Play-full Starts
As ever at the start of a project I have half an idea where I want it to end up, but I don't really know where to start. Part of this will come from the fact that *Finding Play *isn't actually finished yet - and this is very much starting from a 'making-of' kind of place. But it's not just a making of film. This film will encompass the processes that didn't just make the film, but allowed the film to happen; by which I mean the research that I did before starting to make that film that contributed to it being the film I wanted to make in the first place.
That's a really wordy way of saying Pressing Play is a film about my research, whereas Finding Play is a film made as research.
De Koven argues that we are all born playful (2016). But as I was brushing my teeth yesterday evening, I started thinking about a paper I read positing that playfulness is difficult to learn as an adult; playfulness is something that starts from birth, is nurtured, and can be difficult to access if brought up in an environment where it is frowned upon, even punished. (Infuriatingly, I can't for the life of me remember who wrote the paper, and I evidently didn't 'tag' it well enough in my research library - I'll have to come back and cite specifically and properly). Whilst a study in 2020 by René Proyer et al argued the playfulness can be learnt and stimulated in adults "by following short self-administered tasks on a daily basis" (Proyer et al. 2020), the huge amount of research on children's development and play and/or playfulness demonstrates the connection and importance of play's origins in childhood.
I am lucky enough to have been brought up in a family that valued, supported, encouraged play and playfulness. I acknowledge my privilege in many other ways, but in the context of this specific project, this is a particularly relevant. It is this upbringing that allows me to be playful, that has made playfulness part of who I am, whether that's a trait or a skill. So when thinking about making Pressing Play, in the same way that in my written exegesis I would have to acknowledge the personal contexts of my relationship with work and play/playfulness in order to 'set the stage' for my research, I wondered if it would be interesting to somehow the research for this film with some nod to my childhood.
Digging around in my hard drives, I found some old VHS footage from my childhood, digitised at some point by my parents. Watching back through this, I was struck by the moments of joy, of play in my brother and I when we were young, really hammering home the playful context in which we were brought up. This was underscored by the permanent presence of the word 'play' in the corner of the footage, presumably an artefact of the digitisation process. This idea that play is visually foregrounded in these artefacts of my childhood is a really fascinating one.
*Still from archive VHS footage
I don't yet know what role this footage could play in this film - it's still too early to tell. But by putting this on a timeline, even temporarily, I feel like I'm making the first forays into something interesting, something that goes a bit deeper than *Finding Play; something which not only tells a story about playfulness, but perhaps tells my story about playfulness - or, perhaps, a story about my playfulness. And if my story started playfully, it makes sense for this one to reflect that.
References
BARNETT, L. A. & KLEIBER, D. A. 1984. Playfulness and the Early Play Environment. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 144**,** 153-164.
BERES, D. 2020. New research finds playfulness is a skill anyone can learn. *Big Think *[Online]. [Accessed 19-01-2024 2024].
DE KOVEN, B. L. 2016. Playfulness in Hard Times. *A Playful Path *[Online]. [Accessed 19-01-2024 2024].
EIGNER, B. 2015. [The role of playful interactions in the development of the early mother-child relationship--factors of risk and protection]. Psychiatr Hung, 30**,** 35-49.
LIEBERMAN, J. N. 1965. Playfulness and Divergent Thinking: An Investigation of their Relationship at the Kindergarten Level. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 107**,** 219-224.
PROYER, R. T., GANDER, F., BRAUER, K. & CHICK, G. 2021. Can Playfulness be Stimulated? A Randomised Placebo-Controlled Online Playfulness Intervention Study on Effects on Trait Playfulness, Well-Being, and Depression. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 13**,** 129-151.