I’ve been thinking quite a lot about play recently, particularly whether play can help us reimagine and refashion what statehood could mean within progressive polities.
Typically, left engagements with the state gravitate towards critique or reform – both carry an attitude of instrumental, goal-oriented, serious action. Play, from this perspective, seems a ludicrous way of responding to concentrated political power and government. And yet, as an activity that foregrounds stimulation, creativity, interaction, and open-ended uncertain outcomes, play may be a way of practicing the imagination and putting our imaginations into practice – going beyond the limits of what appears possible if we restrict ourselves to the realm of “real” change. While play can bring into being new practices, such as local currencies, it can also provide a way of representing what could be. Chiara de Cesari makes this point in relation to the “anticipatory representation” of a Palestinian state through…
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Digital learning PD Dr Ann Lawless 