which, in archaic society, raises the individual or the collective personality to a higher power.The remainder of this chapter is devoted to an analysis of the idea of virtue (άρετή) as it relates to αγων and play. Competition affords members of a community to win accolades, esteem, and honor, and honor, according to Aristotle, is what allows people "to persuade themselves of their own worth, their virtue." From this, Huizinga concludes that "virtue, honor, nobility, and glory fall at the outset within the field of competition, which is that of play." This connection between virtue (άρετή) and play affords Huizinga the connection he needs to link play with civilization: Training for aristocratic living leads to training for life in the State and for the State. Here too άρετή is not as yet entirely ethical. It still means above all the fitness of the citizen for his tasks in the polis, and the idea it originally contained of exercise by means of contests still retains much of its old weight.The remainder of the chapter is devoted to providing literary and mythological examples of contests that have served the civilizing function, with reference being made to Beowulf, Old Norse sagas, and many others.
IV. Play and law The judge's wig, however, is more than a mere relic of antiquated professional dress. Functionally it has close connections with the dancing masks of savages. It transforms the wearer into another "being". And it is by no means the only very ancient feature which the strong sense of tradition so peculiar to the British has preserved in law. The sporting element and the humour so much in evidence in British legal practice is one of the basic features of law in archaic society.Huizinga 1995, p. 77.
Three play-forms in the lawsuit Huizinga puts forward the idea that there are "three play-forms in the lawsuit" and that these forms can be deduced by comparing practice today with "legal proceedings in archaic society":Huizinga 1955, p. 84. the game of chance, the contest, the verbal battle.
V. Play and war Until recently the "law of nations" was generally held to constitute such a system of limitation, recognizing as it did the ideal of a community with rights and claims for all, and expressly separating the state of war—by declaring it—from peace on the one hand and criminal violence on the other. It remained for the theory of "total war" to banish war's cultural function and extinguish the last vestige of the play-element.Huizinga 1955, p. 90.
This chapter occupies a certain unique position not only in the book but more obviously in Huizinga's own life. The first Dutch version was published in 1938 (before the official outbreak of World War II). The Beacon Press book is based on the combination of Huizinga's English text and the German text, published in Switzerland 1944. Huizinga died in 1945 (the year the Second World War ended). One wages war to obtain a decision of holy validity.Huizinga 1955, p. 91. An armed conflict is as much a mode of justice as divination or a legal proceeding. War itself might be regarded as a form of divination.Note from the translator: "Huizinga's own English MS. replaces this third factor by 'the cessation of normal social conditions'." Huizinga 1955, p. 91.
The chapter contains some pleasantly surprising remarks: