Chapter 11

Question 1

What are play & art?

Answer 1

What are play & art?

Question 2

What did Marshall Sahlins make a distinction between?

Answer 2

Marshall Sahlins made a distinction between work and leisure time

With the exception of when it intersects with religion, and ritual, playfulness, and creativity were often overlooked in early anthropology

Question 3

What is play?

Answer 3

An activity outside of the ordinary that is free, open, imaginative, pleasurable, and alludes to the non-play world by creatively transforming the objects, roles, actions, and relations of the non-play world.

Possibly predates culture as animals also play

Question 4

What does John Huizing say about play?

Answer 4

Play is a free activity that exists outside of ordinary activities of life that is:
- Framed as outside of the norms and expectations of the ordinary
- Free, and therefore, not bound by rules or scripts
- an end in and of itself in that there is no other purpose to play but play
- open because it is creative, imaginative, and innovative
- Pleasurable and voluntary

Question 5

What is metacommunication?

Answer 5

communicating about the process of communication

Question 6

Why is meta-communication important?

Answer 6

Play and non-play must be signalled clearly so that one is not mistaken for the other. This is done through meta-communication

Question 7

What did Gregory Bateson comment?

Answer 7

Anthropologist Gregory Bateson comments on the importance of play among all animals, including humans, as a reflection of our ability to be reflexive, open, and joyful.

Question 8

What are the two types of meta-communication?

Answer 8

Reflexivity and framing

Question 9

What is reflexivity?

Answer 9

critically thinking about the way one thinks and reflecting on one’s own experience

Question 10

What is framing?

Answer 10

a cognitive boundary that marks certain behaviours as “play” or as “ordinary life”

Question 11

Why is play important?

Answer 11

• Imitation of adult activities
• “Edutainment”: dual tasks of education and entertainment
• Commentary on the “real world” and undermining social norms
• Social critique

Question 12

What do different forms of play show us?

Answer 12

Different forms of play show us that people do not always submit to the generally accepted rules of reality that govern everyday life.

• Joking behavior can both reinforce existing social bonds and ease tensions among strangers
• Dangerous activity allows individuals the opportunity to view reality outside of the ordinary

Question 13

What is a game?

Answer 13

A type of play that is less free because games are subject to rules and have an end goal or objective—often to win.

Question 14

How are digital games connected to anthropology?

Answer 14

Digital overlaps with many other areas of anthropology, including virtual anthropology and anthropology of the media.

Question 15

What is digital anthropology?

Answer 15

A broad category that includes “everything that has been developed by, or can be reduced to, the binary—that is bits consisting of 0s and 1s” (Miller and Horst 2020: 5).

Question 16

What questions do anthropologists studying digital play and games ask?

Answer 16

• What constitutes real, actual, or virtual?
• What is the distinction between the ordinary and extraordinary?
• Are these experiences solitary or communal?

Question 17

What is a magic circle?

Answer 17

A social space of gameplay that is set apart from ordinary life and is bound by rules of a particular game

Question 18

What does sport show us?

Answer 18

Sport in the nation-state fosters national pride, cohesiveness, and a sense of identity separate to outside perceptions (e.g., hockey in Canada)

Question 19

How does Christian Bromberger describe sport?

Answer 19

Christian Bromberger describes sport as a metaphor for the daily struggles of life

Question 20

What is art?

Answer 20

A representation that relates to an object, an experience, or some other component of the world and that evokes a felt response.

Question 21

What is an example of art?

Answer 21

A Clovis point is an artifact associated with the Clovis culture, which existed approximately 13,000 years ago in what is now the southwestern United States.

Question 22

In general, art is art when it has a recognizable:

Answer 22

• Form (such as painting or dance)
• Aesthetic (e.g., evokes response or appreciation)
• Process in which the art is made

Question 23

What is tranformation-representation?

Answer 23

Process by which experience is transformed aesthetically in a different medium (e.g., a drawing)

Question 24

What is an example of tranformation-representation?

Answer 24

Bhima, one of the great mythic heroes of Javanese wajang (shadow puppet theatre) is represented in this leather puppet.

Question 25

Who defines what counts as art?

Answer 25

In the west, there is often a distinction between art, and craft, popular culture, and “ethnic” or “folkloric” art—the latter is even referred to in racist terms, such as “primitive art.”

Question 26

What is individual and collective work?

Answer 26

In the west, the works of individual artist are assessed as unique and singular, where collective art is often regulated to the category of folk or craft.

Question 27

How is art categorized?

Answer 27

Intersections of race, class, and gender often impact what modes of art are categorized as folk, popular, or ethnic.

E.g Mariachi in Mexico

Question 28

How does Errington distinguish art?

Answer 28

• “Art by intention”: objects made to be art (masks for rituals)
• “Art by appropriation”: objects that become art at certain moments and designated as “art” by outside “others” (museums, art collectors, global markets)
• Such appropriation strips an object of its cultural significance

Question 29

Susan Vogel (1997) identifies four forms of Baule sculpture:

Answer 29

• Art that is watched (performances featuring carved masks)
• Art that is seen without looking (sacred sculpture)
• Art that is glimpsed (private sculptures of personal figures for hunting and sculptures for spirit spouses)
• Art that is visible to all (everyday objects that the Baule see as beautiful trifles)

Question 30

What is mass media a site of?

Answer 30

• Mass media a site of cultural productions
• The intended message embedded in media is not always what is received

Question 31

What is an example of mass media being a site of cultural productions?

Answer 31

The TV serial Hilmiyya Nights intended to promote national unity, but anthropologist Lila Abu-Lughod discovered that many Egyptians were not interested in this message.

Question 32

Michelle Bigenho’s three forms of authenticity:

Answer 32

• Experiential authenticity
• Cultural-historical authenticity
• Unique authenticity

Question 33

What is experiential authenticity?

Answer 33

exists in the sensory experience connected with a piece of work

Question 34

What cultural-historical authenticity?

Answer 34

stems from the way in which a piece of art is represented in relation to the historical or mythical history of the art form

Question 35

What is unique authenticity?

Answer 35

tied to the individual artists new, innovative, and personal production of a work of art