[Xmca-l] Re: Do adults play?

[Greg Thompson]

Or differently playfully, Nietzsche's:

"Become who you are"

-greg


On Thu, Oct 24, 2013 at 9:08 PM, Greg Thompson <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com>wrote:

> Lois,
> The title reminds me of a favorite line from Lloyd Alexander's Castle of
> Llyr:
>
> "Child, child, do you not see? For each of us comes a time when we must be
> more than what we are."
>
> -greg
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 24, 2013 at 9:20 AM, Lois Holzman <
> lholzman@eastsideinstitute.org> wrote:
>
>> A propos this thread, I invite folks to peruse performingtheworld.organd read the attached announcement and call for proposals for the 8th
>> Performing the World conference to be held in NYC October 10-12, 2014—with
>> the theme "How Shall We Become?" The gathering brings together hundreds who
>> are doing/studying (and even theorizing) play and performance with people
>> of all ages. If you want to see adults play, this is one place to do it.
>> Lois
>>
>>
>>
>> Don't forget to check out the latest at http://loisholzman.org and
>> http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/conceptual-revolution
>>
>> Lois Holzman, Ph.D.
>> Director, East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy
>> 104-106 South Oxford St.
>> Brooklyn NY 11217
>> Chair, Global Outreach for All Stars Project UX
>> tel. 212.941.8906 ext. 324
>> fax 718.797.3966
>> lholzman@eastsideinstitute.org
>> eastsideinstitute.org
>> performingtheworld.org
>> loisholzman.org
>> allstars.org
>> http://esicommunitynews.wordpress.com/
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Oct 22, 2013, at 5:49 PM, CAITLIN WUBBENA <cwubbena@gse.upenn.edu>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > I agree that play allows us to construct realities (through play, we're
>> > able to imagine ourselves in new situations and are then able to
>> construct
>> > realities based on that "practice"). I think Vygotsky does a good job of
>> > setting that up. Kendall Walton also states that those who play develop
>> > better people skills (empathy, etc). I'm looking forward to reading the
>> > Luria article.
>> >
>> > I'm curious, from that point, how play could be conceived as enabling
>> > people to do better work. Maybe there's a way to make a "play as
>> developing
>> > human capital" argument. The set up is definitely there and I think
>> we've
>> > begun to touch upon that question. But I'm curious if there is more
>> > explicit evidence that proves this suspicion I have that people who play
>> > more in childhood are more comfortable "playing" with intellectual ideas
>> > later in life and, thus, produce better academic products.
>> >
>> >
>> > On Tue, Oct 22, 2013 at 11:00 AM, Larry Purss <lpscholar2@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> >
>> >> Greg,
>> >> Let's follow your lead or guidance [or invitation]whaen you pose the
>> >> question:
>> >> Seems like Vygotsky and mead would suggest that play changes over
>> >> developmental time. But it seems like vygotskys narrative of the
>> >> development of play has the main character, play,going down in a blaze
>> of
>> >> glory - sacrificing itself for the sake of the Sacred Symbolic
>> Development.
>> >> This question poses *play* as the main *character* in earlier *stages*
>> [?]
>> >> of development who then in a blaze of glory leaves the stage for the
>> sake
>> >> of *Sacred Symbolic to take over center stage.
>> >>
>> >> I would like to bring in Luria's article "The Problem" which Huw
>> recently
>> >> attached to explore this entering and leaving the stage [situation,
>> >> context]
>> >>
>> >> The hypothesis is that the dominance of "graphical-functional" forms of
>> >> *knowledge* transform when economic forces of production change [and
>> school
>> >> becomes an arena of development]
>> >> In Luria's words, "We needed to examine how REASONING processes took
>> place,
>> >> whether they were part of the subjects' DIRECT practical EXPERIENCE and
>> >> what changes they underwent when reasoning WENT BEYOND graphic
>> functional
>> >> practice and into the REALM of theoretical or FORMALIZED [systematized,
>> >> sedimented] thought."
>> >>
>> >> The next paragraph captures Greg's graphic-functional character exiting
>> >> stage left while "Sacred Symbolic" enters the *play*.
>> >>
>> >> Luria continues, "The next stage was a study of IMAGINATIVE PROCESSES,
>> THE
>> >> REMOVAL OF ONESELF from IMMEDIATE perception [?? M-P would say ALL
>> >> perception involves tradition] and operation on a PURELY symbolic,
>> verbal,
>> >> and logical level."
>> >>
>> >> Now my further question [invitation to dialogue] is to wonder if there
>> is
>> >> another *act* on this stage of consciousness??
>> >>
>> >> Perception AS *mediated* [not immediate] implies
>> >> graphic-functional orienting as involving *traditions*.
>> >> "Sacred Symbolic" requires *imaginal realms*.
>> >> Is there a need for reflecting on the notions of *knowledge* and
>> >> *understanding*.
>> >> Knowledge appropriated FROM the external inwards while understanding
>> moves
>> >> FROM the internal directed outwards?
>> >> I am using the inside/outside as metaphorical to IMAGINE  a graphical
>> >> image. In reality experience moves in EXCESS [m-p] of all metaphors and
>> >> models.
>> >> The move to distinquish knowledge and understanding may return us to
>> the
>> >> realm of *play* [Huw's reminder that play is *as if* knowledge and
>> >> understanding]
>> >> Larry
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On Tue, Oct 22, 2013 at 6:49 AM, <greg.a.thompson@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>
>> >>> Yes, Doug, you speak to the heart of the CHAT Matter, is the play of
>> >>> adults the same as the play of children? Or is there a development or
>> two
>> >>> along the way that involves a radical transformation in the
>> possibilities
>> >>> of play.
>> >>> Seems like Vygotsky and mead would suggest that play changes over
>> >>> developmental time. But it seems like vygotskys narrative of the
>> >>> development of play has the main character, play,going down in a
>> blaze of
>> >>> glory -  sacrificing itself for the sake of the Sacred Symbolic
>> >> Development.
>> >>>
>> >>> But maybe I've got that wrong?
>> >>> Greg
>> >>>
>> >>> Sent from my iPhone
>> >>>
>> >>> On Oct 22, 2013, at 2:31 AM, Douglas Williams <djwdoc@yahoo.com>
>> wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>>> Hi--
>> >>>>
>> >>>> I play bridge....does that count? :)
>> >>>>
>> >>>> What is play? In all species, a rehearsal; a symbolic enactment
>> echoing
>> >>> past and future activity. In humans, a possible world that represents
>> >> what
>> >>> is, what was, and what could be, in a symbolic form that enables it
>> to be
>> >>> shaped through thinking about rules, relationships, perceptions, and
>> >>> feelings. Games are the sum of human experience, in a form more
>> available
>> >>> for introspection and renovation than the "real" world, precisely
>> because
>> >>> they are games. Bridge, for example, is a game of coalitions, of
>> >> strategy,
>> >>> of psychology, of deception, none of which is so far distant from the
>> >> real
>> >>> politics of offices and of the streets. On another level, the Duke of
>> >>> Wellington famously (and for some, inexplicably) observed that the
>> Battle
>> >>> of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton. What Wellington
>> meant
>> >> is
>> >>> that the rehearsal of adversity and courage in sport enabled a beaten
>> >> army
>> >>> to persevere in following a strategy that enabled that beaten army to
>> >> win a
>> >>> long and
>> >>>> terrible battle. Wellington meant that field sport games, in their
>> >> often
>> >>> wanton brutality and sudden reversals, prepared his field commanders
>> to
>> >>> treat the even more wanton brutality and reversal of war with
>> practiced
>> >>> familiarity and undaunted spirit, in the certain belief that as they
>> had
>> >>> come from behind to win at Eton, so they would at Waterloo.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> We are a symbolic species. We live and breathe symbols. We dream of
>> >>> ourselves and each other, and out of our dreams, the world is given
>> form
>> >>> and substance. Communities take shape, symbolic interactions begin,
>> and
>> >>> towers of iron and concrete expand outward and upward from doodles.
>> And
>> >>> sometimes, we just remind ourselves in games of who we are, and where
>> we
>> >>> come from. I lay an offering of that kind of play before you.
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>
>> >>
>> http://uwch-4.humanities.washington.edu/~WG/~DCIII/120F%20Course%20Reader/CR5_Geertz_Deep%20Play.pdf
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Adults not play? What is the business of minds such as ours, if not
>> to
>> >>> dream of the impossible, and make it real? Or, in the words of a Mr.
>> >>> Church, who was confronted with similar doubts:
>> >>>>
>> >>>> No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand
>> >>> years from now, Virginia,  nay, ten times ten thousand years from
>> now, he
>> >>> will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> ...and I would add, the minds of adults.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Cheers,
>> >>>> Doug
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> On Monday, October 21, 2013 5:38 PM, "White, Phillip" <
>> >>> Phillip.White@ucdenver.edu> wrote:
>> >>>>
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Greg  -  Valerie back-channeled me:
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Something quantum physics going on here in a gnomic zen sort of way.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> Valerie
>> >>>>
>> >>>> and in considering what she wrote, i am now wondering if classical
>> >>> mechanical physics isn't being used here in xmca to explain
>> >>> perception/consciousness and the distinction between "play" and
>> >> "reality"  -
>> >>>>
>> >>>> whereas, for our 'mind', in the world of quantum physics, what is
>> >>> perceived - regardless theater, performance, movies, television,
>> whatever
>> >>> the media - the mind does not discriminate between what we call 'real'
>> >> and
>> >>> 'imaginary' .  it's all the same.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> so perhaps it's a false duality to think of play and real as polar
>> >>> opposites, but rather multiple genres of performance would better work
>> >> as a
>> >>> theoretical framework.
>> >>>>
>> >>>> phillip
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> Visiting Assistant Professor
> Department of Anthropology
> 883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> Brigham Young University
> Provo, UT 84602
> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson
>



-- 
Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
Visiting Assistant Professor
Department of Anthropology
883 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson