Traditional Games: Socialization and Culture in Kabylie

*Soraya Dodoo*

#### **Abstract**

Traditional games are an important patrimony of the world's recreational cultural heritage. However, they remain little valued, even neglected to the detriment of sports. This study focuses on traditional games in Kabylie, and the process of socialization through the games.This reveals valuable information on the structures underlying traditional games, and their ethno-motor. A study that associate two fields. The world of bodily practices and the world of Ethnology. Two different worlds that share one reality which is traditional games.

**Keywords:** Traditional games, Socialization, bodily practice, Culture, Ethno-motricity

#### **1. Introduction**

For a long time, physical activities have been regarded as bio-energetic acts. It is until Marcel Mauss work that we discovered that bodily practices are cultural social phenomenon. Marcel Mauss defines body techniques as "the ways in which men, society by society, in a traditional way, know how to use their body" [1]. The ways of playing and moving one's body are not universal but as diverse as languages, clothes and dwellings. Adding to cultural aspect of body, there is diversity in practice movement. For examples, swimming is practiced differently from one society to another and even from one generation to another. In short, "each society has its own unique habits". Mauss Marcel [1] everything is not innate, but transmitted, learned and acquired through education. Everyone must learn to use their body according to what they learn from their family, their environment and their society. Everything is acquired. We are in the presence of a "phenomenon-biologicalsociological. This emphasizes the strong impact of society individual's behavior. In fact, physical activities reflect their social context. P. Parlebas a pioneer of the praxiology-motrice sums up this phenomenon with the concept of "ethnomotricity" which is defined as the set of "fields and nature of motor practices considered from the angle of their relationship to their cultures and to the social environments in which they are located, developed" [2].

Likewise, we see "the game as a system" [3]. There is interaction between the players themselves, and between the players and the environment. Thus, the player is continuously in interaction and in communication with others, whether it is his partner or his opponent, and in relation with the external environment which is the space where the game takes place, and it is in these interactions that the game makes sense [4].

Thus, playful practices are not only physical acts, but they are also nourished by social representations, norms and values of a given group. Although, the richness, study of the games, there have been a little interest even ignored. A few classical authors have taken an interest in play and have studied it as an object. Among them, Johan Huizinga, in his seminal work Homo-ludens [5]. He defined the game as follows: "A free action, felt as 'fictitious' and situated outside of everyday life, capable nevertheless of fully absorbing the player. An action devoid of any material interest and any utility that is accomplished in a time and in an expressly circumscribed space, taking place in order according to given rules." Thus, gambling is a leisure and entertainment activity which allows the player to escape from work and obligations. But this freedom is achieved within the limits of time and within the framework of the circumscribed space. The game is rich, it has a meaning,. For Huizinga, play is older than culture and is the core of culture. He writes: "Culture in its primitive phase is played out. It does not arise from the game as a living fruit that separates from the mother plant, but it unfolds in the game and as a game." He adds: "However, it is important to characterize it as a basis and a factor of culture. This approach is shared by Caillois [6]. According to the author, this activity is unrestricted. Gambling as a leisure hobby is opposed to well-spent working time. If the working time is paid and productive, the game is characterized by free and unproductive. "Indeed, the game produces nothing: neither good nor work. It is essentially sterile". Another author Lévi-Strauss in (1962) devoted part of "Α wild thought" to the analysis of an exotic game, with P. Bourdieu [7–9] who leaned on the question of the sociology of sporting tastes linked to style and social class. Much has been done since then, and the sociology of games has now established itself as a discipline in its own right. She therefore considers games to be a phenomenon that can be justified by a scientific approach, which attempts to objectify the movements of the human body, to understand how it develops and flourishes in a social environment.

#### **2. Traditional games and identity**

The neglect of traditional games in the sports practices of daily life of leisure time and the predominance of sport raise the question of our identity. It could be described as invasion that require awareness. According to Hall, in order to Preserve the cultural aspect, and to escape the latent constraints of a naturalized culture "is to become actively and consciously involved in those aspects of one's existence that seem most natural to him." [10].

In fact, to escape the predominance of sport, there must be an awareness of the crucial role of traditional games as a cultural and socializing phenomenon. In fact, Socialization plays a crucial role in the development of a child's personality. Through the socialization we are filling in the child by by the means of the bodily practices the standards to be respected, the values to be adopted, namely courage, strength, wisdom… All these aspects structure to model of the behavior of the person in accordance with society's expectations.

We take up the idea of P. Parlebas who emphasizes in this regard that the "process of socialization is in the play pact shared and internalized in the body" [3]. Through traditional games, the child comes into contact with rules and codes; in its very body, it shares the collective norm in all conformity and legitimacy. He continues his idea by noting that "the assimilation and internalization of these bodily practices as a code of behavior and in connivance with the way of life of this society directly affect the social aspects of social life: forms of communication , exchange, type of relationship with the body, conception of success, relationship to rules of

#### *Traditional Games: Socialization and Culture in Kabylie DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.98929*

authority…" . The essence of traditional games is in the tradition that sets the rules. To this end, the tradition transmits to the game its codes, its rituals which constitute the master piece. Originated to the Maghreb culture, the reflection on the study of games has imposed itself on us for two reasons. In the first place, during our daily observation, we were struck by the disappearance of the traditional games in favor of the sport which is hoisted on the shield. The Algerian child plays football in the street, plays basketball and volleyball in sports clubs, while ignoring his own traditional games. In the second place, it is clear that the work on playful bodily practices in the Maghreb and particularly in Algeria is not legion.

Borhane Errais and Mohamed Ben LarBi have deepened their studies on playful practices in the Maghreb, qualifying them as changing practices.

In an article entitled Ethnography of bodily practices in pre-colonial Tunisia [11], all stress that: "In all certainty, we will answer that the colonial situation is at the origin of the disintegration and the dissolution of this bodily tradition. "(1986). Indeed, colonialism has substituted a universal model of bodily practices which is the sport, at the expense of traditional games which are put under wraps. B. Errai's point of view associated this fact to the forms of colonial and post-colonial domination which are "the determining factors of this mutation and which have contributed to the disappearance of traditional bodily practices by virtue of the culminating hegemony of sport which triumphs with panache in the Maghreb.

In French colonial schools, the Algerian child was exposed to French culture. In the playgrounds, he played French games introduced by French teachers, such as the game of "Sadraqqa" which is none other than the game of the Four Coins, or the game of Chechia which is none other than the game "Beret game".

This idea is also shared by Kent Edwards in his article "Traditional games of a timeless land: Play cultures in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities" According to Kent, the impact of the European colonizer has transformed even participating in the disappearance of many Aboriginal games. According to Kent, when a culture is under attack, it is always the traditional games that are most affected. It change both inter-group relations and cultural practices. When the colonizer strikes down their material resources, the games take second place in the sense the preoccupation of the group is more to survive than enjoy leisure [12].
