Let's Play!

Is play simply a frivolous childhood act? Or does it teach us skills essential to our survival? Do we underestimate its value? Can it help us achieve success no matter what we're doing? 

Looks like we need to look at the serious business of play.

All the experts agree that play is crucial to the development of a healthy child. But play is just as important for adults. Lister Sinclair assembled a group of illustrious guests to prove the point. The year was 1987 and the program was CBC Radio's Ideas. 

 

The first was Dr Jane Goodall. Goodall is one of the world's foremost researchers of our closest living relatives, the chimpanzee. Over many decades, her study of chimps in the wild illustrates the importance of play in their societies. She claims a chimp who's had the chance to play as a youngster has a far better chance of survival as an adult. Furthermore, she found the chimp's ability to play seems to be an inherited behaviour which helps them learn about the complicated social hierarchy of their group. The young chimps learns to assess and test her own social and physical strengths, as well as his limitations, skills that must be learned in order to compete, invent and thrive. Turns out these lessons are essential not just for chimpanzees, but for humans as well.

Next guest was the eminent child psychologist Dr Bruno Bettelheim. He devoted his life's work to what he called "helping others in their becoming." He believed that play humanizes us, and is, in fact the most important activity human beings engage in. We are simply not human without play.

According to Bettelheim, interactive play, in contrast to other self-centred activities, is a great way to tame our own self-doubt and get validation from others. Play teaches how to play the game, but also how to set the rules for it. 

Sports journalist, and self described professional amateur George Plimpton talked about how he believed the joy of playing is what helps us learn. But he didn't call it learning, to him it was "euphoric identification with.. (an).. athletic feat." Why is play such an important part of life? Plimpton suggests the answer might lie in the fact that play is about being under pressure with not only your skills and your temperament on display. When we play, we are at some level performing and there is something inherently exhilarating about it. That's the essence of life, according to Plimpton. The rest is merely waiting.

Distinguished and yet eminently playful Canadian poet Earle Birney told Lister Sinclair how he liked to play with words and sounds. Lister asked him if play was an essential part of the process in writing a poem. Yes, he said. Even with a serious poem, it's important to let yourself go, find inspiration in everyday things and see the humour in them.  

Richard Feynman was a Nobel award winning physicist who helped develop the nuclear bomb. Totally serious you would think. But he too believed in the power of play. He said play helped him discover new ideas and make mental connections. Feynman remembered a particularly stressful time in his career when he was reminded that the best way to learn, and to open your mind to learning, was to stop worrying about the work, to simply have a good time. That's when work becomes fun and surprises pop up when we least expect them. 

Also on this program was pianist Gloria Saarinen who demonstrated the playfulness musicians use in not only creating new work but also in interpreting it.   

This program was originally produced by Sara Wolch.