Beyond Cat's Cradle

O, sure, there's Cat's Cradle, the two-person, cooperative string-figure game of deserved renown. But there are also solitaire versions that are played, apparently, wherever people have string and fingers.

The Five-Pointed Star that adorns this post is one of a multitude of Navaho string figures (this site includes videos showing how each of the collection is made - which is much, much easier to follow than the written instructions). Equally available to your Web-probing fingers you will find, for example, this collection of The Ancient Art of Hawaiian String Figures as well as the Arctic String Figure Project, and the even more culture-spanning International String Finger Association (ISFA).

Many of the figures shown in these collections, even when augmented by carefully made instructional videos, are challenging enough to make you cry. But they are all and each an invitation to fun, as well as pathway to the play of other cultures.

Before you tie yourself in knots, however, you'd do well to start with this Kids Guide to Easy String Fingers with Video Clips, you betcha.


from Bernie DeKoven, funsmith