Outdoor games embody physical activities with a social impact, capable of highlighting the norms and values of their cultural sphere of influence. A mathematical model of their content reveals universal values, whose internal logic can be expressed through graphs and matrices. Thus, in a measurable and often striking way, a cultural outlook, of which outdoor games are in part a reflection, is highlighted.The contrast between rituals and outdoor games as suggested by Claude Lévi-Strauss is challenged here, in favour of a different contrast between games and sports. Traditional games cannot be consistently put in the same category as “zero sum games”, as in the case of sport; they may assume very different sorts of “non-zero sum” internal logic, in particular epitomised by competitive (and not exclusive) games, and through paradoxical games.
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