ABSTRACT
At the philosophical level, the reflection on alienation acquired a new quality through a link to acceleration. The critical awareness of time control, speed, and acceleration was already expressed in a classic early study when E. P. Thompson analyzed the history of temporal discipline in industrial capitalist work. Temporal discipline and acceleration transformed the player of folk culture into a streamlined athlete. After starting in the world of sport, acceleration also transformed the field of transport technology. By connecting acceleration with the philosophical concept of alienation, a view was thus opened towards a new understanding of alienation as countering human depth, direction, and meaning. Anyway, acceleration, spatial homelessness, and national identity demand a differential phenomenology of alienation. At the level of time, play has strong elements of repetition and rhythm, which are both in contrast to acceleration. Play is, thus, not only an opposite to temporal alienation, to acceleration.
