Everyday play activities as therapeutic and pedagogical encounters

Abstract

This paper focuses on the idea of play activities as everyday therapeutic and pedagogical encounters. Drawing on the Greek therapeia meaning attendance, I argue that play activities between human beings provide opportunities to attend to or stretch towards each other, to create intersubjective, relational spaces and possibilities that contribute to health, well-being and development. Similarly, playful pedagogy is defined here in relation to the continental European model of social pedagogy, which embodies co-construction, dialogue and mutual understanding between teachers-as-learners and learners-as-teachers. Because the field of play scholarship is eclectic (and not always in agreement) I draw on contrasting theoretical perspectives to explore the nature and characteristics of play, and to support the idea of play activities as therapeutic encounters. However, I avoid the common trap of extolling the romantic, often precious, and uncritical view that all play is positive. Drawing on the work of Sutton-Smith (1997), I argue that dark play or cruel play also involves attendance and stretching towards, sometimes with anti-social purposes and damaging consequences. The discussion draws on contemporary issues about the changing nature of play in young people's lives in the context of social and technological change. I use observations and narratives of play to illustrate contrasting theoretical perspectives, focusing on the importance of co-construction, inter-subjectivity and intimacy in play activities.