The present paper argues that Merleau-Ponty’s notion of Flesh/reversibility intellectually is significantly flawed, and leads phenomenology into something of a dead end. This is shown through the following strategy. First Merleau-Ponty’s account of originary perception and his critique of the reflective attitude are expounded. They are shown to culminate in rejection of the subject-object relation as an ontological fundamental in favour of a ‘hyper-reflective method’. A critique of Merleau-Ponty’s position is then offered. It argues that originary perception is not logically (...) prior to reflective thought, and that Merleau-Ponty fails to do justice to the scope of the subject-object relation. Specifically, he overlooks the way in which the relation is the basis of our practical perceptual orientation. It is then shown how this relation actually pervades Merleau-Ponty’s own all-important ‘hyper-reflective’ alternative – the notion of ‘Flesh’. Possible counter-arguments are considered and refuted. The.. (shrink)

In common language, education is mostly understood as teaching. In this article, I would like to employ the hermeneutical philosophy of Merleau-Ponty to draw attention on that other etymological background of education: educere. Education as educere is about liberating or displacing our view instead of achieving a liberated view. In this sense, education does not refer to an immaterial relation of knowing or mastering , but to a relation of being . I hope to demonstrate Merleau-Ponty's philosophy of the body (...) can make us attentive to the importance of this hermeneutical and praxical character of education. After all, his thinking very aptly describes our relation to the world in terms of a corporeal being rather than in terms of a cognitive or abstract knowing. His conception of corporeality and of our being to the world deconstructs a mere formal and all too immaterial account of education. (shrink)

The last decades have seen a rising philosophical interest in the phenomenology of skill acquisition. One central topic in this work is the relation between the athlete's background capacities and foreground attention as an invariant feature of skilful movements. The purpose of this paper is to examine further this gestalt relation from the perspective of Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological account of embodied learning and a classical notion from philosophy of sport, namely ?sweet tension of uncertainty of outcome?. In the first part we (...) will explicate how Merleau-Ponty understands embodied learning as a form of gestalt switch that allows the athlete to perceive the world more meaningfully in relation to an ongoing movement project. That is, a skilled athlete perceives more and better opportunities for actions. In the second part, we revisit the classical notion of ?sweet tension of uncertainty of outcome? developed by Kretchmar. This phrase is attributed to the indeterminate back and forth rallies between sport contestants, and to persons facing a sport situation that produces an ambiguity as to whether one will succeed in one's task. In the third part, we then juxtapose Merleau-Ponty's notion of embodied learning and the notion of sweet tension from philosophy of sport in order to draw out the relations between the two notions. In addition, in much of the philosophical work on skill acquisition (for instance in Merleau-Ponty and his much-cited commentator, Hubert Dreyfus) the distinction between everyday skills (such as walking and opening doors) and sport skills is collapsed. Our discussion aims to show that by introducing the notion of ?sweet tension? to the literature on phenomenology of skill acquisition, we are able to highlight a phenomenological difference between everyday skills and sport skills. (shrink)

This essay takes up the claim made recently by Simon Critchley in The Companion to Continental Philosophy that a feature common to many philosophers in the Continental tradition is the utopian demand that things be otherwise. The general question I pursue has to do with whether or not such a claim includes movements within Continental philosophy that do not self-identify with the utopian (like critical theory). The particular question has to do with whether or not the movement of phenomenology is (...) utopian or does it, because of its other commitments, view the utopian as the antithesis to its orientation, which makes that claim that phenomenology is utopian seem strange. My thesis is that phenomenology can be seen as a utopian tradition but that some account must be given that demonstrates this connection to the utopian. In particular, I argue that Maurice Merleau-Ponty''s phenomenology provides an understanding of the utopian, which I call a non-conventional view, that is vastly different from the one assumed by most when they see or hear the word utopian, which I label conventional. I show that such a non-conventional understanding can be developed in a way that neither requires us to view the utopian solely as opposed to finitude and contingency, nor a form of thought and action from which we necessarily need to dissociate ourselves. It is this non-conventional view of the utopian that in the end enables us to understand how Continental philosophy in general and phenomenology in particular are important bearers of the utopian demand that things be otherwise. (shrink)

One of the main topics in philosophical work dealing with physical education is if and how the subject can justify its educational value. Acquisition of practical knowledge in the form of skills and the provision of positive and meaningful embodied experiences are central to the justification of physical education. The purpose of this article is to explore the relationship between skill and embodied experience in physical education through the notion and concept of habit. The literature on phenomenology of skill acquisition (...) is first considered. In particular, we draw on Merleau-Ponty’s notion of habit. Further, we introduce pragmatist philosophy and in particular the work of John Dewey as a useful complement to the phenomenological perspective. It is in particular Dewey’s emphasis on habits, experience and education that are found to be useful in our exploration of the relationship between the two justifications under consideration, because it allows us to point out the importance of habits of att... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Ethics & the Environment 10.2 (2005) 175-194 [Access article in PDF] Measure for Measure The Reliance of Human Knowledge on the Things of the World Tim Adamson When all things were in disorder, God created in each thing in relation to itself, and in all things in relation to each other, all the measures and harmonies which they could possibly receive. —Plato, Timaeus (69b) Is my body a thing, (...) is it an idea? It is neither, being the measurant of the things. We will therefore have to recognize an ideality that is not alien to the flesh, that gives it its axes, its depth, its dimensions. —Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1968, 152) The search for truths differs from the search for truth criteria in more ways than those that are immediately obvious. —M. C. Dillon (1997, 9) The notion that all knowledge is a form of measurement can be traced back to the Socratic insight that knowledge requires the presence of some standard against which things are measured. We cannot account for our knowledge of things, Socrates argued, without appealing to some prior capacity we have for recognizing, comparing, or measuring things in terms of something else, for example, a concept or definition. In the modern era, Kant extended this insight to include perception as such, [End Page 175] arguing that even though our perceptual experience seems to be direct and immediate, upon reflection we know that some process of mediation must be at work which enables us to have a stable experience of objects. Faced with such insights, we are compelled to ask how such measuring is possible. If experience and knowledge rely on some capacity for measurement, what is measurement and what does it entail?The most common contemporary answer to this question can be found in notion that our experience and knowledge are "constructed" by distinctly human, that is, cultural factors. Having abandoned Kant's notion of a priori knowledge and its various Idealist offshoots, contemporary constructivism nonetheless maintains that cultural structures (although not fixed or permanent ones) serve as the basic principles upon which experience and knowledge are built. Such a view has some merit, insofar as it enables us to acknowledge the mediated character of our experience, while also avoiding the problematic claims of traditional idealism. But as appealing as this view is, it raises the question of the place and role of nature in our experience. From a constructivist point of view, although we may acknowledge that our experience and knowledge depend in crucial ways upon natural elements and events, it can often seem naive to discuss the role of such natural factors within experience—except, that is, as we admit that nature itself is "constructed" by culture, for example, language, conceptual systems, theoretical constructs, ideology, political power, institutional practices, and so forth. That is, although we no longer accord cultural factors an a priori or absolute status, we remain convinced that in fact cultural norms play the final, determining role in shaping our experience. In the end, we have come to believe, it is culture that measures and defines nature, not vice versa.My aim in this essay is to articulate an alternative view of the measurement involved in human experience and knowledge, one which helps us to overcome the privileging of culture over nature that still plagues contemporary thought. My account is inspired by Merleau-Ponty's philosophy of the body, particularly his notion that the human body serves as a "measurant of things." There are two key components of this claim. First, it describes the body's general capacity for measurement, and does not appeal to any specific measure or standard of measurement. As a measurant, the body is not any particular measure; rather, it is a thing that measures, an element of the natural world that brings measurement to the [End Page 176] things it encounters, thus bringing meaning into our experience. Second, the body's capacity to measure shows how our natural being as bodies is inherently meaningful, because measurement is, as we shall see... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Ethics & the Environment 10.2 (2005) 175-194 [Access article in PDF] Measure for Measure The Reliance of Human Knowledge on the Things of the World Tim Adamson When all things were in disorder, God created in each thing in relation to itself, and in all things in relation to each other, all the measures and harmonies which they could possibly receive. —Plato, Timaeus (69b) Is my body a thing, (...) is it an idea? It is neither, being the measurant of the things. We will therefore have to recognize an ideality that is not alien to the flesh, that gives it its axes, its depth, its dimensions. —Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1968, 152) The search for truths differs from the search for truth criteria in more ways than those that are immediately obvious. —M. C. Dillon (1997, 9) The notion that all knowledge is a form of measurement can be traced back to the Socratic insight that knowledge requires the presence of some standard against which things are measured. We cannot account for our knowledge of things, Socrates argued, without appealing to some prior capacity we have for recognizing, comparing, or measuring things in terms of something else, for example, a concept or definition. In the modern era, Kant extended this insight to include perception as such, [End Page 175] arguing that even though our perceptual experience seems to be direct and immediate, upon reflection we know that some process of mediation must be at work which enables us to have a stable experience of objects. Faced with such insights, we are compelled to ask how such measuring is possible. If experience and knowledge rely on some capacity for measurement, what is measurement and what does it entail?The most common contemporary answer to this question can be found in notion that our experience and knowledge are "constructed" by distinctly human, that is, cultural factors. Having abandoned Kant's notion of a priori knowledge and its various Idealist offshoots, contemporary constructivism nonetheless maintains that cultural structures (although not fixed or permanent ones) serve as the basic principles upon which experience and knowledge are built. Such a view has some merit, insofar as it enables us to acknowledge the mediated character of our experience, while also avoiding the problematic claims of traditional idealism. But as appealing as this view is, it raises the question of the place and role of nature in our experience. From a constructivist point of view, although we may acknowledge that our experience and knowledge depend in crucial ways upon natural elements and events, it can often seem naive to discuss the role of such natural factors within experience—except, that is, as we admit that nature itself is "constructed" by culture, for example, language, conceptual systems, theoretical constructs, ideology, political power, institutional practices, and so forth. That is, although we no longer accord cultural factors an a priori or absolute status, we remain convinced that in fact cultural norms play the final, determining role in shaping our experience. In the end, we have come to believe, it is culture that measures and defines nature, not vice versa.My aim in this essay is to articulate an alternative view of the measurement involved in human experience and knowledge, one which helps us to overcome the privileging of culture over nature that still plagues contemporary thought. My account is inspired by Merleau-Ponty's philosophy of the body, particularly his notion that the human body serves as a "measurant of things." There are two key components of this claim. First, it describes the body's general capacity for measurement, and does not appeal to any specific measure or standard of measurement. As a measurant, the body is not any particular measure; rather, it is a thing that measures, an element of the natural world that brings measurement to the [End Page 176] things it encounters, thus bringing meaning into our experience. Second, the body's capacity to measure shows how our natural being as bodies is inherently meaningful, because measurement is, as we shall see... (shrink)

Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of embodiment has been widely adopted by enactivists seeking to provide an account of cognition that is both embodied and embedded. Yet very little attention has been paid to Merleau-Ponty’s later works. This is troubling given that in The Visible and the Invisible Merleau-Ponty revises his conception of embodied subjectivity because he came to the realization that understanding consciousness through the concepts of subject and object imposed a dualistic framework that he was trying to escape. To overcome (...) this dichotomy Merleau-Ponty more fully develops the radically embodied ontology implicit in his earlier work by introducing the concept of flesh. I argue that the enactive account of subjectivity would be improved by “giving flesh” to the enactive subject, given that the enactive account of subjectivity as grounded in pre-reflective bodily self-consciousness is ultimately rooted in accounts of which the later Merleau-Ponty is critical. Incorporating flesh resolves the underlying problems with the enactive account of subjectivity and makes the account more consistent with the ontological commitments to embodiment and embeddedness. (shrink)

Embodied cognition has attracted significant attention within cognitive science and related fields in recent years. It is most noteworthy for its emphasis on the inextricable connection between mental functioning and embodied activity and thus for its departure from standard cognitive science's implicit commitment to the unembodied mind. This article offers a review of embodied cognition's recent empirical and theoretical contributions and suggests how this movement has moved beyond standard cognitive science. The article then clarifies important respects in which embodied cognition (...) has not departed fundamentally from the standard view. A shared commitment to representationalism, and ultimately, mechanism, suggest that the standard and embodied cognition movements are more closely related than is commonly acknowledged. Arguments against representationalism and mechanism are reviewed and an alternative position that does not entail these conceptual undergirdings is offered. (shrink)

Minkälaista ontologista ajattelua Merleau-Ponty kehitteli myöhäisfilosofiassaan? Tarkastelen seuraavassa Merleau-Pontyn ontologian hahmotelmaa ennen kaikkea keskeneräiseksi jääneen ja postuumisti julkaistun teoksen Le visible et l’invisible muotoilujen pohjalta. Selkeytän Merleau-Pontyn teksteissä tulkinnanvaraiseksi jäänyttä lihan ontologista ulottuvuutta kahden hänen myöhäisfilosofiassaan keskeisen käsitteen, kaksoiskosketuksen ja käännettävyyden, avulla. Lihan rakenteen kuvauksessa käytän apuna Merleau-Pontyn esille nostamia taide-esimerkkejä. Esitykseni mukaan Merleau-Pontyn myöhäisfilosofian muotoilut viittaavat olemisen ajatteluun dynaamisena, aina vasta muotoutumassa olevana kudelmana, joka kykenee ylläpitämään sekä yhteyttä ja samuutta että erottumista. Merleau-Pontyn fenomenologiassa lihan ontologinen ulottuvuus mahdollistaa elettyjen (...) kokemustemme moniselitteisyyden ja keskeneräisyyden. (shrink)

A formalism is developed that treats a robot as a subject that can interpret its own experience rather than an object that is interpreted within our experience. A regulative definition of a meaningful experience in robots is proposed in which the present sensible experience is considered meaningful to the agent, as the subject of the experience, if it can be related to the agent's temporal horizons. This definition is validated by demonstrating that such an experience in evolutionary autonomous agents is (...) embodied, contextual and normative, as is required for the maintenance of phenomenological accuracy. With this formalism it is shown how a dialectic similar to that described in Hegelian phenomenology can emerge in the robotic experience and why the presence of such a dialectic can serve as a constraint in the further development of cognitive agents. (shrink)

This paper takes as its point of departure Merleau-Ponty’s assertion: “everything will have to begin again, in politics as well as in philosophy”. In pursuing his later work, Merleau-Ponty signalled the need for a reconfiguration of his philosophical vision, so it was no longer caught in Cartesianism and the philosophy of consciousness. This required a turn towards ontology through which he consolidated two key ideas: firstly, a pervasive interdependence articulated in his reversibility thesis and the ontology of ‘flesh’; secondly, a (...) radical contingency at the heart of existence. This paper interrogates the political implications of these ideas, and specifically regarding humanism and human progress. Relatedly, I address the question – how might recognitions of ontological interdependence and radical contingency support a flourishing democracy? Merleau-Ponty’s early political work concerned the issues of his day – Nazism, Marxism and the status of humanism – and did not engage extensively with these emerging onto-political concerns. Nonetheless, there are indicative reflections in the writings and interviews; the political implications of his ontological interrogations become more thematic in the later works. There is no rupture between the earlier and later works regarding his philosophical vision, although he later distanced himself from Marxism with revelations of the gulags under Stalin and the Korean War. The overarching claim of this paper – we need to rethink politics from the ground up beginning with ontology; ontology is political and the political is intrinsically ontologically informed. Getting the ontology ‘right’ is a matter of discovery and not theory choice. (shrink)

Husserl’s theory of empathy plays a crucial role in his transcendental phenomenology and has ever since been critically examined. Among various critiques leveled at Husserl, the issue of bodily similarity between oneself and the other lies at the core, not only because Husserl conceives of it as the motivating factor of empathy but also because his account of it has been taken to be problematic. In this article, I review a main interpretation of the issue of bodily similarity in Husserl, (...) which takes the bodily similarity in question to be a visual resemblance between oneself and the other. By contrast, I give a new interpretation of bodily similarity by taking into account Husserl’s emphasis on tactual experience with regard to the constitution of one’s own lived body and the foreign body. I argue that the bodily similarity in question amounts to a similar manner of twofold bodily manifestation in oneself and the other, and I also suggest that this interpretation further enables a new understanding of interpersonal relation in Husserl. (shrink)

The enactive approach to cognition and consciousness offers a valuable alternative to the standard approaches dominant in the sciences of mind. As an embodied account, enactivism incorporates theoretical perspectives on the body from phenomenology, cognitive science, and biology, which provides a unique interpretation of embodiment with critical insight into the embodied nature of cognition and consciousness. Nonetheless, I argue that several revisions are required to make enactivism viable within the context of the sciences of mind. The enactive account of subjectivity (...) is problematic, in light of arguments developed in Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s later texts, because it is implicitly dualistic. I demonstrate that this implicit dualism can be resolved by incorporating the conceptual framework of flesh that Merleau-Ponty introduces in his later works. However, this new framework presents a challenge of understanding how body can break with world in experience. I provide a solution to this problem by way of developing revisions to the enactive account of cognition, which I argue is problematic in its generality. I offer a new interpretation of enactive cognition modelled on structural flexibility that overcomes the difficulties of the previous account. These revisions to enactive cognition provide a way of understanding how body can break with world, resulting in an account of the enactive body as expressing a massive integration of its different ways of being in the world, as cognitive, conscious, affective, and agentive. These revisions provide a more consistent and plausible articulation of the enactive approach that is more amenable to guiding the sciences of mind. (shrink)

The literature on sensory processing disorders in institutionalized infants highlights the impact of early deprivation on infant perception. Through a Merleau-Pontian, hyperdialectic analysis of the extraordinary development of infant perception under circumstances of severe deprivation the intimate link between environmental affordances and perceptual systems becomes apparent. This paper offers an updated reading of Merleau-Ponty’s late work as a philosophy of systems and outlines some fertile philosophical concepts and methods developed by Merleau-Ponty in The visible and the Invisible. Merleau-Ponty’s concept of (...) the chiasm, understood from a systems perspective, and his method of the hyperdialectic are applied in a child case study of an infant who suffered severe neglect in a Romanian orphanage. (shrink)

The moral presentation: an essay on Merleau-Ponty's notion of time in the Phenomenology of Perception: The purpose of this essay is to investigate the notion of memory in Merleau-Ponty, suggesting a possible interpretation of the time and memory within Merleau-Ponty’s genetic phenomenological analysis. Ultimately, our hypothesis is that Merleau-Ponty’s understanding of the problem of representation and perception - particularly the problem of retention - places an ethical ground in perception. We will suggest that the phenomenological approach to memory might pave (...) a different undertaking of morals as constructed in the living-present. Our objective is then to point a moral dimension to the process of presentation-representation that happens in consciousness, and establish that our way into the comprehension of values has both a passive and active dimension that is often underdeveloped in studies of how we establish moral and political convictions. Keywords: Time, Memory, Representation, Perception, Ethics A presentação moral: um ensaio sobre a noção de tempo de Merleau-Ponty na Fenomenologia da Percepção Resumo: O propósito desse ensaio é instigar a ideia de memória em Merleau-Ponty, sugerindo uma possível interpretação de tempo e memória dentro da análise genética-fenomenológica de Merleau-Ponty. Em última medida, nossa hipótese é que o entendimento de Merleau-Ponty sobre o problema da representação e da percepção - particularmente o problema da retenção - coloca um fundamento ético para a percepção. Nós iremos sugerir que a abordagem fenomenológica para a memória pode nos dar um diferente modo de análise da moral enquanto construída no presente-vivido. Nosso objetivo é então apontar para uma dimensão moral para o processo de apresentação-representação que acontece na consciência e estabelecê-lo como um caminho para nossa representação consciente, entendendo que nosso modo de compreensão tem tanto uma dimensão intencionalmente ativa quanto passiva que é frequentemente pouco desenvolvida em estudos sobre nossos estabelecimento de convicções morais e políticas. Palavras chaves: Tempo, Memória, Representação, Percepção, Ética La presentación moral: un ensayo sobre la noción de tiempo de Merleau-Ponty en la Fenomenología de la Percepción Resumen: El propósito de este ensayo es instigar la idea de memoria en Merleau-Ponty, sugiriendo una posible interpretación del tiempo y la memoria dentro del análisis genético-fenomenológico de Merleau-Ponty. En última instancia, nuestra hipótesis es que la comprensión de Merleau-Ponty del problema de la representación y la percepción, particularmente el problema de la retención, sienta una base ética para la percepción. Sugeriremos que el enfoque fenomenológico de la memoria puede darnos un modo diferente de análisis moral a medida que se integra en el presente. Nuestro objetivo es, entonces, señalar una dimensión moral al proceso de presentación-representación que tiene lugar en la conciencia y establecerlo como un camino hacia nuestra representación consciente, entendiendo que nuestro modo de comprensión tiene una dimensión intencionalmente activa y pasiva que a menudo se entiende mal. desarrollado en estudios de nuestro establecimiento de creencias morales y políticas. Palavras clave: Tiempo, Memoria, Representación, Percepción, Ética Data de registro: 03/09/2019 Data de aceite: 22/07/2020. (shrink)

This article takes up the call of feminist thinkers to reconsider the importance of the utopian. I offer a view of the utopian that is situated, critical, and relevant to transformative politics, a view that is structured by embodiment. To this end, I consider some epistemological and ontological connections of situated utopian thinking that enable us to think the utopian differently. Finally, I argue that this view of the utopian can be found in the political efforts of “integrative feminisms.”.

This article draws on a study of infant participation in research, and work in philosophical-empirical inquiry, to illuminate some of the inexhaustible entanglements constituting the collec...

The idea that infant participation in research is achievable by researchers ‘voicing’ infants’ experiences and ‘perspectives’ is a central feature of current moves towards participatory research. In this article we offer an alternative. Specifically, we suggest a different point of reference than infants’ own experiences and ‘perspectives’; namely, the encounter between researcher and infant as it unfolds in practice. Drawing from a large-scale study of infants in family day care, and Merleau-Ponty’s notions of écart and reversibility, we articulate the possibility (...) that infants’ participation in research encounters may be felt by researchers in the ways that infants evoke embodied responses. Drawing on Dillon’s ethics of particularity, which builds upon écart and reversibility, we discuss the idea that researchers’ embodied responses to infants provoke possibilities for ethical reflection, which can afford new ways of ‘going on’. We propose that space may be created for infants to influence ECEC practice when researchers attend to their own embodied responses to infants during the research encounter; and to the factors that may diminish infants’ capacities to affect such responses. (shrink)

Robert Litman descreve quatro casos extraordinários em que indivíduos revelam esse conhecimento reprimido por meio da análise de sonhos após o suicídio do “outro”. Em cada caso, ocorre um momento de reconhecimento da significância do sonho tal que o sujeito se dá conta da culpabilidade. E, em cada caso, essa culpabilidade teve que ver com uma interrupção na comunicação que é revelada através da psicanálise. Quero desconstruir a relação transferência-contratransferência como uma reciprocidade simbiótica. Não ouso adiante, inalterado, quando transcendo quem (...) eu era através da língua com outros. A língua é a alteração da subjetividade. Ofereço uma crítica de certas compreensões de alteridade envolvidas em psicoterapia pelo exame da situação geral do encontro com outros por meio do evento-língua, peculiar à psicoterapia. Devo reconhecer que a ameaça da alteridade do paciente é também a promessa da minha habilidade em oferecer ajuda. Se consideramos seriamente a transcendência do evento-língua da terapia, vemos que o processo de alteração do outro implica mudanças para todos os envolvidos.Robert Litman describes four remarkable cases where individuals reveal this repressed knowledge through dream analysis after the suicide of the “other.” In each case, there comes a moment of recognition of the significance of the dream such that the subject realizes culpability. And in each case, this culpability had to do with a communication breakdown that is revealed through psychoanalysis. I want to deconstruct the transference / counter-transference relationship as a symbiotic reciprocity. I do not venture forth unchanged as I transcend who I was through language with others. Language is alteration of subjectivity. I offer a criticism of certain understandings of alterity involved in psychotherapy by examining the general situation of the encounter with others through the peculiar language-event of psychotherapy. I must recognize that the threat of the alterity of the patient is also the promise of my ability to offer help. If we take seriously the transcendence of the language-event of therapy, we see that the process of altering another involves changes for all involved. (shrink)

Resumen: Los objetivos de mi trabajo son: explorar la génesis de la función llamada “arco intencional” en la infancia, entenderla como un proceso de desarrollo paulatino y analizar los procesos intermedios que intervienen en su definición. Asimismo, intentaré demostrar que el concepto de arco intencional, aunque poco desarrollado por Merleau-Ponty, conlleva consecuencias que impregnan y sostienen gran parte de su teoría perceptual. Esclarecer la trama conceptual que lo fundamenta no sólo podrá arrojar luz sobre la génesis de la percepción en (...) su teoría, sino que también aportará herramientas valiosas para explicar los inicios de la constitución del cuerpo habitual en la niñez.: This paper aims to explore the genesis of the function called “intentional arc” during childhood, considering it as a process of gradual development and analysing the intermediate processes that collaborate in its definition. I also attempt to demonstrate that the concept of intentional arc, though scarcely developed by Merleau-Ponty, has consequences that imbue and support much of his perceptual theory. Clarifying the conceptual framework that sustains it can not only shed light on the genesis of perception in his theory, but also provides valuable tools to account for the beginning of the constitution of the habitual body in childhood. (shrink)