Anti(-)bodies for Physical Education: An embodied studying with 'ignorant schoolmasters'

Aim: To discover value propositions for physical education (PE) as a discrete subject within the mainstream school curriculum and demonstrate the subject’s academic legitimacy based on that value under the premise that PE is in crisis. Background: With the rising influence of embodied cognition (EC) in the field of education, PE may no longer be the only bodily-focused subject in the school curriculum, as EC encourages teachers of non-PE subjects to include the body in their pedagogies for more effective teaching. The implications for PE as a discrete subject are explored in this thesis through a detailed overview of EC and inferences from extant literature surrounding EC and education. Method: Using a complexity-informed methodology, data from two sets of semistructured interviews and a diary entry relating to the researcher’s bout with shingles were collected and analysed postqualitatively and reflexively in two stages. An emergent method called ‘embodied studying’, which combines Sheets-Johnstone’s (2011) perspective on kinaesthesia and Tyson Lewis’s (2013) notion of studying, ‘tinkered’ with tasks and thought experiments to identify pedagogical gaps and ‘traced’ embodied signatures to aid the discovery of value propositions. Findings: Stage 1 data identified a central organising concept of ignorance, leading to the adoption of Rancière’s The Ignorant Schoolmaster (TIS) (1987/1991) as this thesis’s guiding text. Stage 2 data emerged agential integrity and body ownership as pedagogical gaps, and non-traditional application of fundamental movement skills (FMS) and posthumanism are suggested as value propositions respectively. Psychophysiological conditions of phantom limbs, body integrity identity disorder (BIID), and the rubber hand illusion (RHI) were traced as embodied signatures for the pedagogical gaps. Tracing the shingles’ experience to the concept of autoimmunity revealed the body as another ‘ignorant schoolmaster’. Conclusion: In an unconventional and layered way, the thesis provokes PE teachers to resolve the marginalisation of PE by ‘ignoring’ the body in their pedagogies. Essentially, this thesis is an embodied studying that can empower the PE fraternity by illustrating that value propositions (antibodies to the crisis) can also be found in teaching contexts where the body is ignored pedagogical focus (anti-bodies). In short, anti-bodies are also antibodies for PE.

Name thesis:degree_name

PhD

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Education

Grantor dc:publisher

ResearchSpace@Auckland

Year dc:date.issued

2022

Author dc:creator

• Viswanathan, Sarkkunan

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Ovens, Alan
• Smith, Wayne

Statement dc:rights

• Items in ResearchSpace are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• https://researchspace.auckland.ac.nz/docs/uoa-docs/rights.htm

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/2292/64644

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:researchspace.auckland.ac.nz:2292/64644