To scribble beyond the paper: a phenomenological analysis of movement in the early childhood

Jesica Estefanía Buffone

doi:10.46553/tab.22.2023.p40-62

Authors

Jesica Estefanía Buffone Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas ; Laboratorio de Investigación en Ciencias Humanas/Universidad Nacional de San Martín

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.46553/tab.22.2023.p40-62

Keywords:

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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Author Biography

Jesica Estefanía Buffone, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas ; Laboratorio de Investigación en Ciencias Humanas/Universidad Nacional de San Martín

Jesica Estefanía Buffone es Doctora en Filosofía por la Universidad de Buenos Aires y por la Université Lyon 3 - Jean Moulin. Es Magíster en Psicología Cognitiva y Aprendizaje por la FLACSO y la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Especialista en educación en contexto de encierro (I.E.S. Nº1 Alicia Moreau de Justo) y Profesora de Enseñanza Media y Superior en Filosofía por la Universidad de Buenos Aires. Se desempeña como becaria postdoctoral del Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET) en el Laboratorio de Investigación en Ciencias Humanas de la Universidad Nacional de San Martín (LICH-UNSAM). Es docente de grado en la Universidad CAECE y en la Universidad Nacional de Tres de Febrero en la carrera de Psicomotricidad. Publicó artículos en revistas nacionales e internacionales sobre fenomenología e infancia, y es una de las editoras de Metis. Revista Interdisciplinaria de Fenomenología (UCES). Actualmente, se dedica a explorar la ligazón entre movimiento, objetos y percepción, tomando como punto de partida el cruce entre fenomenología y psicología del desarrollo.

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