Woman and Womanhood: A Search for PrinciplesSaleeby, C. W. (Caleb Williams)
Science
Woman and Womanhood: A Search for Principles
Saleeby, C. W. (Caleb Williams)
Eugenics; Women
The second, though less obvious, is no less important. What is the most
palpable fact of the child's play? It is enjoyment. We have done for
ever with the elegant morality which grown-up people, very particular
about their own meals, used to impose upon children, and which was based
upon the idea that everything which a child enjoys is therefore bad for
it. We are learning the elements of the physiology of joy. We find that
pleasure and boredom have distinct effects upon the body and the mind,
notably in the matter of fatigue. Careful study of fatigue in school
children has shown that the hour devoted to physical exercise of the
dreary kind under a strict disciplinarian may, instead of being a
recreation, actually induce more fatigue than an hour of mathematics.
If, then, we cannot allow the girl to play, but must give her some kind
of formal exercise, we must at least make it as enjoyable as possible.
There are Continental systems of gymnastics which do not believe in the
use of music because, forsooth, they find that the music diminishes the
disciplinary effect! Such an argument dismisses those who adduce it from
the category of those entitled to have anything to do with young people.
They should devote themselves to training the rhinoceros, these
martinets; the human spirit is not for their mauling. In point of fact
one of the redeeming features of physical training is the use of music,
which goes far to supply the pleasure that accrues from the natural
exercise of games, and greatly reduces the fatigue of which the risk is
otherwise by no means inconsiderable. We leave this subject, then, for
the nonce, having arrived at the conclusion that the objects of
physical training are skill and pleasure rather than strength and
discipline; that the system is best which is nearest to play; and that
the use of music is specially to be commended.
But, as we have said, artificial physical training at its best is not to
be compared with the real thing; more especially if, as is usually the
case, the real thing has the advantage of being practised in pure air.
We must ask ourselves, then, what sort of games are suitable for girls,
and to what extent, if at all, mixed games are desirable. We must first
remind ourselves of the proviso that any game may be played to excess,
whether physical excess or mental excess, the risk of both of these
being involved when the competitive element is made too conspicuous. If
this risk be avoided there is no objection, perhaps, to even such a
vigorous game as hockey in moderation for girls. The present writer has
observed mixed hockey for many years, and finds it impossible to believe
that the game should be condemned for girls, but he has always seen it
under conditions where the game was simply played for the fun of the
thing, and that makes a great difference.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account