The body in contemporary times: can school physical education re-signify it?

Abstract

This interpretative article presents a reflection on the role of school physical education in re-signifying the body in the face of the stereotyped body created in contemporary times. It makes reference to the contributions from body researchers, especially Breton, and to ideas from sociologists such as Durkheim and Foucault and anthropologists such as Mauss. It also reflects upon the body issue in physical education practices in which teacher and students both hold body re-signifying possibilities through an awareness process that helps to overcome fragmentation and proposes interdisciplinarity as a key element. This reflection demands that the reality of pedagogical practices be recognized in school physical education as a freeing social space, and not as a mere emulator of non-critical practices.