From Playgrounds to PlayStation: The Interaction of Technology and Play

Description

In this romp through the changing landscape of nineteenth- and twentieth-century American toys, games, hobbies, and amusements, senior historian of technology Carroll Pursell poses a simple but interesting question: What can we learn by studying the relationship between technology and play? From Playgrounds to PlayStation explores how play reflects and drives the evolution of American culture. Pursell engagingly examines the ways in which technology affects play and play shapes people. The objects that children (and adults) play with and play on, along with their games and the hobbies they pursue, can reinforce but also challenge gender roles and cultural norms. Inventors—who often talk about "playing" at their work, as if motivated by the pure fun of invention—have used new materials and technologies to reshape sports and gameplay, sometimes even crafting new, extreme forms of recreation, but always responding to popular demand. Drawing from a range of sources, including scholarly monographs, patent records, newspapers, and popular and technical journals, the book covers numerous modes and sites of play. Pursell touches on the safety-conscious playground reform movement, the dazzling mechanical innovations that gave rise to commercial amusement parks, and the media’s colorful promotion of toys, pastimes, and sporting events. Along the way, he shows readers how technology enables the forms, equipment, and devices of play to evolve constantly, both reflecting consumer choices and driving innovators and manufacturers to promote toys that involve entirely new kinds of play—from LEGOs and skateboards to beading kits and videogames.

Get the book

Amazon.com

Search the book

eBay.com

Search the book

Other editions

• 

  From Playgrounds to Playstation: The Interaction of Technology & Play

  • 2015-04-23
  • 216 pages
  • Ebook
  • Johns Hopkins University Press+ORM

Similar books

• 

  The Ethics of Poker

  By Todd M. Furman

  ... deals made with a drunken person violate the informed consent rule and are immoral. how ... morally accountable for his action(s) if the action(s) 4.

• 

  Treading Through: 45 Years of Philippine Dance

  By Basilio Esteban S. Villaruz

  That body is whole because it is a thinking ( Mabel Todd's ) and conceptualizing body . ... Both processes have to deal with the idea of beauty in dance ...

• 

  We the Gamers: How Games Teach Ethics and Civics

  By Karen Schrier

  K. Schrier and D. Gibson (Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 2010), pp. 239–261). 15. Becker, “Choosing and Using Games in the Classroom.” 16. For further information, see D. Simkins, “Assessing Video Games for Learning,” Learning, ...

• 

  Playing with Sound: A Theory of Interacting with Sound and Music in Video Games

  By Karen Collins

  Leonardo Music Journal 14 : 97-104 . Gibbs , M. R. , K. Hew , and G. Wadley . 2004. Social Translucence of the Xbox Live Voice Channel . In Entertainment Computing , ed . M. Rauterberg . 377–385 . Berlin : Springer - Verlag Gibson ...

• 

  A Parent's Guide to Video Games: A Practical Guide to Selecting and Managing Home Video Games

  By Jason Rich

  Production Staff Lead Editor : J. L. France Copy Editors : Cover Design : Irene , Alphonse & Manfred Additional Concepts One on One Graphics Carolyn Porter Page Design : Cover Credits DuckTalesTM and © 1991 The Disney Company .

• 

  Really Clever Crosswords 2

  By David Levinson Wilk

  C rossword lovers will welcome this second volume of clever, challenging puzzles by David Levinson Wilk.

• 

  Crosswords

  By David Levinson Wilk

  Fill the coffee cup, find a pencil, and grab a chair: it’s time to solve some crosswords! What a great way to take a break, relax, and give the brain a fun challenge, too.

• 

  Suburban Xanadu: The Casino Resort on the Las Vegas Strip and Beyond

  By David G. Schwartz

  Levinson was a prominent member of the Detroit - area “ gambling fraternity . ” He collaborated with Samuel Garfield , a Midwest betting and gambling operator and friend of Moe Dalitz.26 Levinson's two brothers , Mike and Louis ...

• 

  The Hogwarts Library Collection: The Complete Harry Potter Hogwarts Library Books

  By J.K. Rowling

  This collection includes the updated edition of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, with a new foreword from J.K. Rowling (writing as Newt Scamander) and six new beasts!

• 

  Bridge Strategy at Trick One

  By Fred L. Karpin

  21445-1 Paperbound $ 2.50 THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF Oz , L. Frank Baum . America's finest children's book in facsimile of first edition with all Denslow illustrations in full color . The edition a child should have .