Abstract

This paper argues the centrality of play for any understanding of reflexivity and so indeed for human existence in the world. It ties both play and ritual to the human potential to create "as if" or subjunctive universes through which other realities can be tested, explored and judged. These aspects of human social existence, together with our ability to symbolize and hence notate our experience are explored in terms of their relation to the transformations of the Axial Age.