Public-domain ebook
The Play of Man
by Karl Groos
Language: en1,349 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: Archaeology & Anthropology·Psychiatry/Psychology
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #58411.
About this book
The Play of Man is a scholarly treatise that extends Karl Groos’s earlier work on animal play to the human sphere. Opening with a detailed preface that explains the author’s intent to build on his 1896 study, the book proceeds to a systematic classification of play, beginning with “playful experimentation” of the sensory apparatus. The introductory sections outline how even newborns engage in touch‑based activities that evolve into purposeful grasping, positioning these behaviors as the earliest forms of play. Throughout the first part, Groos distinguishes between impulses of the first order, those directed toward an individual’s own psycho‑physical organism, and impulses of the second order, which involve social and sexual interactions. By grounding his analysis in biological, psychological, and aesthetic perspectives, he offers a comprehensive, though admittedly provisional, framework for understanding the myriad ways humans experiment with sensation, movement, and higher mental powers.
Written in the formal, didactic style of early‑20th‑century German scholarship, the work combines dense philosophical argument with meticulous empirical observation. Its language is precise, often invoking contemporary psychologists such as Ribot and Jodl, and it assumes a reader comfortable with technical terminology. Students of the history of psychology, scholars of child development, and anyone interested in the intellectual lineage of play theory will find Groos’s exhaustive taxonomy and interdisciplinary approach rewarding, while those seeking a light narrative or modern jargon may prefer more accessible treatments.
Who appears in The Play of Man
- Professor GroosMiddle‑aged German scholar, neat beard, round spectacles, dark suit with academic frock coat, thoughtful expression
The opening · free to read
Editor’s Preface
The present writer contributed a somewhat lengthy preface and also an appendix to the translation of the author’s earlier volume, The Play of Animals, mainly because—apart from the expressed wish of Professor Groos—he wanted to say something about the book. It is a pleasure to him now to have the justification for it which comes from the adoption by Professor Groos in this volume of the suggestions made in the translation of the earlier one. The main points have all been accepted and used by the author (see pp. 265, 376, 395, of this volume, for example), and further discussions of them have been brought out. This is said in view of the opinion of many that “introductions” are always out of place.
A notable thing about the present volume, considered in relation to the Play of Animals, is the modification of the theory of play as respects its criteria—a point fully explained by the author in his Introduction (see especially p. 5).
The present writer’s editorial function has been confined to the insertion of various notes, and the suggesting to the translator of certain renderings; both mainly of a terminological sort (see pp. 5, 122, 133, 264, for examples). In this connection it has been found possible to anticipate and follow the recommendations made in the present writer’s Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology (now in press), seeing that Professor Groos is in active co-operation with the committee engaged upon the German-English equivalents of that work, in so far adopted here. A particular case is the group of renderings: “Preparation” (Vorübung), “Habituation” (Einübung), “Exercise” (Ausübung), all terms of the “Practice” (Uebung) theory of play. Another case is the set of terms applied to the various reactions of “Shyness”—e. g., “Bashfulness” (Schüchternheit), “Coyness” (Sprödigkeit), “Modesty” (Bescheidenheit), “Shame” (Scham), etc. Biologists will note the adoption of “Rudiment” for Anlage in its biological sense.
Intrinsically the work will be found a worthy companion to The Play of Animals, a book which has already become famous.
J. MARK BALDWIN.
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, February, 1901.
Author’s Preface
In this work my aim is to present the anthropological aspects of the same subject treated of in my psychological investigation of animal play, published in 1896, which may be said to have been a pioneer attempt in its department. In the discussion of human play, however, I am supported by valuable philosophical works, among which I acknowledge myself especially indebted to those of Schaller, Lazarus, and Colozza. In regard to the standpoint from which I approach the general problem of play, it is hardly necessary for me to speak at length here. It is the same practice theory on which I intrenched myself in the earlier work. The difficulties in its way, arising from our as yet imperfect understanding of human impulse life, are fully allowed for in the introduction to the first section, and I am convinced that the results attained by its adoption will, on the whole, justify the method of treatment which I have chosen.
Since it was my interest in æsthetics which first induced me to turn my attention to the subject of play, it is natural that the æsthetic phase of the question should be conspicuous in this volume. Still, I wish it to be distinctly understood that my inquiry has not been conducted solely in obedience to such leadings, nor should it be judged exclusively by æsthetic criteria. I have intentionally left many questions open for more mature consideration, at some future time, when I can give to them more thought than was possible in the year’s study which I have devoted to play phenomena.
KARL GROOS.
BASEL, December, 1898.
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