To scribble beyond the paper: a phenomenological analysis of movement in the early childhood
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.46553/tab.22.2023.p40-62Keywords:
Children’s scribble, Phenomenology, Movements, Objects, Merleau-Ponty.Abstract
What do children do when they scribble? This question, which seems to appeal only to developmental psychologists or early childhood educators, indirectly confronts us with many problems typical of the philosophy of the body. What is the relationship between corporeality and cognition? Does all thought imply movement? Are the objects we manipulate decisive when it comes to understanding our ways of knowing the world? The objective of this work is to analyse scribbling (as a complex activity that has been the exclusive object of study in Psychology for years) from a phenomenological approach, considering it as an experience in which not only the child expresses his contact with the world, but also collaborates with the exploration of their motor possibilities. To do this, first, the description that Piaget and Luquet make of children's drawing will be presented, to then contrast it with research that considers the scribble as a significant experience, with intersubjective roots and with an expressive and communicational meaning. Secondly, Maurice Merleau-Ponty's proposal on children's drawing will be described as a framework for analysis that allows a holistic approach to this experience, making materials and the body a constitutive part of its realization. In this work, then, a phenomenological analysis of movement will be carried out, taking (as in the phenomenological tradition) elements from empirical disciplines. I believe that a phenomenological approach to scribbling shows us (unlike other approaches) that this experience is not only settled on the surface on which it is performed, but also involves others, the objects that intervene in its realization and the body of the child. Likewise, the analysis of scribbling, as a specifically infantile experience and typical of the first years of life, can shed light on the relationship between perception and movement, showing in a specific experience how motor skills and objects are linked in early childhood, as correlates of children's motor exploration.
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