The study aims to lay the groundwork for systematically investigating children’s peer discourse at different age levels with a view to delimiting the role of peer talk for pragmatic development. An interdisciplinary stance to the study of children’s peer talk is argued for, considering it simultaneously as the arena for the co-construction of childhood cultures as well as an arena for development. We propose a four-dimensional model of discursive events, meant to capture both dimensions simultaneously. The model takes into account (...) the dynamic interplay among the type of activity children are engaged in, the overall thematic frame of the event, its internal framing by the children themselves and the genre used. The model is applied to the analysis of natural peer talk at two age levels, preschoolers and fourth graders, focusing mainly on variation along the dimension of keying. The two age groups studied are shown to share a rich repertoire of keyings and genres, but to differ in their relative salience and modes of realization by age. Our analysis suggests that peer talk offers children ample opportunities to listen in, practice and display conversational as well as academic discursive skills, and hence may very well prove a crucial site for pragmatic development. (shrink)

s This article centres on an empirically based phenomenological analysis of how children are put to sleep in Japanese nurseries. Drawing on interviews and participant-observations conducted at a daycare centre in north-east Japan, this article explores the cultural and social meanings attached to co-sleeping. It explores the process through which co-sleeping becomes a manifestation of intimacy, and emphasizes the sensuous and embodied experience of sleep between teacher and child. Examining alternative theories of embodiment, this article helps to extend our understanding (...) of experiences of co-sleeping from finite separate bodies, to a sensuous experience and space that is all-encompassing and inclusive of more than just the body (non-Cartesian). (shrink)