Deep play means, (according to Bentham's concept), play where stakes are so high that it becomes plain unreasonable for a person to participate but at the same time making the play intensely dramatic and engrossing. The play is situated after Clifford Geertz's scrutiny of the folks of Balinese, with whom he lived among earning their trust. A cock fight game drew folks closer to him and thus he ended up learning an immense deal about the Balinese community. The play is a betting game practiced by the folks of this community, as they cheer on cocks in which they have got betted upon.
Weber's viewpoint is usually that the participants often improve the center bet, (bet by the participating individuals), due to a number of reasons. This center bet in turn influences and frequently sets the mood and the rate at which onlookers will bet. Bentham's argument is from the financial viewpoint where he argues that the losses an individual is because of make, are exceedingly high thus making such form of play immoral. This is because of the fact a game maybe dictated upon by the centre bet, but the cocks in the duel might not be necessarily evenly matched. People may bet, sometimes resistant to the winning cock due to kinsman and loyalty ties generally speaking even when they are fully aware of the likelihood of the opposition cock to win the match. He is constantly on the argue that folks who take part in this "immoral" play should be curbed by the law since such people are in way over their heads, usually in a bet, thus making them enemies of themselves (Geertz's, 26).
Weber, on the other hand, begs to differ in his argument that this kind of play (deep play), instead of shallow play, has little regarding the amount of money or economical aspect. He insists that, in such play, many factors enter into play such as; esteem, honor, dignity and respect. A term known as status. The participants setting the guts bet may raise the stakes in a bid showing their dominance and portray their ultra egos. They could raise money for the bets even when these are well aware that the chances of winning are bleak. Family ties could also make an individual bet and only his fellow kinsman or good friend in order to determine where his / her loyalties lie. For instance, a visitor from another clan may be invited for a cock fight by the locals. He may may actually have the bigger and more likely to win cock, however the home-crowd would still bet in favor of the house cock to prevent the raising of questions on where loyalties lie. The cocks are said to be surrogates of the owners who will be the real participants seeking after every other's blood inside the ring (Bartholomae, 46).
This is the essential principle behind deep playing. It could be likened to a poker game where the losing player tries to seem confident in order to say his control among the list of participants. The onlookers on the outside, though aware of his dire situation, continue to cheer him on so that they can intimidate the other players into forfeiting the overall game or dupe them into convinced that he comes with an upper hand.
In the novel, "Passing" by Nella Larsen, passing which is the name directed at the book is symbolic of the process of passing. By definition, passing refers to an associate person of one racial group, mostly African-American, choosing to recognize with the European-American community, to flee social prejudice. In this particular play, however, passing can be interpreted differently depending on the degree of critical thinking about the reader with regard to the novel. It is said (the novel), to be largely ambiguous at the end in that there is no common point of assembly of thoughts by the readers who are left wondering what happened (Schechner, 87).
The novel can be set alongside the two points of argument by Bentham and Weber, again with respect to the understanding and interpretation by the reader.
For those considering it from the sexuality angle, we've Irene Redfield, who's the protagonist of the novel who we read is a latent lesbian, who passes as a married African-American woman with an African-American doctor for a husband when it is convenient for her. For those taking a look at the novel from the racial perspective-which is the not hidden meaning, we have Clare Kendry who later changes her name to Clare Bellew after her marriage to John Bellew, her white racist husband. She is a Blonde African-American woman who passes for white.
With respect to Bentham's theory, one case can be viewed from the following perspective: Irene who passes as a part time lesbian and part time married woman should come clean to her husband because according to Bentham, it is morally upright to do so. From Weber's point of argument, he argues that she is morally justified never to come clean as there's a puddle of factors protecting against her from doing this that ultimately raises the stakes, therefore, engaging the readers and characters alike in a sought of "deep play. " The factors as would be argued by Weber are; a society where trends such as lesbianism are unknown and unheard of and the loss of her husband, whom she would most likely lose because of this (Schmidt, 54).
In this other case, Bentham would reason it out the following: Clare must have come out clean to her husband, despite the fact that he was a staunch racist who even refers to her as "Nig" because her skin had turned chocolate slowly but surely after their marriage, because it is morally ethical. Weber along with his more appropriate line of reasoning, would have argued out that kind of play in question had its stakes extraordinarily high for a number of reasons; she was a black woman married to a white racist, she had earlier not informed her the reality, thus leading to their union and the actual fact that at that time, society had deemed it awkward for mixed color marriages to take place which could have been treated with much skepticism.
Dark play is thus particularly intriguing when put to play by authors since it becomes virtually unpredictable in order to an account ending. The deep play also offers the result of invoking human feelings that make a piece of text come alive as one reads along. Authors, therefore, use the facet of "deep play" by conflicting with the social norms that are already established in a society. Deep play is therefore, an excellent creation of creative writing. It seeks to change wrong believes and inform a population where ignorance has taken its toll (Weimann, William, 67).
