Mutual experiences: understanding children’s play in nature through sensory ethnography

ABSTRACT

This paper introduces the concept ‘mutual experiences’ to highlight how a researcher’s sensory experiences may contribute to producing knowledge concerning children’s bodily play in a natural environment. The article also demonstrates how photo-interviews can give a researcher virtual access to places and events where s/he cannot be present. The inspiration for the concept of ‘mutual experiences’ emerged from three sources: (1) The premise that human experiences and knowledge are embodied and develop interactively from environments, (2) the literature on sensory ethnography and (3) ethnographically inspired studies of children playing in a natural environment. The concept is illustrated through an analysis of empirical examples. It is argued that applying this concept could contribute to a more open, enriched and intersubjective understanding of children’s interactive play in a natural environment.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• nature
• play
• mutual experiences
• sensory ethnography

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank colleagues at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Professor Kirsti P. Gurholt, and the reviewers for insightful comments that have helped to improve the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Both fieldwork sessions received ethical approval from the board of the Norwegian Centre for Research Data. Children and their families were informed about the aims of the research. They were assured that participation was voluntary and that participant privacy and anonymity would be respected.

2. A search in Western Norway University of Applied Sciences Campus Sogndal’s databases in EBSCOhost, ScienceDirect (SD), and in The Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning (JAEOL) were conducted on 23 January 2017 at 1:00pm. The keywords ‘children [and] sensory [and] ethnography’ provided 16 (EBSCOhost), 9 (SD), and 5 (JAEOL) articles between 2007 and 2017. The search in the ScienceDirect database used the keywords ‘children [and] ‘sensory ethnography’. All of the articles were reviewed to identify studies of children in nature applying a sensory ethnographical and/or an informant-led photography approach.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jostein Rønning Sanderud

Jostein Rønning Sanderud is an Assistant Professor at the Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. His research interest centres on the interactive relationship between the natural environment and children’s play. Sanderud teaches friluftsliv, outdoor education and science at the Pre-school Education and Friluftsliv programmes.