Reflections on Spades
An Interview with Amina S. McIntyre

At work on a PhD in Religion from Vanderbilt University concentrating on
religion, psychology, and culture, Amina S. McIntyre holds a BA in Anthropology from Colby College, an MA in African American and African Diaspora Studies from Indiana University, an MFA in Playwriting from Spalding
University, and an MTS from Emory University. She is a playwright from theAtlanta, Georgia, area who has worked with the Actor’s Express, the Atlanta
History Museum, the Out of Hand Theatre, Oakland Cemetery, and theVanguard Repertory Theatre. An Elder in Full Connection with the CME
Church, she is also a cofounder of the Hush Harbor Lab—a new play development company in Atlanta—and an avid Spades player. She discusses here theintersections of her interests—of her work and play, of drama and religion,of card games and African American culture—and their implications. Key
words: Black joy; card games; hush harbor; Spades; storytelling, trash talking

American Journal of Play: When you recall your childhood memories, do you
remember playing traditional board and card games or more imaginative,
pretend play?
Amina McIntyre: A mix of both. In my early childhood, my two brothers and I
spent time playing Monopoly, Sorry, checkers, Election Day (this random
game that taught about electoral votes), and wari, a Senegalese game withpebbles. My Baba and Mama were both preachers’ children, so they did notplay cards outside of Uno and Go Fish; instead, we picked up card games
like gin rummy, speed, and Spades at school and at Camp Best Friends,
a summer program in Atlanta, Georgia. While we received a Nintendo
around the second year it came out (we started with the customary Super
Mario Bros., Duck Hunt, and Donkey Kong), we still played outside quite abit. We made up games like balloon volleyball, and the living room versionof floor is lava and Legends of the Hidden Temple. We played hide-and-seek,
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American Journal of Play, volume 13, numbers 2 and 3 © The Strong
Contact Amina S. McIntyre at amina.mcintyre@vanderbilt.edu

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find the switch (hide-and-seek with a switch), freeze tag, pick-up footballand baseball and even dodgeball if we could get the community kids overto play. My parents owned a vacant lot beside our house, so it was normal
for the neighborhood to come play.
AJP: How does play influence your creative process as a playwright?
McIntyre: Theatre encourages creativity. You learn pretty early that even withina structure, there is spontaneity, innovation, and individuality. No matterthe story, there are basic questions: Why today? What does a character
want? What are they willing to do to get what they want? What are their
obstacles? Do they get what they want? No matter what happens, thesequestions will be answered. Knowing the boundaries, there are unlimited
possibilities in the creative process, even bending and testing the guidelinesof the questions and structure. The same, I believe, shows up in play. We set
the guidelines, then bend them to help our efforts. What becomes difficult,often, is when the rules change, but the subversive can happen there. Morethan anything, play invites me to imagine beyond what I see and engage inwhat could be possible, even if it does not yet exist.
AJP: Let’s dive into a specific play experience: what is Spades?
McIntyre: Spades is a four-player card game where the objective is to gain themost books (tricks) between the teams or at least the number of books
they set out to make through a bid. There are two players per team, twoteams per game. Similar to Hearts, the trump card (highest weight cards)
in Spades is the spades suite. In Win at Spades: Advanced Play and Strategy(1999), Joseph Andrews notes the game is largely played in the UnitedStates, though Alfred Schademan links Spades to English whist from the1700s, providing a scale and a map to mark the evolution and time. The
game is won by the team who has won the most rounds or the first teamto acquire the most points. It is similar also to a game called Bid Whist,played with four players, ideally two sets of partners, where bidding andachieving the most books is the goal. The trump card can change based on
the deal. Bid Whist is often considered the father of Spades.
		 In a Black American context, the rules are a hybrid of Bid Whist andSpades. Important to note here is that other people of the African diaspora, especially African and Caribbean, will learn how to play Spades
with African Americans. I refer to African American and Black Americaninterchangeably, the Black American label does extend to those of African
descent who enter the play space.

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AJP: How do you play?
McIntyre: Let’s start with the basics. First, the table is set by players declaring
their turn and the deck being prepared for play. Players choose a partner
and their seats; partners must sit across from one another and cannot see
each other’s hands. There is a discussion often here about the rules of thegame, the number to reach that is the end of the game (often 250, 300, or500) or three out of five books (this is dependent on how much time people
have to play). A dealer is designated—each person at the table will deal
the cards over the course of the game. Often, the first dealer is determinedby which person pulls the first spade off the top of a turned down deck.
Afterwards, the dealer position is passed clockwise. To ensure fairness ina shuffle, the opposing member team to the right of the dealer (counterclockwise) is allowed to cut the cards, conducting a soft reshuffle (either
moving a few cards or half the deck from the top of the cards to the bottom
or another location within the deck) with hopes of adjusting the potential
hand to be dealt.
		 Once the cards are dealt and the partners see their own cards, a bid isentered. This is the only time the partners can discuss what is in their hands
to any degree, but only in relationship to how many books can potentiallybe obtained. This is an indication also of how many spades, face cards,
or high cards a player might have in the hand. There are many strategies
around how a bid number actually forms. Once it is entered, the goal isto acquire at least the books entered and try to stop the other team frommaking their books. The minimum allowed to bid is four (unless they bidnil, which is zero). A book is one play in a game where each of the players
have thrown out one card; the highest weighted card wins the hand. Players
receive points if the books bid are made.
		 From here, each player throws out a card. The player to the left of thedealer throws down the first card and play proceeds clockwise; afterwards,
whoever wins the book throws out the first card. Spades most often are
introduced with a cut during play, when a player no longer has a suit anda spade is introduced, after which a spade can lead the book.
AJP: Are there variations of this game play?
McIntyre: Yes. In Spades, there are incorporated rules or printed rules; in Black
American households there are inscribed rules—informal, customized
rules—which might include wild cards (where the Ace of Spades is not
the highest card), not playing a spade until a cut has occurred, or otherReflections on Spades

general understandings. Clarifying rules at the beginning of the game ismost important here; communal rules and decorum are often known andclarified before approaching the table. There are some rules you will notsee in a Black American game, specifically that nil is not an option. The
first hand might bid itself where the first round is the best of the cards.
Partners might be able to go up one more book in the bidding process if
the bidding seems low.
		 The house rules are set by naming how the cards are weighted (trumpcards and their order), and how the game will be calculated (such as bybags, the total score to reach, what determines an automatic ending of thegame). Other house rules might include what counts as fair play (once yourhand is off the card, you cannot pick it back up or you may or may not beforced to play the hand or sit it out) and deciding who deals the cards.
		 If the first-hand bids itself, this is an opportunity for players to see
how the cards have fallen and a way to get a blind advantage (also a way
to gauge skill, flow of game, and impact scoring). The caveat is if someone
runs a Boston (at least ten books won), it is considered an automatic gamewin on the first hand. In subsequent rounds, the team that did not deal
bids first. Each team must bid at least board (four books). In some places,
a team can elect to go blind if they are behind one hundred points. They
must bid for half of the points, to get double the points (if the group wants
to get five books, they will go blind one hundred). Some play the game sothat you cannot go blind more than the points you are behind. If a teamwants to go blind seven, it has to be down at least 140 points.
		 No matter the variation of the rules, the one cardinal sin of any Spades
hand is reneging. Similar to Hearts and Bid Whist, in Spades, only particular cards can be played at a time. If you are leading the round, you throwout what you have and you must play that suit. If you do not have that suit,
there is an option to play off. If a spade is in the hand, it is ideal to play
the spade, unless your partner is winning the hand (has an Ace but you
are cutting that suit, so instead of a spade, you might throw out a heart orsomething that will work in your favor). If you have thrown out a card offsuit and then reveal you still have it, the opposing team can call renege.
To renege costs you three books or one hundred points if you are caught(the challenger would have to choose the right book and prove the renege
happened). To renege is a form of cheating.
		 For scoring, in the first hand, a player writes simply the number of

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books made and adds a zero behind the number. Once bidding starts, thenumber of books is written under as an addition ledger, with each team’s
scores, listed side by side. If the books are made, points are added, if not,subtracted. If the team is counting bags, the number over the books bidded is placed beside the original bid number in which case the score could
be 128–35. Often, people count only the bidded numbers. The team thatreaches the number first wins the game.
		 These are rules I have played and observed at house parties, private
invitations, and Meetup group games and have heard in interviews andconversations I’ve shared them with persons who regularly partner. Blackdigital writers Awesomely Luuvie and Damon Young of Very Smart Brothas
website have explored Spades in feature-length articles, both explainingthat learning the rules—including the game’s significance, terminology,
how to play—is a rite of passage and necessary as a cultural epistemology.
Spades is an invited space requiring both an understanding of communal
conduct requirements and the game rules.
AJP: Where did you learn how to play Spades?
McIntyre: In the cafeteria at Southwest, now Jean Childs Young Middle Schoolin Atlanta, Georgia. In the morning, if you arrived before homeroom, you
would sit in the cafeteria. Students would pull out cards and start playing.
At lunch, they would eat or pullout cards while waiting their turn in line.
My brothers and I, with our friends, would perfect our skills at home or on
the weekends. I’m not sure that I ever saw rules to the game written down
until I started researching for a class.
AJP: What can you tell us about the role of performance and embodiment inplaying Spades? Does the game require a certain level of bluffing or body
movement?
McIntyre: For me the performance and embodiment are in the site of the gameas well as in how partners act or read the table. The location of the gameis often in a secluded area, at a house or a place accessed only by word of
mouth. The game creates a subversive space where the players participating
are allowed to be themselves. One person I interviewed spoke of how sucha gathering involved cooking dinner with friends and catching up on thehighlights of life, politics, and just being in each other’s presence.
		 Performance and embodiment also show up in the pregame conversation, where there are improvisations and dialects to the rules. The languageof the play space must be established for clarity, even if it is based on

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previously incorporated rules. How someone holds and organizes theircards. How they bid. How they engage with their partner and the rest of
the players. How they sit at the table and what seat they prefer. How thescore is kept (I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a score card that is“Us versus Them,” with the assumption that Us will be the winner). How
the cards are shuffled and how they are dealt.
		 Even the kinds of cards used (think the Martin cards based on thecharacters from the television show Martin or the waterproof decks madeby The Black Pack company) can give a certain aesthetic and insight intoa player’s personality. Of course, trash talking is also a part of the performance as well as dealing. It’s all about strategy and about flexing skill. Take
shuffling, for example. When the dealer shuffles, the opposite team has thefirst card advantage, so the goal is to fairly set the cards that are not in theirfavor. Skill level is determined if someone knows how to shuffle traditionally (as a riffle or splitting the cards evenly and braiding the cards together)or if they have to do an overhand (pulling repeatedly from the middle andplacing the cards on top or bottom). Almost any time I’ve seen an overhand shuffle, there are groans or comments made at the table about lack ofskill. The same comes from the opposing teams’ cut. It seems, for example,
more risky or more challenging to move a single card from the bottom tothe top than to pick half the deck up and put the cards at the bottom. If
someone brings out a French cut, in which the deck is broken into four
piles, a card is turned over and given to each before reassembling the deck,
it might signal a person’s strategy as well. With dealing it’s all about style,how someone holds the cards (if they use their whole hand to throw thecards or just two fingers), if they decide to break the clockwise formation
to manipulate the shuffle even more. This last part is tricky though—beinga show-off can gain respect if the cards fall right or show judgment if there’s
a misdeal (where not everyone gets their thirteen cards).
		 No matter the skill of the persons playing, there is the luck of the cards,
the skill of the players, and anticipating what is in their hands. This creates a space for improvisation, camaraderie, and unique expression. This
also lends not only to bragging rights but also trash talking centered on
the display of skill, strategy, and finesse (the style of the players and theirpartners’ compatibility).
AJP: How is trash talking part of the performance?
McIntyre: Trash talking is very much a part of game strategy. When I inter-

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viewed a few people about this for a project, one person spoke of how it
was used to gauge the skill and also to throw people off their strategy. Since
partners cannot table talk to their partners, trash talking or conversations
about their game, their partners’ successes, and other bluffs will come up
in many ways.
		 Trash talking is a version of playing the dozens—a spoken-word insult
game—yet it’s imperative things do not overly insult the group. The competition is to be good natured but not meant to hurt. The goal is to distract,
not to isolate or damage, a person. I’ve spoken with one partner group thatwould play only within a vetted circle of friends for this reason. Otherwise,
whatever you bring to the table—clothes (if they are distracting), people,
food, or drink, is fair game. People often agree that trash talking can be ameans of catharsis, so long as it is in fun and has the right spirit about it.
Effective trash talking is also a skill, much like playing the cards, because
it can get someone to second guess their instincts. For players who needto concentrate, who get tied up in the talk, this can cause them not to pay
attention to the cards. Winning over the mind can be just as important as
winning the books.
AJP: In addition to your own play experiences, are there specific scholars or
theories that inform your conception of the relationship between Black
joy and Spades?
McIntyre: In the past five years, greater attention has been placed on Black
joy with the emergence of hashtags such as #blackjoy, #blackboyjoy, and#blackgirlmagic. Scholars like Jessica Lu, Catherine Knight Steele, Brittany
Packett Cunningham, Chante Joseph, and even Kleaver Cruz’s The BlackJoy Project via Instagram, along with Adreinne Waheed’s Black Joy andResistance and its pictures of protest and joy and Keno Evol’s A Garden ofBlack Joy: Global Poetry from the Edges of Liberation and Living have all
started offering definitions of Black joy. Before getting to Black joy, I want
to offer a definition of joy as an emotion emitted in response to exciting
activity, encouraging spaces, and simple satisfaction. Beyond the emotion, Black joy also encompasses the cultural experiences of people of theAfrican diaspora.
		 Our experiences are informed by societal and cultural memories including the impact of colonialism and the slave trades (trans-Atlantic andothers), the attempted reduction of Black lives to labor and chattel, therevolution and independence of nations and people, and the continued

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resistance interwoven into the fabric of Black culture. There is a rich history starting with W. E. B. Du Bois discussing what our souls encompass
and how black people can be seen as whole. But it’s not until much laterthat Gina Dent intentionally connects the cultural considerations that must
be taken into account around Black joy and pleasure. Black joy is universal
and subversive; it crosses language and historical and cultural boundaries and can be found especially in the arts and in play spaces. What is mostimportant here is to consider that Spades is a play space where Black joy
occurs and can be a way to move participants toward liberation. With theneed to promote and protect Black joy, a Spades play space could be seen
as a different kind of resistance and a call for restoration.
AJP: Where do you see Spades in a larger discussion of the history of Blackleisure and recreation?
McIntyre: That’s a great question because we do not often chronicle the importance of leisure and recreation. Even Du Bois and most conversations ofBlack joy center around resistance, activism, work (especially accomplishments), and fighting. Black joy is absolutely in these spaces. Yet, in thesereflections, we must be willing to see all Black bodies as both worthy ofand engaging in leisure and play activities, not just as labor. Even in play,
I don’t mean the sports industry, which has also become a form of labor,
but genuine play such as Spades, laughter, and cathartic release, outside ofa policed, watchful eye, which we often leave out of our narratives. Theseskills learned from our experiences are brought into play. Chance and calculation are prominent in African American recreational life, especially in
African diasporic traditional storytelling featuring Br’er Rabbit, High John
the Conqueror, and John Henry. Each of these characters have strength,
quick wit, and an ability to outthink their opponents. These skills may not
be known to the opponent, but they are recognized and encouraged within
the Black community and when playing Spades.
		 This leads me to think about Karl Groos’s definition of recreation theory
as the application of surplus energy to an activity that brings restoration
and rest for adults after work. Doris Bergen further details how adults
instinctually need to play, a need different from that of children, who are
given more access to play. However, while Groos discusses games of adults
and actually mentions the Spades predecessor whist in The Play of Man,
he does not include a specific cultural hybrid. His discussion of dominoes, for example, does not explore what can be considered “dialect” or

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“creolized.” Nor does Groos or Bergen discuss the potential sociopolitical
impact of groups for whom recreation creates a subversive play space. However, Stephanie Camp’s work on chattel slavery tells us about the banned
parties of the enslaved that include dancing, music, and other events, specifically the need for pleasure that was forbidden and prohibited. There isa need for unpoliced, vibrant spaces for Black Americans to reclaim theirleisure and designate a space to be what is needed for the group at the time
the space is created.
		 This brings to mind both the creation and uses of “hush harbors.” Somescholars like Thomas Webber write about them also being places for black
markets and leisure gathering in addition to settings for ritual and worship. Spades ties in here for me as a location of being—the intersection of
the natural, human need for people to have recreational time and the ways
Black people go about making the space for recreation to occur.
AJP: How important is the space in which people play Spades?
McIntyre: For the Black community, Spades is not just a game; it is a hush harbor, a site of joy, and a play space. Miguel Sicart writes of play spaces being
where play can occur, yet there is the space for, like, theatre, spontaneity,
innovation, and individuality (I’d change “individuality” to “communality” in larger spaces). They are organic and malleable to the needs of thoseutilizing the environment, lending themselves to both structure and improvisation. Playing Spades supports Black cultural expressions and cultivatesBlack joy by creating a free, unjudged environment. There is opportunity
here also for people not to have to code switch, a place where their true
selves can be shown without repercussion.
		 For Black people, I argue that seclusion and reclusion (even temporary)is necessary for a site of joy, ruling persons out by whether they know how
to play and the rules. Even if someone does not know how to play, understanding its importance makes it an inclusive environment.
		 This idea of Spades as a setting and a protected communal gathering ishistorically reminiscent of hush harbors, created by and for people of African descent in the Americas. Hush harbors were spaces often in the brushand out of sight of overseers and enslavers where the enslaved Africans
met to practice spirituality, ritual, and live-in community, deriving frommaroon societies. Garth Baker-Fletcher, Albert Raboteau, and Thomas L.
Webber write specifically about these secluded, illegal spaces where rituals
could be performed in the open. Characteristics of hush harbors include

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seclusion—often by invitation only (through word of mouth) and attended
by persons with similar demographics. They centered on traditional African
beliefs and values and cultural habits. They offered different places to eat,drink, and relax. In hush harbors, Black people did not have to put on theact required of them by white culture. Hush harbors were protected spaces
in which they could bring their African cultural memory, places where
Blackness and Black identity was formed.
		 Spades is not the only modern hush harbor; even in an age of social
media and the freedom for Black people to live, not all things are sharedin an effort to protect Black joy. This is similar to how barbershops andbeauty shops put Black culture in plain sight, but they operate within theirown rules. Fraternities, sororities, HBCUs, Black culture centers at predominantly white institutions, Black Hamptons, the Chittlin’ Circuit, theNegro League Baseball teams (and Negro League Little League Teams at
local recreation centers), Pink Robe Chronicles, The Nap Ministry, even
Congressional Black Caucus, are all examples of spaces that house a safe,
cultural environment. This is different from a liminal space; this is not a
new created space, but a space that has no physical home, a space whereparticipants engage in practices based on retained generational knowledge.
Moreover, Spades as a play space and hush harbor has multiple purposesand covers all the needs, emotional and spiritual.
AJP: What do you think the card game and its play can reveal about Black adultplay and intergenerational community building?
McIntyre: Studying Spades offers a counternarrative to the mainstream Black
stories focusing primarily on the trauma inflicted through violence andcommunal resistance. Normalizing adult play in which joy is resistancecan be an integral part of recognizing Black social development. Thereis a sacredness of play spaces—particularly how they can be a source ofjoy, how the knowledge is passed down, and how the game is preserved.
The game of Spades operates as a modern hush harbor space, protecting
the culture, making sure one is worthy enough to attend to the table andfinding the right partner (even if your partner is the person on the couch
who doesn’t play the game). Those are only a few elements of the larger
community this space provides for people to embody joy and creations. It’s
just one example of satisfying the need for cultivated spaces where Black
joy can be freely embodied and liberation consists of joy, laughter, andcommunal camaraderie.

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