Thesis (doctoral)--Universität St. Gallen, 2002.

How we come to know about social phenomena is an important sociological question and a central focus of this thesis. How knowledge is organised and produced and becomes part of ruling relations is empirically interrogated through an institutional ethnography. I do this in the context of explicating the construction of a public history concerning Aboriginal Australian child separations over the 20th century, and in particular as it arose in the 1990s as a social problem. Particular attention is given to knowledge construction practices around the Australian National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal Children from Their Families (1996-1997) and the related Bringing Them Home Oral History Project (1998-2002). The once separated children have come to be known as The Stolen Generation(s) in public discourse and have been represented as sharing a common experience as well as reasons for the separations. Against the master narrative of common experience and discussion of the reasons for it, this thesis raises the problematic that knowledge is grounded in particular times and places, and also that many people who are differently related and who have experiences which contain many differences as well as similarities end up being represented as though saying the same thing. Through an institutional ethnography grounded in explicating the social organising activities which produced the Bringing Them Home Oral History Project, I examine how institutional relations coordinate the multiplicity and variability of people’s experiences through a textually-mediated project with a focused concern regarding the knowing subject, ideology, accounts, texts and analytical mapping. Through this I show how ruling relations are implicated in constructing what is known about the Aboriginal child separation histories, and more generally how experience, memory, the telling of a life and the making of public history are embedded in social organising practices.

De nombreux travaux chez l'adulte attestent de l'implication des systèmes sensori-moteurs dans les activités conceptuelles. Ce travail interroge la pertinence d'une approche incarnée de la formation des concepts et vise à fournir des éléments de compréhension quant à l'influence des actions sur la formation de concepts d'objets, en adoptant une approche développementale. Les modèles classiques du développement conceptuel suggèrent des points de départ unitaire aux premières catégories. Le modèle de Nelson souligne l'importance des interactions entre individu et environnement, et celui de Quinn et Eimas au contraire met l'accent sur la similarité perceptive comme point de départ des premières catégories. Ces modèles unitaires sont pourtant remis en cause, notamment par la variabilité des informations prises en compte pour catégoriser les objets. En défendant une approche globale, différentielle et interactionniste, nous envisagerons dans un premier temps une distinction entre domaines d'appartenance des objets (objets naturels et fabriqués) pour lui préférer ensuite une distinction en termes de manipulabilité des objets. Considérant que les caractéristiques de manipulation des objets se reflètent dans l'organisation des catégories taxonomiques, nous proposerons que les activités conceptuelles des enfants puissent être relatives aux interactions sensorielles et motrices avec les objets. Chez l'adulte, certains des résultats attestent de la nature sensori-motrice des connaissances conceptuelles et du rôle de l'action dans leur acquisition, appuyant les théories de la cognition incarnée (i.e., embodied cognition). Une série de travaux chez l'enfant de 5 à 9 ans a été conduite afin d'étudier, d'un point de vue développemental, les hypothèses d'une cognition incarnée. Les premiers testent l'existence de simulations sensori-motrices lors du traitement conceptuel. Les suivants évaluent directement le rôle des actions sur la catégorisation. Sont opposés des gestes de saisie d'objets et des gestes d'utilisation. La saisie d'objets, à pleine main ou à 2-3 doigts, permet très clairement la prise en compte d'informations structurales, utilisées ensuite comme critère de catégorisation d'objets nouveaux. Les actions d'utilisation, faire rouler ou appuyer, ont une influence moindre, plus variable selon l'âge des enfants. L'analyse des mouvements oculaires lors de la recherche de cible parmi des distracteurs similaires quant à la saisie ou à l'utilisation permet finalement de distinguer l'influence des affordances à la saisie de celle des actions elles-mêmes. Du point de vue développemental, les affordances à la saisie seraient détectées automatiquement quelles que soient les actions effectuées, dès l'âge de 5 ans, tandis que les informations issues des actions seraient prises en compte peu à peu, celles issues des actions d'utilisation intervenant plus tardivement que celles issues des actions de saisie. En outre, les performances catégorielles semblent modulées par la concordance ou la discordance entre les informations issues des actions et celles issues des affordances à la saisie. / In adults, a wide range of results argue that sensory-motor systems are involved during conceptualprocessing. Following a developmental approach, the dissertation asks whether the developmentof concepts might be embodied and deals with the influence of action on conceptual knowledge.Classical models of development suggest that conceptual knowledge develops from one mechanism.Nelson’s position argues for a derivation of concepts from the interaction children have in theirenvironment, while Quinn and Eimas rather suggest that first categories are built from visual similaritydetection. However, children variability in taking account different information when categorizingchallenges these models. We adopt a global, differential and interactionist approach to consider thatvariability in categorization might be explained by a distinction across domain (living vs. artifacts) butalso by a distinction across manipulability of objects. We further consider that manipulability of objects isreflected in the organization of taxonomic knowledge to propose that children conceptual processingare grounded in the sensorial and motor interactions they have with objects. In adults, different studiesshow that actions influences conceptual processing; these studies give support to embodiedcognition theories. We conducted seven studies in 5 – to 9- year- old children to assess the hypothesesof an embodied development of conceptual knowledge. Two studies test the hypothesis of sensorimotorsimulations during conceptual processing. The five following studies directly assessed theinfluence of action on concepts was assessed in five other studies. We contrasted the influence of graspand use. Grasp training, either with full hand or pinch, allow children to take into account volumetricinformation that is subsequently used as cue to categorize new objects. Use training, either push and rollor press, results in a weaker influence that differs with ages. Finally analyses of eye movement patternduring target identification among distractors that could be either grasped or pushed allow us todisentangle the influence of perceived grasp affordances from the influence of training by itself. From adevelopmental point of view; grasp affordances seem to be automatically detected by the age offive, and whatever the training condition. Information computed during training seems to be graduallytaken into account from seven to nine, with use information influence occurring later than graspinformation. Moreover, children performances might be modulated by the concordance or the discordance between the perception of grasp affordances and information from action training.