Hugging the teacher: Reading bodily practice in an Israeli kindergarten

This paper, based on an ethnographic study of an Israeli kindergarten, describes the practice of hugging, by the girls, of the teacher, and the latter's response to the girls' initiative. Based on Bourdieu's concept of habitus and the assumption that embodiment is crucial to social-cultural learning, the paper demonstrates the complex interweaving of social meanings that may be experienced through, and read into, the practice of hugging. By focusing on this single bodily practice, and endeavouring to reveal some of the richness of interpretation that emerges out of such a focus, the paper aims to show how the educational researcher, in setting out an array of possible readings, may provide teachers with innovative ways of seeing the routine practices of classroom life.