The Impossible Reversal
A History of How We Play
- Publisher's listprice GBP 23.99
-
11 461 Ft (10 915 Ft + 5% VAT)
The price is estimated because at the time of ordering we do not know what conversion rates will apply to HUF / product currency when the book arrives. In case HUF is weaker, the price increases slightly, in case HUF is stronger, the price goes lower slightly.
- Discount 10% (cc. 1 146 Ft off)
- Discounted price 10 315 Ft (9 824 Ft + 5% VAT)
Subcribe now and take benefit of a favourable price.
Subscribe
11 461 Ft
Availability
Not yet published.
Why don't you give exact delivery time?
Delivery time is estimated on our previous experiences. We give estimations only, because we order from outside Hungary, and the delivery time mainly depends on how quickly the publisher supplies the book. Faster or slower deliveries both happen, but we do our best to supply as quickly as possible.
Product details:
- Publisher University Of Minnesota Press
- Date of Publication 24 February 2026
- ISBN 9781517916220
- Binding Paperback
- No. of pages352 pages
- Size 216x140x18 mm
- Weight 425 g
- Language English
- Illustrations 43 black and white illustrations 700
Categories
Long description:
"
Tracing the cultural history of play - from Fluxus to SimCity
Games and gamified activities have become ubiquitous in many adults' lives, and play is widely valued for fostering creativity, community, growth, and empathy. But how did we come to our current understanding of what it means to play? The Impossible Reversal charts the transformation of notions of playfulness beginning in the second half of the twentieth century, when a legion of artists, academics, and engineers developed new ways of theorizing, structuring, and designing ludic activity.
Through examples ranging from experimental Fluxus games to corporate role-playing exercises and from the Easy Bake Oven to Tetris, The Impossible Reversal presents four styles of playfulness characteristic of the ""era of designed play"": the impossible reversal, which puts a player in a seemingly hopeless scenario they must upend with a tiny gesture; expending the secret, which involves silly rules that gain an obscure power and require players to embrace failure; simulated freedom, a satiric criticism of the ordinary world; and oblique repetition, a way of playing that stumbles toward unimaginable outcomes through simple, meaningless, and endlessly iterated acts.
A unique genealogical account of play as both concept and practice, The Impossible Reversal illuminates how playfulness became essential for understanding cultural, technical, and economic production in the United States.
Retail e-book files for this title are screen-reader friendly with images accompanied by short alt text and/or extended descriptions.
" MoreTable of Contents:
Contents
Introduction: Interpreting Play
Part I. The Impossible Reversal
1. Play Without Rules: George Brecht and the Uncertainty of Judgment
2. Pinball Logics: From the EM Arcades to The Incredible Machine
Part II. Expending the Secret
3. Play Without Knowing: Yoko Ono and the Anthropology of Ritual
4. Act Natural: From Therapeutic Role-Play to Super Mario World
Part III. Simulated Freedom
5. Play Without End: Benjamin Patterson and Liberal Subjectivity
6. Model Citizens: From Management Training to SimCity
Part IV. Oblique Repetition
7. Play Without Meaning: Shigeko Kubota and the Semiotics of Chess
8. Adventures in Abstraction: From Media Panic to Tetris
Conclusion: Synthesizing Video Games
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
More
