Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 15.djvu/60

 46 W. H. WINCH : VI. PSYCHOLOGY OF PLAY PLAY IN LANGUAGE. One problem to be considered is whether, when using language for play purposes, there is a tendency for us to use atavistic forms and bygone grammatical relations. A second question relates to the normal development of speech. As the appropriate organic structures develop in the child, so he begins to make his babblements more and more articulate and human. How far will such spontaneity and inventiveness develop a serviceable language ? I only propose now to offer a few observations under these heads. 1. Is play language atavistic ? I think we shall be disposed to answer this question in the affirmative. In language used when playing we find just such interjectional utterance and absence of grammatical construction and distinction as we find lower down in the evolutionary scale of language. We have most of us experi- enced the delightful babyisms of the lover when playing at love ; and the grammatical constructions of people who " talk for talking's sake " show many primitive marks. The diffi- culty of applying this schema throughout lies in the existence of good artistic literature ; though even here the greatest aesthetic satisfaction is often obtained by archaic forms and words unvulgarised by contact with the work-a-day needs of life. Milton's " Vallombrosa " and the old lady's " Mesopo- tamia " have a charm for most of us in our aesthetic moments, though, in the world of work, they would be rather long-winded geographical names which we should endeavour to localise in an ordnance survey map. Beautiful prose and poetry, which we read, as we say significantly, for relaxation, are developed for their own sake, and not as instruments of intellectual precision. I can do no more than refer to the quaint incomprehensi- bilities of the language which children employ in their con- certed games. The phrase just now occurs to me, " Ena, dena, dina, dust," which commences some incantation, and will, I suppose, remain a mystery till we trace its genesis in the past. The average adult when at play, however, is not so very far removed from the child. Most of us can remember when Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay brought emotional satisfaction to many whom Browning will never reach, and how Hi-tiddle-de-hi-ti- hi-ti-hi with its faint echo of Greek rowdyism, proved that echolalia was not confined to the minor poet. 2. To what extent will children acquire language spon- taneously and by play ?