Conceptualizing the Phenomenology of Movement in Physical Education: Implications for Pedagogical Inquiry and Development

Abstract

There is increased phenomenological interest, philosophical and empirical, in the meaning and meaning-making dimensions of the experience of movement in physical education (Kentel & Dobson, 2007; Kretchmar, 2000a; Loland, 2006; Smith, 2007; Whitehead, 1990). This scholarly concern about the qualities and characteristics of movement shifts the focus of pedagogical interest to the embodied meanings of such experience and the subjective values associated with it (Johnson, 2008). Too often the meaning of movement has been invisible in the discourse of physical education. Philosophical framing and empirically informed discussion about the phenomenological basis of movement as well as interpretation of its embodied time-space affordances and constraints has the potential to reconceive curriculum, pedagogical, and policy development. In this paper, for the purposes of framing ongoing inquiry we examine phenomenological contributions to the physical education literature that examined or describe the intrinsic qualities of movement and consider implications of renewed interest in meaning and meaningmaking for pedagogical theory development and practices.