scholarly journals Simone de Beauvoir and the Ambiguity of Childhood

Paragraph ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 329-346 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clémentine Beauvais
Keyword(s):  
Adult Child ◽  
The Other ◽  
Simone De Beauvoir ◽  
Ethical Relation ◽  
Child Relationship

This article explores Simone de Beauvoir's conceptualization of childhood and its importance for her existentialist thought. Beauvoir's theorization of childhood, I argue, offers a sophisticated portrayal of the child and of the adult–child relationship: the child is not a normal ‘other’ for the adult, but what I call a temporal other, perceived by adults as an ambiguous being; in turn, childhood is conceptualized as the origin of the ambiguity of adulthood. This foregrounding of childhood has important implications for Beauvoir's existentialism, in particular regarding her ethics. Through the adult–child relationship, her vision of an ethical relation to otherness emerges — one which foregrounds both the violence and the mutual liberation involved in encounters with the other.

Alterity in Simone de Beauvoir and Emmanuel Levinas: From Ambiguity to Ambivalence

Hypatia ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-58
Author(s):  
Valerie Giovanini
Keyword(s):  
Emmanuel Levinas ◽  
The Other ◽  
Simone De Beauvoir ◽  
Ethical Relation ◽  
Male Privilege ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
Close Proximity ◽  
The Absolute ◽  
Normative Standards ◽  
Free Thought

This article is meant to stage an encounter, a kind of rendezvous, between Emmanuel Levinas and Simone de Beauvoir regarding how alterity seems to enable an ethical relation for Levinas while closing one for Beauvoir. I will argue that Beauvoir's reading of Levinas on “the other” is not a charitable one, and the ethical ambivalence in Levinas's notion of alterity can motivate the praxis Beauvoir seeks for undoing social forms of oppression. I will start with Beauvoir's interpretation of alterity as “feminine otherness” in Levinas's ethics that, for her, originates in the violent perspective of male privilege. Then I will move to Levinas's response to this critique in a set of interviews with Philip Nemo, and to consideration of how a more charitable reading of alterity, understood as a sort of ambivalence in the structure of subjectivity, creates a close proximity between Levinas's and Beauvoir's ethics of action. I contend that both Beauvoir and Levinas respectively developed their ethics of action, either of ambiguity or of ambivalent alterity, in order to free thought from the absolute seriousness with which normative standards are held.

Simone de Beauvoir's Philosophy of Individuation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Hengehold
Keyword(s):  
Lived Experience ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Sexual Difference ◽  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
The Other ◽  
Simone De Beauvoir ◽  
Second Sex ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The World

Most studies of Simone de Beauvoir situate her with respect to Hegel and the tradition of 20th-century phenomenology begun by Husserl, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty. This book analyzes The Second Sex in light of the concepts of becoming, problematization, and the Other found in Gilles Deleuze. Reading Beauvoir through a Deleuzian lens allows more emphasis to be placed on Beauvoir's early interest in Bergson and Leibniz, and on the individuation of consciousness, a puzzle of continuing interest to both phenomenologists and Deleuzians. By engaging with the philosophical issues in her novels and student diaries, this book rethinks Beauvoir’s focus on recognition in The Second Sex in terms of women’s struggle to individuate themselves despite sexist forms of representation. It shows how specific forms of women’s “lived experience” can be understood as the result of habits conforming to and resisting this sexist “sense.” Later feminists put forward important criticisms regarding Beauvoir’s claims not to be a philosopher, as well as the value of sexual difference and the supposedly Eurocentric universalism of her thought. Deleuzians, on the other hand, might well object to her ideas about recognition. This book attempts to address those criticisms, while challenging the historicist assumptions behind many efforts to establish Beauvoir’s significance as a philosopher and feminist thinker. As a result, readers can establish a productive relationship between Beauvoir’s “problems” and those of women around the world who read her work under very different circumstances.

Preliminary Communication: 2: The Highlands Dependency Questionnaire (HDQ): An administered version for use with mothers of school children

1971 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 343-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Berg ◽  
Ralph McGuire ◽  
Edward Whelan
Keyword(s):  
General Population ◽  
Secondary School ◽  
School Children ◽  
Reliability And Validity ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
The Other ◽  
Factor Analyses ◽  
Child Relationship ◽  
Preliminary Communication ◽  
Mother Child Relationship

SYNOPSISA questionnaire concerned with dependency, mainly in the mother–child relationship, and intended for use in child psychiatry, is described. It was administered to the mothers of 116 randomly selected junior and secondary school children in the general population, stratified into age, sex, social class, and school groupings. Two meaningful dimensions were revealed by principal component factor analyses: one concerned with reliance on mother and the other reflecting sociability. Reliability and validity were found to be satisfactory.

Treatment of a Parent Adult-Child Relationship

1947 ◽  
Vol 28 (6) ◽  
pp. 217-223
Author(s):  
Caryl Baumann ◽  
Ethel Hurvitz
Keyword(s):  
Adult Child ◽  
Child Relationship

scholarly journals Study of Psychomotor Development and Environmental Quality at Shelter Homes for Children Aged 0 to 2 in the Department of Chuquisaca (Bolivia)

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (12) ◽  
pp. 4191
Author(s):  
Sagrario Pérez-De La Cruz ◽  
Ivonne Ramírez ◽  
Carolina Maldonado
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Quality ◽  
Motor Development ◽  
Developmental Disorders ◽  
Adult Child ◽  
Environmental Indicators ◽  
Psychomotor Development ◽  
Learning Material ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
Early Stimulation ◽  
Child Relationship

Children in situations of destitution who become institutionalized commonly display developmental disorders, including delayed growth. The aim was to evaluate the environmental quality of the casas cuna of the Department of Chuquisaca (Plurinational state of Bolivia) in children aged 0 to 2 years old after receiving an early stimulation program based on psychomotor therapy. Thirty-six children who were institutionalized at shelter homes in the Department of Chuquisaca were selected to receive sessions of psychomotricity over a five-month period. The Infant/Toddler Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (IT-HOME) scale and the Attachment During Stress Scale (ADS) were used. The adult−child relationship with factors of responsiveness (−0.89; p = 0.037), acceptance (0.57; p = 0.024), organization (−1.03; p < 0.001), learning material (−2.57; p < 0.001) and involvement (−1.92; p < 0.001) scored below expectations, showing that environmental indicators are a poor stimulation for children growing up in shelter homes. Improvements were found in the children’s development after receiving this therapy. In conclusion, an early stimulation program based on psychomotor therapy over five months provided favorable results for the acquisition of skills for communication, motor development and social skills, which positively affect the psychomotor development.

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