SPORTS, PLAY, AND

GAME
BY: DR. RESURRECCION M. MARCELO
HISTORY

• Deals with the study of past events, usually written as a chronological account
• It is the study of change, or lack of change, over time.
• Therefore, sport history is the study of how sport change (or not) over time. sport, play,
and physical educations as we know them are the latest rendition of all of the changes
that have occurred in the past. To study these activities as they have been practiced and
viewed in the past is to understand what sport and play are now.
 THE TWO BASIC TYPES OF TRADITIONAL HISTORICAL
RESEARCH
1. Descriptive history describes objectively and in as much detail as possible, what
happened in the past. Descriptive history tries to provide the, who, what, when, and where
of the past, and it tries to do so without injecting ideas, values, and judgments from the
present onto the events of the past. Many early historical works are descriptive and are
literally records of the past.
2. Interpretive history evaluates the evidence and attempts to explain the how and the why
of events that happened in the past. What makes interpretive history different from
descriptive history is that an interpretive history introduces the narrator’s perspective
into the interpretation, and the history is no longer “just the facts.” Using a particular
perspective does not, however, make interpretive history less valuable. On the contrary,
the use of some perspective allows much of the fullness and the richness of history to
come forth and makes the historical explanation more open to discussion.
 BETWEEN DESCRIPTIVE AND INTERPRETIVE HISTORIES, ONE IS NOT BETTER OR
WORSE THAN THE OTHER; THEY ARE MERELY DIFFERENT ACCOUNTS OF WHAT
OCCURRED. TO WRITE EITHER DESCRIPTIVE OR INTERPRETIVE HISTORY, WE MUST
HAVE ACCESS TO DIFFERENT TYPES OF INFORMATION.

The two main source of historical research are:

1. The first is a primary source, one that was part of the event being studied. Examples of
primary sources include an eyewitness account of an event, a contemporary newspaper
story, a picture or painting made at the time of the event, a video recording of the event, a
record of the event kept by an observer, and an ancient inscription or account of the event.
Primary sources, then, are first-hand accounts of historical events.
2. Secondary sources of historical research are written by those who did not
participate in or observe the event being studied. Examples include some
magazine articles, many history textbooks, and other accounts of the event,
like Hollywood movies. In 2007, 300 premiered in cinemas around the
world.
 URBANIZATION AND INDUSTRIALIZATION
• Another way to interpret the changes in sport and physical education involves where
people live—in the country or the city—and how they go about providing for
themselves—with muscle power or with technology.
• Like modernization, urbanization and industrialization patterns explain changes that
happened primarily during the nineteenth century.
• In the early 1800s, most Americans lived in the country, providing for themselves by farming
the land, and their farming practices used either their own muscle power or that of their
livestock.
• In the 1820s, cities in the United States began to grow faster than did the agrarian
population, beginning the shift from a farming nation to an urban nation.
• For instance, it was difficult to have team games when people lived far apart because of
their farming lifestyles. The railroad changed this. In addition, sporting activities could
not safely be held at night until the invention of the electric light made large, indoor
events possible. These and many other changes can be explained through
interpretations that take into account urbanization and industrialization.
SPORT

• Sport is a modern term first used in England around A.D. 1440. The origins
of the word sport, or its etymology, are Latin and French. In French, the
word de(s)porter has its roots in Latin word deportare, which means “to
amuse oneself.” Over time, the meaning of the term sport grew from
merely “amusing oneself”. Over time, the meaning of the term sport grew
from merely “amusing oneself” to an interpretation that was used
extensively.
 WHAT ARE SPORTS
• Sports are athletic activities that involve some degree of competition. It can be formally
defined as “usually competitive physical activity which, through casual or organized
participation, aim to use, maintain or improve physical ability and skills while providing
entertainment to participants, and in some cases, spectators.”
• Sports also have a set of rules, which ensures fair competition.Various physical activities,
including cricket, baseball, soccer, running, cycling, rock climbing, swimming, diving, football,
field hockey, race car driving, kayaking, and weight lifting, fall under the category of sports.
As you can see from these examples, sports can include teams as well as individual
competitors. Moreover, sports are usually outdoor activities.
• Sport cannot be understood, however without understanding something
about the nature of play and the nature of games, for play is a larger
domain than sport. While it can be argued that all sport is play, it does not
follow that all play is sport.
PLAY

• According to Huizinga, play is a free activity standing quite consciously

outside “ordinary” life as being “not serious,” but at the same time
absorbing the player intensely and utterly. It is an activity connected with
no material interest, and no profit can be gained by it.
• According to Garvey (1990) play is a range of voluntary, intrinsically motivated
activities associated with recreational pleasure and enjoyment

• The 3 fundamental characteristics of Play (by J. Levy)

• Play is intrinsically motivated. We are born with the desire to play; we don’t have to be
taught to do this.
• Play involves the temporary suspension of normal/typical reality and the
acceptance of alternative realities. We can be so immersed in the “play experience”
that we enter a reality that is highly personal and out of the norm.
• Play involves an internal locus of control. We believe that we have control over our
actions and outcomes while engaging in various forms of play.
 TYPES OF PLAY
• Cognitive Dimension
• Practice play – it is the first type of play that appears in life, related to body actions – from simple to
complex – and to visual to tactile experimentation of objects. Repetition is a typical characteristic of this
type of play
• Symbolic play – it starts around second year of life, and it refers to the symbolic use of one’s own body
and of objects, as they were something else, to pretend and make-believe activities. The simplest form of
this type of play is the simulation of action with the body – pretending to eat, to drive a car, etc., the
most complex is the role playing – acting roles and planning scenes for them.
• Constructive play – it consists in gathering, combining, arranging and fitting more elements to form a
whole, and achieve a specific goal. The child combines abilities gained through practice and symbolic play
and the three types reciprocally co-exist and feed off each other.
• Play with rules – it includes play and games based on a specific code and rules accepted and followed by
the players. It starts with simple rules invented by the players to make their play activities more
challenging and it may evolve in the use of board games, as well as in sport activities.
• Social Dimension
• Solitary play – the child plays alone and independently even if sounded by others
• Parallel play – the child plays independently performing the same activity, at the same time, and in
the same place of the other persons, also engaged in play without joining them.
• Associative play – the child is focused on separate activity with respect to his/her peers, but there
is a considerable amount of sharing, lending, taking turns with them.
• Cooperative play – joining others in sustained engagement in activities with objects, toys, materials
or games with a shared goal of purpose. Children can organize their play cooperatively with a
common goal and are able to differentiate and assign roles.
 WHAT ARE GAMES

• A game is an activity generally involving skill, knowledge, or luck, in which you follow a set of rules
and try to win against an opponent. We usually play games for fun or entertainment, but they can also
serve an educational function. All in all, a set of rules, a goal, and competition are the three basic
components of games. Generally, games involve both mental and physical stimulation.
• Some games can be played alone; for example, solitaire and video games. Some are played between
two individuals or two teams. Games can have a variety of forms. Board games like chess, Monopoly,
and Ludo, card games like poker and bridge, guessing games, lawn games, video games etc. are some
examples.Various games may require various skills and talents. They also help to develop practical
skills.
• A game is a somewhat more organized effort at play, where the organized and playful elements of the
activity become more evident. All of us have “played games,” so we have a good idea of what to expect
when we do so. This structuring of the playful impulse leads to the following definition of a game:
• Arriving at a definition of sport based on play and games, however, is not without its difficulties.This is
because when factors such as religion, social class, and historical period are considered, sport may not
easily fi t into a universally accepted definition. For example, throughout history, dependent upon one’s
socioeconomic status, one person’s sport may have been another person’s work. Kings and noblemen
would often hunt on their private reserves for the enjoyment of the sport, while their peasants worked
at developing their skills as hunters in an effort to put food on the table and survive one more day.
 SIMILARITIES BETWEEN GAMES AND
SPORTS
• Both games and sports have a set of rules, which ensure fair competition.
• They may involve teams or individual competitors.
• People play games and sports for recreation and amusement, but they also gain various skills and
knowledge through games and sports.
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN GAMES AND SPORTS

• A game is an activity typically involving skill, knowledge, or luck, in which you follow fixed
rules and try to win against an opponent. Sports, on the other hand, refer to an activity
involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or a team competes against
others.
 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SPORTS AND RECREATION

BASKETBALL FISHING HUNTING VOLLEYBALL CHESS

A high degree of training, investment, and coaching, along with
spectators, publicity, and institutional control such as with a varsity
basketball game at a university.
Mainly for fun, exercise, or relaxation

The amount of fun diminishes, and the amount of serious work

increases as you move from recreation to sports
SPORTS INCLUDES:

• Elements of competition
• Physical activity
• Aspect of organization
• The influence of outcome on quality experience
Elvin (1993)

• The focus is on activity

• Satisfaction is gained primarily from the quality of the experience