Ethnography as Play

American Journal of Play, volume 14, number 1 © The Strong Contact T. L. Taylor at tl@tltaylor.com Navigating entry processes and learning to inhabit a space, puzzling out how the system works and its forms of discovery, intensely enjoying the experi- ence despite its many frustrations and failures, moving through it all in embod- ied and affective ways, grappling with unknowns, and eventually setting the experience aside and moving onto something new are common moments in both ethnography and play. [...]despite the "playing" in Turner's formulation being more linked to drama, I find his expression of process, particularly around exploration, trials, and iteration, resonant with some of the playful stances I detail. Following on the heels of another attendee they found themselves eventually "tumbling into [a] courtyard" where the wife of the man they were running with "whipped out a table, a tablecloth, three chairs, and three cups of tea, and we all, without any explicit communi- cation whatsoever, sat down, commenced to sip tea, and sought to compose ourselves" as policemen shortly came looking for them (4). By engaging in tried-and-true ethnographic tech- niques (such as in-depth engagement over time with participants, conversation and learning, and building up a set of practices to inhabit the space), ethnogra- phers of these worlds have offered important insights into life in digital spaces.