Forum on Play : Play in Childhood

Play in Childhood : An
Anthropological Perspective
Allison James

This paper offers a critical assessment and some illustrations of an

anthropological approach to the study of children’s play. It argues that
universal definitions of play are problematic and that therefore attention
should be paid to the local definitions of play operative in any culture. This
includes, importantly, the meanings that children attribute to and generate
through their play. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork the paper illustrates
just one aspect of children’s play : the different ways in which play
facilitates power relations to be articulated, upheld, and challenged. In this
sense play is revealed to be far from a frivolous activity. Instead, it is a
serious medium through which children conduct their social affairs.

Keywords : Childhood ; power ; anthropology ; culture

1962 ; cf. Ehrman, 1968) or marked by frivolity would be

Introduction
to ignore the specificities of local social contexts.
Within social anthropology there has been a long-standing
interest in play and, in particular, in defining the dis- Similarly, the conceptual separation between ‘ play ’ and
tinction between play and work. Cross-culturally, the ‘ work ’ activities may not be clear-cut and moreover, as
conceptual separations between play and other kinds of Sack (1977) has argued, play and work may not be
activity are not as clear-cut as they appear to be. Thus, for regarded as oppositional in some societies. Even within
example, whereas in Western industrialised societies play industrialised societies this distinction does not always
is thought to be primarily the activity of children, adults hold : the professional footballer works at what other men
being deemed to have leisure, anthropological studies may play and the DIY enthusiast spends leisure time
reveal that, cross-culturally, this linking between classi- doing the work of others. Thus, in order to understand
fications of age categories and activities may not occur. ‘ play ’ it is important to ask, as Wallman (1979) does for
Children and adults may participate alongside each other work, how play as an activity is constituted in a particular
in ‘ play-like ’ activities. Bada (1993, p. 204), for example, society, rather than starting from a predetermined set of
argues that the concept of ‘ playing ’ may be said to universal criteria that may be of limited relevance. From
encompass social practices as diverse as ‘ religious ritual, the perspective of social anthropology, therefore, interest
entertainment, dance, music, contests or sport ’ and to in play must centre on the particular cultural meanings
constitute adults’ as well as children’s activities. Similarly, that are attached to ‘ play ’ as a form of social action in
attempts to develop some universal characteristics for particular societies.
play as a particular kind of activity have also foundered.
For Huizinga (1949, pp. 26–28), play represented ‘ a Such an approach questions the extent to which play,
stepping out of ‘‘ real life ’’ into a temporary sphere of rather than work, can be said to be constitutive of
Allison James activity with a disposition all of its own … (where) special children’s experience of childhood, as is often taken to be
Department of rules obtain ’. Depicted as a temporary world ‘ dedicated the case for Western industrial societies. This is not to
Sociology & Social to the performance of an act apart ’, this description ignore the fact that many children in industrialised
Anthropology, nonetheless also characterises many kinds of religious and societies also participate in part-time work, outside
University of Hull, Hull, ritual activities to be found cross-culturally. To suggest, domestic settings. In cultures where children take on
North Humberside therefore, that ‘ play ’ is everywhere separated out by work-like tasks from an early age the play\work dis-
HU6 7RX particular temporal and spatial characteristics (Caillois, tinction may not be meaningful at all : play-like activities

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often take place alongside those of work and do not perspective immediately casts doubts, then, on the utility
constitute a separate domain of action (Reynolds, 1989). of universal definitions of childhood ; it therefore also
Additionally, as noted, in many societies such as those questions any attempt to develop a universal formulation
described by Rossie (1993) for Africa, ‘ play ’ is not of the role or purposes of children’s play. If childhood
reserved for children, while as Briggs (1986) observes, takes on particular local forms for children, then what
among the Inuit, the games adults play with children are play ‘ means ’ in any culture and for any group of children
highly dangerous and frightening for children and rep- must be explored in that local social context.
resent serious social lessons.
Central to this discussion is the status of children’s culture
An insistence on cultural specificity has encouraged social vis-a' -vis the adult world and the extent to which the
anthropologists, therefore, to abandon the task of seeking ‘ culture of childhood ’ can be said to represent a separate
universal definitions of play, of endeavouring to define its and autonomous children’s world (James, Jenks, & Prout,
purpose, or of trying to separate out play and work as 1998). Clearly, in many cultures, sets of cultural practices
necessarily distinct kinds of activities that children do. (Bourdieu, 1977) specific to children can be identified,
Rather, attention has turned to documenting the activities such as those documented by the Opies (Opie & Opie,
locally embraced as play and to the qualities and exper- 1969, 1977) for Britain. In their seminal work on the lore,
iences attributed to those activities. Thus, in the 1970s, language, and games of childhood the Opies were among
Schwartzman (1978) took the lead in interpreting the first to show that the rhymes and games that children
children’s play cross-culturally, seeing it as an important teach one another are peculiar to children and different
socialising medium through which children learn about from the nursery rhymes and games that adults teach their
the affective and cognitive systems of their particular offspring. They established that many of these children’s
culture. In this sense play was, for her, to be regarded as rhymes and games have a considerable antiquity and that
transformative of children. For Sutton-Smith (1977), on their mode of transmission—between generations of chil-
the other hand, play was best to be regarded as that which dren who pass into and out of childhood—has helped
potentiates rather than simply socialises children. In his perpetuate a distinctive and thriving oral children’s
view, play offers an arena of activity through which culture. At the same time, however, the Opies indicated
children explore and come to understand the social world, that these cultural practices were not simply a branch of
and through this activity children generate social meanings folklore but, instead, very useful practices used by children
that may, but often do not, reflect those of the adult world. in their daily lives. Teasing rhymes and ritual games are
Thus play may be as much about nonsense as about sense. easily adapted by children in their social encounters in the
The ethnographer must be sensitive to this when seeing playground. They are used by children as specific means
play as taking on a ‘ socialising ’ function : play may be as for achieving specific ends. Thus, according to the Opies
much about transformation as imitation and as much (Opie & Opie, 1977, p. 22), the twin themes of con-
about social disorder as about order. It is best regarded as servation and innovation permeate ‘ a thriving unself-
a ‘ cognitive activity which liberates thought ’, something conscious culture ’ belonging exclusively to children.
that permits the exploration of innovative as well as
routine, socialising roles (Sutton-Smith, 1977, p. 236). However, within the new social studies of childhood the
postulation of a separate culture of childhood is no longer
In this article I build on some of these approaches by regarded as theoretically sound (James et al., 1998).
considering what an anthropological approach to the Though a seductive proposition, in that it provides
study of ‘ childhood ’ can contribute to the understanding conceptual space for the voice of the child that is central to
of children’s play through the use of the ethnographic an anthropological approach to childhood, it is clear that
method of participant observation. In brief, I argue that it the activities of children are always and necessarily
facilitates a view of childhood play as a contextualised, contextualised by the adult world. Thus, children’s play
rather than simply naturalised, feature of children’s lives and games, although certainly a distinctive feature of child
and is a view of play that makes no a priori assumptions social life in Western industrialised societies, cannot be
about its socialising function. conceptually separated off from the adult world into an
insular children’s culture. However, in rejecting such a
view it is not necessary to retreat to the older argument
The culture of childhood that saw children’s play and games as simply characterised
This anthropological approach to children’s play thus by a passive mimicry. Rather, taking up Geertz’s (1976)
departs from more common understandings of play as point that any culture ‘ consists of socially established
purposeful and unproblematically imitative and, in doing structures of meaning ’, what a contemporary anthro-
so, is able to acknowledge fully the socially constructed pological approach to children’s play suggests is that in
character of childhood (James & Prout, 1990). By this is those very games and activities, which are said to be
meant that whilst all children experience biological child- expressive of the ‘ culture of childhood ’, can be found
hood, in the sense that all children grow from infancy to some of the structures of social meaning that are mean-
adulthood, the precise form in which that ‘ growing up ’ ingful to children. That is to say, in children’s play can be
takes place will differ across and between societies. Such a discovered some of the signs and symbols through which

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children come to understand the potential and possibilities socialisation process. Play and games may be one arena
of the social world. It is interpreting those meanings that within which this orientation can be seen to take place.
becomes, then, the analytic task.

For example, although games such as those of ‘ Doctors Child’s play ?

and Nurses ’ and ‘ Mummies and Daddies ’ may seem to Drawing on ethnographic field material, gathered during
offer clear evidence of processes of gender socialisation, a study of the social lives of children aged between 4 and
from an anthropological perspective what is most signifi- 9 years at an English primary school, I shall now provide
cant about these games is that they are played out and some substantive illustration of these more general obser-
experienced by children in the company of other children. vations. (This study was funded by the British Academy
It is therefore children’s understandings—what they mean, and a full account can be found in James, 1993.) In
why they play them, and what that play involves—that an particular, I show how issues of social identity arise, are
anthropological approach seeks to discover. Although taken on, and are negotiated and\or resolved by children
this may well reveal that, in such games, stereotypes of through the ebb and flow of the games they play with one
gender are writ large, through closely documenting the another.
performance of these games, children’s own understand-
ing of the complexity of gender roles may be revealed and The school where the research was carried out was large,
instances of contradiction or denial may be enacted. with approximately 400 children on its roll and was
Additionally, although this might be said, therefore, to situated in a mainly working-class district of a large
provide valuable insight into the ways in which children English town. In recent times, the social mix had changed,
come to learn about their future adult roles as men and with approximately 60 % of the children now living in
women in society, it must also be recognised that such council property. It was not, however, very ethnically
games are, at the same time, speaking to children’s mixed : just about 4 % of the children came from an Afro-
everyday concerns as children. Children may therefore use Caribbean or Chinese background and there was only one
their role as a ‘ mummy ’ or a ‘ daddy ’ to orchestrate their Asian family represented in the school child population. A
present social relations in the playground and to play out scattering of children came from mixed-race families and
particular power relations (Goodwin, 1997, and see about 20 % lived in one-parent households. It was, in sum,
below). a fairly ordinary local primary school and one which, for
a period of 1 year, I attended.
From the perspective of a social anthropological approach
to childhood, therefore, play is to be regarded as just one Within this environment I worked hard to cultivate an
aspect of the shared repertoire of cultural practices anthropological fieldwork role. Through participating in
through which children themselves find ways of making the children’s games, listening to their stories, and often
some sense of their social encounters with others—with becoming the unknowing butt of their jokes and teasing, I
teachers, adults, and children. But, at the same time, it is took on the role of a much larger and older friend, rather
acknowledged that these very resources, which give than teacher or parent, in order to explore what, from the
particular and peculiar characteristics to the ‘ culture of children’s point of view, were significant markers of social
childhood ’, are shaped largely by adults’ wants and identity. In doing so, I was acknowledging the ways in
desires. These find expression through a particular ideo- which the school in British society is an important and
logy centring on the ‘ needs ’ and ‘ (in)abilities ’ of children, instructive site of childhood for the cultural framing
of particular cultural understandings of what childhood of children’s identities. In Western societies, it is the
should be : we want our children to learn, so we segregate school system that largely contextualises children’s social
them in school ; we want them to grow up to be sociable, experience of childhood through conceptually and literally
so we encourage them to make friends, to play games ; we distancing children from the adult world (Hockey &
desire them to be protected in their innocence, so we James, 1993). In schools, boys and girls are forced into
curtail their activities within a known environment and daily mutual interaction with one another. There are few
endeavour to restrict their access to certain types of places to escape the crowd at school, and any withdrawal
knowledge (Hockey & James, 1993 ; James & Prout, from the company of other children may be interpreted by
1990). In this sense children’s present experiences and own staff and parents, if not by children themselves, as a
cultural practices are conceptually orchestrated through stigmatising sign of difference. The school world styles
wider ideologies of childhood (Stainton-Rogers & particular kinds of interactions between children through
Stainton-Rogers, 1992). Thus, for example, under the its contextualising of a particular children’s culture. In the
banner of what Ennew (1986) describes as the obligation world outside school, ‘ at home or in the street ’, another
to be happy, the day-to-day lives of children are shaped social order may pertain. Here school friendships may be
through the construction of childhood as being an reaffirmed but they may also be refused. Different games
apprenticeship for the future (James & Prout, 1990). It is may be played, different jokes told.
a future that is both uncertain and unknown, and yet one
towards which children must begin to take on particu- For example, the rigid gender separation in children’s play
larised orientations, made manifest to them through the at school, noted commonly in the literature (Lever, 1976 ;

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Thorne, 1993), may not occur outside that context. This Patsy’s version was quickly accepted by Jess who, shy and
was revealed to me by 6-year-old Alice. In answer to the less articulate, saw herself as a novice in these affairs.
question ‘ Do you play with boys ? ’ Alice replied that she ‘ Patsy ’, Jess told me in hushed tones, ‘ knows them all ’.
played with Bobby at home and on the way to school. At Thus, although undoubtedly such changes in the telling
the school gate, however, this friendship was, each day, and retelling from one child to another accounts for the
temporarily suspended. Only on their return journey home variations and transformations in linguistic lore docu-
was it resumed. Similarly, ways of behaving and ways of mented by the Opies (Opie & Opie, 1977), within any
talking may abruptly change as children leave their home particular group of children there does exist an authorised
environment and join their contemporaries in the play- version that each child must get to know. Eight-year-old
ground. Cassie, also a little shy and reticent, described how this
arises. She told me that ‘ you just hear other people doing
Thus the school, in providing an important location for it ’ and then copy their version. Lorna, more confident,
the ‘ culture of childhood ’, can be said to furnish children disparagingly told me that ‘ Mary Smith kept making
with, in Sutton-Smith’s (1977) terms, potential ways of them up and kept spreading them ’. It was as if some
‘ being ’ or models of identity that they can try out and disease had run rife through the company of children.
refashion, adopt or abandon, augment or modify. Nina was the most explicit about how rhymes became
Although these may often turn out to represent future known and particular renderings accepted : ‘ Jackie’s sister
adult roles—as classical socialisation theory suggests—the taught Jackie, Jackie taught Polly, Polly taught me and I
way in which this process occurs is not through simple taught Susie and Susie taught Kim ’. All this takes time.
imitation. Children are not mirrors in which we can see Moreover, it is a mode of oral and visual transmission that
our younger selves. Instead, children’s progressive under- requires an active participation, necessitating endless
standing of their future as men and women in the social repetition and practice, careful listening, and observation
world is a complex, inventive, and innovative process. (see also Sluckin, 1981).
Children actively engaged with their future adult roles
through the intricacies of their day-to-day encounters.
They are not simply copied or taken on. Those children who are not allowed by others to play or
from whom knowledge about how to play is withheld are
But in order to play—whether it be informal games of thus effectively already taking on identities as losers in the
‘ Mummies and Daddies ’ or the rule-bound games of Tig social world. In this respect the ownership of games can be
and skipping games—a child must first learn how to play as critical. Some games gather their participants demo-
a child among other children at school. This means getting cratically. Two children put their arms round each other’s
to know and learning to use the implicit rules of behaviour shoulders and march through the playground calling out :
and thought embedded in the cultural practices of ‘ Who wants to play ? ’, followed by the name of the game.
childhood which, as I show below, may facilitate the Anyone may join such a line and, on some occasions, this
enactment of particular power relations. This is not to say activity transforms into a game itself : as the line gets
that all play relations are necessarily also power relations. longer so the chanting becomes louder and the faster it
Thus it is only among the 6- and 7-year-olds—those who wheels around the playground. At other times, however,
have been a year or so at school—that the traditional one child may decide on a game and initiate play ; for that
games of childhood play noted by the Opies (Opie & Opie, playtime ownership of the game befalls that child and she
1969, 1977) begin to flourish, for knowing how to play or he is able to choose the players. Being ‘ allowed ’ to play
takes both time and practice. In addition, it requires a signals identity as an insider through bestowing temporary
degree of social skill for, in effect, you can’t play until you membership of a particular social group upon an in-
know how to play and you only get to know how to play dividual child. Not being allowed to play, conversely,
by joining in. Surmounting these barriers is also difficult to confers outsider status as either a fleeting or more
achieve, as 7-year-old Jess and Patsy’s conversation permanent identity. A child may therefore use this power
illustrates. The two girls were telling me about the ‘ dips ’ to augment his or her own identity ; to curry favour
used by children to initiate a game and Jess had begun to with a more popular child or, indeed, to humiliate or
relate one of the rhymes they use : ostracise.

Jess : Mickey Mouse in the house,

pulling down his trousers, These power relations are revealed in the following
quick mum, smack his bum example of a game that took place in the ‘ home corner ’
ninety-nine a hundred. located in the nursery classroom. Usually but not always
initiated by girls, scenes from daily domestic life were
Patsy : (interrupting) enacted out here. Boys were conscripted to play the male
No. number one. roles ‘ you’re daddy right ? ’, but were often refused a more
Mickey mouse in his house, active part in the domestic environment constructed by
pulling down his trousers. the girls around babies and future maternal roles. One 4-
quick mum, smack his bum, year-old girl established this world as she played, drawing
and that’s the end of number one. a boy into her script where necessary :

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‘ You’re out of my house ’ she says to no one in particular as ways to initiate a game, to later refuse the ‘ rules of the
she brings plates and cups to a table. ‘ I haven’t no peas in my game ’ is not a skill to be admired. Jess complained bitterly
house ’. (To a boy standing watching) : ‘ Will you look after to me of what she regarded as one girl’s unfairness. This
my food ? … You’re daddy right ? Come on, hurry. You can girl always refused to be ‘ it ’, to be the chaser in games of
have milk shake and I’ve got some peas. I know where they chase. Jess interpreted her refusal not as a skill developed
are … lost them … in the pink jug. Where’s the milk jug over time, but as the explicit rejection of the very rules of
because I need it ? No. We don’t need it there. I gave it to dad play itself and as a sign of her potential outsiderness. ‘ It’s
and he was losing it. I’m going home ’. (To the boy again :) not fair ’, a phrase that commonly echoes round the
‘ You come to my house, dad, there’s your hat.’ (She gives playground, may not therefore constitute an appeal for
him a straw hat). ‘ Go away.’ (She pushes away another boy parity and equality—jostling for position in the hierarchy
who attempts to join in). On another day, hanging around of esteem is central to much of what children do. It may,
outside the Wendy House in the reception class and refused instead, be an objection to another’s flagrant disregard of
access by the girls for the third time, 5-year-old Saul the implicit rules of play itself.
reluctantly announced : ‘ I’ll go off to work again ’.

Gaining the confidence to participate in games is therefore Conclusion

very important, as this example suggests. A child’s abilities Through the use of the ethnographic method, which
and social skills are often put to the test and power positions children as social actors who can give their own
struggles may become central to many children’s games. account of the social world, an anthropological approach
For example, the simple power of touch that comes into based on long-term participant observation can explore
play in games of Tig or Stuck in the Mud transfers the social interactions involved in children’s play as they
symbolic stigmas from child to child. Others can be unfold. These all too brief glimpses of children’s play and
rendered immobile and a nonparticipant through being culture documented above reveal a set of ‘ childish ’ skills
touched. For the swift and artful child such games are and embodied practices which, as Goodwin (1997) notes,
unproblematic : other children can easily and quickly be make children into shrewd political actors. It is clear that
made to ‘ stick in the mud ’ as the stigma is passed on. For acquiring playground skills involves more than just getting
the fat, slow child, however, or for the child with asthma to know the structure and rules of a game ; children
or for the youngest child in a group, participation may be candidly weigh up the balance of power and prestige in the
more tricky : to be ‘ it ’ may mean endlessly and hopelessly literal playing out of social identity. In the playground
chasing others who laugh and mock attempts to catch reputations are made and lost and stigmatised identities
them. Participation in these games means, therefore, being may be temporarily conferred or more permanently
able to assess one’s own skills and abilities in comparison acquired. Playing the game means, therefore, knowing
to others. It also means learning how to manipulate and what to play, where to play, how to play, and who to play
operate dips—these games of seeming random chance that with, and it is through a detailed engagement with the
lend the illusion of fairness to deciding who is ‘ it ’. Jess and performance of children’s play that such patterns of
Patsy are talking to me again and explaining how being activities can be successfully revealed.
‘ it ’ (being on) is decided at the start of the game :

Jess : Sometimes I be on … but she (Patsy) always makes References

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