Homo Ludens (book) - XII. Play-element in Contemporary Civilization

XII. Play-element in Contemporary Civilization

“In American politics it is even more evident. Long before the two-party system had reduced itself to two gigantic teams whose political differences were hardly discernible to an outsider, electioneering in America had developed into a kind of national sport.”

Huizinga died in 1945. Hence his observations on contemporary civilization in the final chapter of the book date back to the end of the Second World War.

Read more about this topic:  Homo Ludens (book)

Famous quotes containing the words contemporary and/or civilization:

    The shift from the perception of the child as innocent to the perception of the child as competent has greatly increased the demands on contemporary children for maturity, for participating in competitive sports, for early academic achievement, and for protecting themselves against adults who might do them harm. While children might be able to cope with any one of those demands taken singly, taken together they often exceed children’s adaptive capacity.
    David Elkind (20th century)

    I am writing to resist the view that Europe and civilization are going to Hell. If I am being “crucified for an idea”Mthat is, the coherent idea around which my muddles accumulated—it is probably the idea that European culture ought to survive, that the best qualities of it ought to survive along with whatever cultures, in whatever universality. Against the propaganda of terror and the propaganda of luxury, have you a nice simple answer?
    Ezra Pound (1885–1972)