Fun and Frivolity: Adulthood

Abstract

Moving from the discussion of fun in childhood this chapter discusses the ways in which fun is understood and experienced in adulthood—but also addresses issues of transition from adolescence to adulthood in relation to fun. It is clear that most people think that we experience fun differently in adulthood than we do in childhood—things that were once boring become fun: sunbathing, shopping, chatting, drinking, relaxing in a spa, gardening, reading the paper on Sunday, watching the Antiques Roadshow, for example—fun as adults, not much fun as children.. It is an accepted wisdom that we grow into some forms of fun and grow out of others. That said, there is a strong discourse that some forms of fun in adulthood can be a return to a more innocent or childish sensibility—or that in fun we can escape from the responsibilities or burdens of adulthood. The multidimensional and context dependency of fun again complicates attempts to say something definitive about it. However, it is the context dependency of it that may give us clues to how the idea of fun is constructed differently in adulthood—even if this difference between fun in childhood and fun in adulthood is not experienced so distinctly.