| （School of Physical Education，Northeast Normal University，Changchun 130024，China) Abstract: Play and game are the basics to understand competition. Starting with the difference between play and game, the authors pointed out that scholars in China had mixed up these two concepts, failed to know about the cur-rent state of oversea research, thus put forward some academic viewpoints which were internationally incompatible. The authors pointed out the followings: play and game should be differentiated: animals can play, but only human being can play a game; Huizinga’s game theory was inadequate to rebut the theory of “the essence of competition is game”; the standpoint of anti-essentialism had been refuted by many people, was inadequate to become a stumbling block in the study of the essence of competition. Finally, the authors introduced achievements made by western scholars in play and game research, and pointed out the conditions for a game to turn into a competition.
Key words: sports principle；essence of sport；play；game；competition |
