Tuesday, April 8, 2003: 3:00-5:00 p.m.
There's more to such cultural practices as Halloween masquerade
or Santa Claus than meets the single-lensed eye. Play, myth
and fantasy are windows to the complex dynamics by which members
of families negotiate variants of meaning. Cindy Dell Clark's
presentation will consider patterns of multivocality in family
ritual, in cases when imagination acts as a crucial and dynamic
pivot-point for mediating and relating meanings among the
old and the young. Her discussion will draw on ethnographic
work with children and families, including Santa Claus, the
Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and Halloween. She will also
touch upon the everyday imaginal rituals in the families of
children with chronic illness.
Cindy Dell Clark is Assistant Professor of Human Development
and Family Studies at Pennsylvania State University. Her book,
"In Sickness and in Play: Children Coping with Chronic
Illness" will be published by the Rutgers University
Press in 2003, as part of its series in Childhood Studies.
The book reports on an ethnographic study of 5-to-8 year old
children suffering from severe asthma or diabetes. In this
study, children's own views of illness were given voice, through
child-centered interviewing methods. Play and imagination
emerged from the research as an important aspect of how children
coped with illness.
As Professor Clark described, coping with play and imagination
(called "imaginal coping") has been a scant subject
in past clinical and experimental research. Based on Clark's
ethnographic investigation, it was clear that children suffering
from illness used imagination to cope in daily life. First,
children used toys, blankets, or even decorated bed sheets
as transitional objects, objects which reassured them about
their security and safety amidst illness. Another form of
imaginal coping concerned rituals practiced along with treatment,
such as when administering medication by injection (in diabetes)
or by a machine-nebulizer (in asthma). Such rituals included
games, which were co-constructed between child and family
members.
Professor Clark earned her master's and doctoral degrees
in human development from the University of Chicago. She has
a bachelor's degree in international relations from the University
of Pennsylvania. Her training is interdisciplinary, including
training in child development as well as anthropology and
sociology. She is especially interested in imagination and
play as aspects of children's personal and cultural meaning-making.
She is also interested in rituals and holidays as builders
of shared culture and individual meaning. She has an interest
in how children and families navigate traumatic and stressful
circumstances, including chronic illness. Her books include
"Flights of Fancy, Leaps of Faith: Children's Myths in
Contemporary America."
The MARIAL Center
Emory West, 4th Floor, Room 415E
Open to the public
Refreshments will be served
