I have already earlier written about homo ludens and the new ethos of creativity. It is pretty interesting how the notion homo ludens has become popular in the contemporary discussion.

It seems we have understood that a human being is not just a homo economicus of economic rationality nor the engineering blacksmith of homo faber but also a playful human. The famous key work regarding this thematics is the classic book Homo Ludens (1938) by the Dutch cultural historian Johan Huizinga (1872–1945).

Huizinga's main idea is that even “unnecessary” challenges seem to play a remarkable role in the advancement and development of the human culture. Works of art, games, sports, festivals and carnevals are deeply rooted phenomena of humanity – even though they are not the results of straightforward need or necessity.

Homo ludens has been a key term not only in academic discourse but, for example, in the advertising and design world. As an opposite to the traditional homo economicus or homo faber who stress the importance of rational thinking, quantity and concrete goals, homo ludens knowingly seeks for new experiences, plays around with possibilities, embraces the idea of freedom and is happy to take risks to obtain new sensations.

A reference to the French word bricolage might add some interesting depth to this discussion. 'Bricolage' is used to mean the building, the assembly or hobby-like hand crafting, and it acts as a nice metaphor of creative processes and do-it-yourself attitude. As we know, creativity is often defined as a process of assembling – a process where something new and extraordinary is built with new combinations.

Being creative means to combine separate and sometimes distant elements into new forms and combinations. The process of creativity can also be defined as a process to create a product or a service that can be considered a new one. This is a relevant viewpoint for service design activities and design professionals, too.

In addition to homo ludens, some other phrases starting with the word 'homo' have been used to describe the contemporary members of the information and media society. Aki Järvinen, a researcher of digital culture has used the phrase homo aestheticus-informaticus to describe the knowledge-intensive type of contemporaries who nevertheless stresses the importance of aesthetic values and new sensations (art, design, experiences, entertainment industry, etc.).

And it seems to us that the contemporary human is, indeed, homo connectus and homo creativus: the creative contemporary actively searching for new links, nodes and connection points in the digital information networks.

Literature:

Inkinen, Sam (2008). Quo vadis, homo ludens? (preface). In: Fernandez, A. & Leino, O. & Wirman, H. (eds.), Extending Experiences. Rovaniemi: Lapin yliopistokustannus, pp. 9–17.

Järvinen, Aki (1999). Hyperteoria. Lähtökohtia digitaalisen kulttuurin tutkimukselle. Nykykulttuurin tutkimusyksikön julkaisuja 60. Jyväskylä: Jyväskylän yliopisto.

Järvinen, Aki & Mäyrä, Ilkka (eds.) (1999). Johdatus digitaaliseen kulttuuriin. Tampere: Vastapaino.