Shepherding the child: embodied directive sequences in parent–child interactions

Abstract

The present study explores how directives are constituted in and through situated verbal, bodily, and spatial practices. The foci are parental directives requesting routine family tasks to be carried out in an immediate situational context and necessitating the child's locomotion from one place to another (e.g., to take a bath, brush his/her teeth). As documented, such directive sequences were designed with what is here called parental shepherding moves, that is, “techniques of the body” (Mauss, Economy and Society 2: 70–88, 1973 [1935]) that monitor the child's body for compliance. Body twist, a form of tactile intervention, was deployed to terminate the child's prior activity and initiate a relevant activity by perceptually reorienting the child in the lived architecture of the home. Tactile and non-tactile steering constituted means for monitoring and controlling the direction, pace, and route of the child's locomotion. Overall, these embodied directives served as multifunctional cultural tools that scaffolded the child into reflexive awareness of the dialogic and embodied characteristics of social action and accountability.