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Recreational activities in cultural centres

Article  in  Transformations in Business and Economics · January 2016

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 Recreational Activities in Cultural Centres

Dr., prof. Virginija Jurėnienė

Department of Philosophy and Culture Studies
Vilnius University Kaunas Faculty of Humanities
Muitines str. 8, LT-44280, Kaunas, Lithuania,
Phone +370 37 202627
Fax: +370 37 423222
E-mail: Virginija.jureniene@khf.vu.lt

Ausra Andre Stonyte MBA

Department of Philosophy and Culture Studies
Vilnius University Kaunas Faculty of Humanities
Muitines str. 8, LT-44280, Kaunas, Lithuania,
Phone +370 37 202627
Fax: +370 37 423222
E-mail: a.a.stonyte@gmail.com

Virginija Jurėnienė is professor at Department of Philosophy and Culture Studies at Kaunas

Humanitarian Faculty, Vilnius University. Her areas of research interest include: culture management,
culture/ creative tourism, culture centres activities and gender issues.
Ausra Andre Stonyte is MBA at Department of Philosophy and Culture Studies at Kaunas
Humanitarian Faculty, Vilnius University. Her areas of research interest include: culture management,
culture centres activities.

Abstract
The objective of this paper aims to analyze the role of cultural centres in the context of recreation. The
following research question is discussed: What role cultural centres play in the process of recreation?
The situation of the Lithuanian national culture is discussed and the role of cultural centres in
enhancing the traditional Lithuanian culture is analysed but not analysed the role of cultural centres in
recreation of communities. Cultural recreation activities and their organisation have not been studied by
Lithuanian scientists; thus, effective organisation of recreational activities requires more profound
studies and their application. Also, it is essential to raise the competences of the cultural centre
employees and educate the society.
The empirical analysis of data allows stating that cultural centres are organising recreational activities
in Lithuania.

Keywords: cultural centres, Lithuanian culture, recreational activities.

JEL classification: L30, Z1, Z13

Introduction

Cultural centres are one of the creators of cultural recreation and organisers of recreational
activities. They are treated as one of the most important cultural institutes that carry out this function
due to very simple following reasons: the network of cultural centres is wide, they are established in
small towns and villages, and the activities organised by them are accessible to a large number of
people. Recreational activities developed and applied by cultural centres are treated as an effective way
of improvement of life quality of a community, and culture in this case is treated as the main index that
influences the wellbeing of a human community. Foreign countries understand the importance and
relevance of this phenomenon, and thus discuss more and more on the topic, carry out research, write
scientific works, establish cultural and recreational centres.
Lithuania not only includes little information or research on the topic of recreation, but also
does not have a formed legal framework; thus, recreation as a complex process is managed by
interested branches of economy, general government and private sector. Recreation itself has not been
acknowledged as rehabilitation in the health care system, which is why it does not have a management
structure. Meanwhile, cultural recreation and its functions are not yet discussed, and there are no
studies on the topic. This article is the first research of its type; it aims at forming foundations for
further studies on the topic which are essential in order to understand, perceive and apply cultural
recreation effectively to improve human life quality.
Object of the article: Cultural centres.
The aim of article is to reveal the peculiarities of the recreational activities of the X cultural
centre.
The selected research strategy – a case study – requires both quantitative and qualitative
perspectives into the data collected. A case study has been chosen because the aim is to study one
phenomenon, i.e. organisation of the recreational activities of cultural centres from three different
perspectives: consumers, managers of cultural centres and experts.

1. Recreational spaces

Cultural recreational activities is an effective means which helps people to regain physical and
mental powers. A clear impact of culture on human physical and mental power recreation is effective
improvement of the life quality of a community which also influences not only the human health and
wellbeing, but also creates social capital and has economic impact. The cultural activities of the
country’s residents, their participation in them express the activeness of the society, its needs and
values; therefore, organisation of such activities could become one of the priorities in forming cultural
life of a community.
Studies of which spaces people are mostly inclined to attribute to recreational spaces have
shown that the majority of the respondents see cultural institutions and residential parks, squares and
other open spaces as recreational spaces. Figure 1 introduces the recreational spaces selected by the
respondents during the quantitative research.
 Fig. 1. Which of these spaces would you attribute to recreational?

8
44
22

44 28
10

12
Cultural institutions Open spaces Religious institutions
Sports institutions Entertainment centres Health institutions
Education institutions Home

Source: created by the author.

Cultural institutions and parks, squares and other open spaces were attributed to recreational by
44 respondents. 28 respondents saw entertainment centres as a recreational space, 22 respondents
attributed sports institutions to recreational spaces. Meanwhile, 10 respondents noted health institutions
as recreational spaces. Moreover, 8 of the respondents see religious institutions as recreational. In the
field ‘other’, respondents also included education institutions (2) and home (1). The study has revealed
that respondents saw both open (parks, squares and other open spaces) and closed (cultural institutions)
recreational spaces as equally important. In the grouping “Recreational spaces according to recreational
activities” (Appendix X), section psychological perception of spatial dependency, recreational spaces
are divided into public, partially public and private. It is important to note that the respondents are more
inclined to attribute public or partially public (cultural institutions, open spaces, entertainment centres)
spaces to recreational that those are thought of as private (health institutions, religious institutions).

Recreational activities
The respondents were asked by means of an open question which recreational activities
organised by cultural centres (CC) were their most frequent choices. This questions shows not only the
frequency of activity selection, but also which activities are seen as recreational by the respondents.
The study has revealed that the respondents tended to see cinema, events, concerts, tourist routes,
circus, dance nights, exhibitions, plays, participation in a dance group as recreational; also, one of the
respondents noted that they were more inclined to choose increased activities. The frequency of activity
selection distributes as follows: cinema was designated as one of the most frequently selected
recreational activities by 12 respondents, events – by 10, concerts – by 31, tourist routes – by 1, circus
– by 1, dance evenings – by 14, exhibitions – by 5, plays – by 17, participation – by 6, and 1
respondent was mostly inclined to choose increased activities. This is presented graphically in Figure 2.
 Fig. 2. Frequency of recreational activity selection

Source: created by the author.

In summary, it can be said that the concept of recreation has not been fully perceived by the CC
consumers. Even though respondents tend to relate it with activities or a state, the majority of the
respondents either see recreation as a location or are unaware of it. One can make an assumption that
this is due to the fact that the term “recreational zones” extensively used in tourism makes people
juxtapose these two phenomena. As Interviewee No. 1 claims, “the term ‘recreation’ does not live in
the activities of cultural institutions and, especially, cultural centres”. Meanwhile, the qualitative
interview method reveals that people who work in CCs understand the essence of recreation even
though they do not face the term in the workplace.

Consumer assessment of recreational activity organisation

A study of consumer opinions from four aspects has been used to reveal how consumers
evaluate recreational activities organised by cultural centres.
First, whether CC recreational activities are organised appropriately.
Second, according to the noted changes of emotional or physical state influenced by
participation in activities organised by CC.
Third, according to designated disadvantages in recreational activities organised by CC.
Four, according to which recreational activities organised by CC there was a lack of according
to consumers.
The study has revealed that the majority (59%) of consumers pointed out that recreational
activities were organised in an appropriate way. The remaining respondents allocated as follows: 34%
did not have an opinion, and 7% pointed out that recreational activities were not organised
appropriately.
Figure 3 introduces a graphic representation of how participation in recreational activities
organised by CC influences the changes of physical and/or emotional state of the respondents. The
study has revealed that 81% of the respondents saw participation in such activities as bringing positive
change to their physical and/or emotional state. 13% of the respondents said that participation in these
activities did not result in any changes, and 6% of the respondents maintained that the activities did
invoke various changes of physical and/or emotional state. None of the respondents noted that such
activities invoked negative changes in their state.
Fig. 3. Changes of emotional and/or physical state invoked by recreational activities
organised by cultural centres

Source: created by the author.

15% of the respondents answered the open question What disadvantages of organisation f
recreational activities of a cultural centre have you noticed? and named the disadvantages. The
remaining respondents claimed that they did not see any disadvantages, or left the question out. The
answers to this question have been divided into 4 following groups: lack of material and human
resources, administration problems, interinstitutional cooperation problems and management problems.
Figure 4 introduces percentile distribution of these groups.
 Fig. 4. Disadvantages of recreational activity
organisation

Source: created by the author.

Disadvantages of material resources describe the lack of premises or other material basis. The
answers of the respondents reveal just that: “premises are not suitable for events”, “there is a lack of
styling for the events”. Meanwhile, when it comes to human resources, it does not only stand for the
lack of specialists as in, “there are no good specialists because they refuse to live and work in small
towns”, but also the lack of their competences. Sociality means not only cooperation among the
members of a community, but also among institutions that are established in the same community. The
respondent who designates this problem also says, “There are no shared organisations, a shared strategy
is not being developed, which means that local resources are not made good use out of”. Management
problems manifest as organisational problems of events, i.e. the organisation of events lack quality and
appropriateness: “events are not fluent”.
As it can be seen in the aforementioned Figure 4, visitors of cultural centres are mostly inclined
to notice the lack of material and human resources, whereas the lack of interinstitutional cooperation,
or sociality, is the least frequently noticed problem.
The analysis of the respondents’ opinion on which recreational activities organised by CC there
is a lack of in their place of residence has shown that recreational activities organised by CC lack
appearances of professional art creators, youth events, sports events, cinema and dance nights. The
distribution of the respondents’ opinions is presented in Figure 5. 7 respondents noted events for youth
as the activity that there was the largest lack of. 6 respondents pointed out the lack of appearances by
professional art creators. It is important to note that 10 participants of the survey mentioned that they
did not notice any lack of activities with one of them claiming, “one would need more time to
participate everywhere”.
 Fig. 5. Which recreational activities organised by C is there a lack of in your
location?

Source: created by the author.

Having analysed all four factors that reveal the consumer evaluation of recreational activities, it
becomes evident that consumers see disadvantages of the organisation of such activities; however, the
majority of the respondents are happy with the quality of the organisation of these activities. Moreover,
the respondents claim that they have undergone positive changes of physical and/or emotional state by
participating in such activities; however, they point out that there is a lack of events for the youth.

2. Differences between recreational and other activities

The analysis of how the management of cultural centre sees the differences between
recreational and other activities shows that, first of all, recreational activities differ in that they can be
either passive or active. Many other activities do not have this feature, e.g. working activities which
usually requires especially active participation in it. Meanwhile, recreation is rest, and, as it has been
mentioned in the theoretical part, recreation may include either various activities or doing nothing.
Interviewee No.1 agrees with this and states that:
“Recreational activities, in my opinion, is human rest which aims at regaining strength.
Watching a ‘cheap’ film, which allows ‘disconnecting’ the brain is rest. Thus, recreation does not pose
a goal of directing the rest a certain direction”.
The statement by Interviewee No.1 reveals the second tendency; according to him, there is no
goal to direct rest a certain way. This means that the function of control which is usually especially
active in other activities (educational, administrational) is not as active in this activity. A strong
manifestation of control in recreation would mean that rest can be controlled. In this case, there would
be a need for common rest criteria according to which this control should be carried out. Meanwhile,
rest, recreation are individual phenomena, each of which are perceived differently by each individual.
The statement if Interviewee No. 2 supports the previous statement and also reveals the third tendency
– independent selection of activity. The interviewee says that:
“First of all, this should be a freely chosen activity. No one can decide for other people what
physical or mental refreshment one needs”.
The theoretical part also mentions that an activity can provide a recreational function only when
it is chosen freely. In summary, it can be said that all the distinguished features – duality of activities
(active and passive), absence of strict control and free selection – are closely related factors which
separate recreational activities from other activities.

3. Differences between recreational activities

Speaking of the differences between recreational activities and other activities it is important to
mention that not all the differences introduces in the previous chapter are equally applicable to all
recreational activities. Recreational activities are also different, and the principles that are applicable
when speaking about cultural recreation are not necessarily applicable to, for instance, sports
recreation. These differences arise due to difference of the primary aims of these activities. Interviewee
2 agrees with this and states that:
“Recreational activities are different because a cultural centre first and foremost undertakes
cultural education, and a sports centre – promotion of increased physical activity.”
The concept of recreational activity is extensive and can be analysed from various perspectives.
As it has been mentioned, recreation can be active or passive, which divides recreational activities into
two groups. Another factor that allows recreational activities to be divided lies in the definition of
recreation itself. It says that recreation is improvement of physical and/or spiritual state. Barely any
activities improve both of these states at the same time; mostly, recreational activities are directed
towards improvement of one particular state, i.e. either physical or spiritual. Interviewee No. 3
emphasises this difference when speaking of cultural and other recreational activities. He claims that
they are different and explains:
“As I have mentioned, this is related to cultural programmes. The aim is to exercise the human
spirit. The human spirit is exercised even through dance.”
Meanwhile, Interviewee No. 1 disagrees with the previous opinions about the differences of
recreational activities and evaluates them from a management perspective which analyses the activities
in four management steps: planning, organisation, management and control. Comparing recreational
activities from this perspective shows barely any or no differences between activities because both
sports and cultural activities alongside many other activities are organised based on the same
aforementioned principles. According to Interviewee No. 1, the only difference is which of the
principles is applied most strongly:
“Keeping in mind the aforementioned components, I would say there is no difference, except for
the fact that control becomes the most important in sports. However, it is important to note that I have
never organised real sports events”.
In summary, it can be states that the differences of recreational activities are emphasised by
their primary goal. Even from the management perspective, different recreational activities are applied
different intensity management steps. Thus, the differences between recreational and other activities
cannot be treated generally without respect to specific recreational activities.
 4. Organisation of recreational activities

As it has been mentioned, the concept of recreation is not widespread, and its functions are not
clearly perceived; however, the study reveals that in terms of organisation of these activities the most
important are human resources and improvement of employee competences in this area. Interviewees
No. 1 and No. 2 agree with the opinion of Interviewee No. 3 who says that:
“Knowledge is needed, as it is the case everywhere. The most important goal is to define
recreation to residents and employees”.
Interviewee No. 4 also agrees with this opinion who provides the following opinion about the
specialists of recreational activity organisation:
“We imagine that recreation is a good way to spend our free time <…>; however, even the
country itself has not yet understood the benefit of recreation. If there are specialist who will start to
consciously and purposefully include recreational activities into the lists of activities in cultural centres
with measured and calculated benefits, then I believe that even the projects provided will have a line
with information about the benefit of that particular event for a person including his/her health,
satisfaction and maybe even the sense of safety being a part of the society”.
Analysis of competences needed in the organisation of recreational activities has also revealed
the importance of psychological knowledge. Since recreation, as we have established, is refreshment of
psychological and emotional strength, the need for this special knowledge arises while organising
recreational activities. In this case, the role of a psychologist would reveal itself through organisation of
activities intended to improve the emotional state of a human being. This opinion is supported by
Interviewee No. 4 who says the following about the participation of a psychologist in organisation of
recreational activities:
“I believe that there is no luxury in having psychologists in cultural centres. I don’t mean those
psychologists who listen to how bad someone feels, I mean those who would organise activities that
allow people to get to know themselves, to talk about their problems through certain activities. After
all, it is possible to reveal your problems through drawing, modelling, dancing, i.e. various means of
artistic expression.”
This reveals the gap in the administration of activities of cultural centres as cultural institutions
because, according to Interviewee No. 2, it is difficult to find a person who would have such extensive
education, and a psychologist cannot work in cultural centres. According to Interviewee No. 2, this is
because:
“The Ministry of Culture determines which specialists can work in [cultural] centres, and there
are no psychologists among them”
Analysing the peculiarities of organisation of recreational and other activities reveals that the
opinions of the interviewees about organisation of other activities is mostly the same. All three
interviewees agree with this. The core statement of this assumption could be the idea expressed by
Interviewee No. 2 about absence of pure forms of activities:
“There is a very small difference. I think that these activities interconnect, which is good
because there are no pure forms anymore; they are impossible in a postmodernist society; there are
various combinations (e.g. of the fields of Art).”
It has been mentioned by Jureniene and Stonyte that education is mostly designated as a part of
recreation or vice versa (Jureniene, Stonyte, 2015). This shows how closely different activities are
related, and organisation of these activities becomes a complex process where one needs to focus on
the peculiarities of several interrelated activities instead of just one. Interviewee No. 1 agrees with the
aforementioned opinion and maintains that:
 “generally speaking [organisation] is not different. All these components [planning,
organisation, management and control] and their importance depend on the type and extent of
activities”
However, Interviewee No. 1 emphasised that, depending on the type and extent of activities, the
importance of one of the components may differ. It has already been mentioned how the function of
control for different activities can differ. Moreover, disappearance or depreciation of the function of
control in the context of recreational activities has been discussed. Thus, it can be said that the main
difference while organising recreational and other activities is control or, in certain cases, its absence or
insignificance.

Conclusions:
Cultural recreation activities and their organisation have not been studied by Lithuanian
scientists; thus, effective organisation of recreational activities require more profound studies and their
application. Also, it is essential to raise the competences of the cultural centre employees and educate
the society.
The concept of recreation has not been perceived by XCC consumers and managers. Most of
the consumers see recreation as location and do not know what it is. Meanwhile, employees of XCC
define the concept correctly, yet they cannot identify recreational activities that take place in XCC and
essentially do not understand recreational activities.

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4. Jureniene V., Stonyte A. A. (2015) Recreational Activities in Cultural Centres: a Theoretical Approach
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