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Langeveld, Jan Martinus

Langeveld spoke of the “home, street, and kitchen approach” in practicing phenomenology to emphasize this quotidian interest in ordinary life topics, even as these topics often were born in the lifeworld contexts of clinical professional practices. The interest in the ordinary and the everyday was simultaneously expressed in the work of the philosopher Henri Lefebvre, who was said to have “discovered” the “quotidian” at about the same time.

The best way to explore the essential meaning of a certain phenomenon, such as the secret place, is by showing what it is not. Langeveld presents counter-examples of the secret place and space experiences such as the child’s experience of a lookout from a tree, a tower, or a window. From a lookout, the child experiences the tension between distance and nearness. Langeveld shows how the lookout experience differs from the eidos of the secret place experience. With additional examples of counter-experiences, he shows that the secret place does not involve the child in activities such as hide and seek, spying on others, doing mischief, going into forbidden places, or even simply playing with toys. In other words, by drawing us near the phenomenon of the secret place and by imaginatively varying the examples and comparing the secret place with the lookout place, the spying place, the hideout, etc., we discover, in part, the unique meaning of the secret place. Rather than see the child involved in spying or hiding activities, what we see is that the child may just “be” in that special place, while perhaps gazing dreamingly into the distance (Langeveld, 1983a, 1983b).

 

Selected Readings:
Langeveld, M. J. (1964). “In Memoriam.” Prof. Dr. J. Linschoten. Nederlands Tijdschrift voor de Psychologie 19: 101–103.
Langeveld, M. J. (1979). Beknopte Theoretische Pedagogiek. Groningen: Wolters-Noordhoff.
Langeveld, M. J. (1983a). “The Secret Place in the Life of the Child.” Phenomenology + Pedagogy 1(2): 181–189.
Langeveld, M. J. (1983b). “The Stillness of the Secret Place.” Phenomenology + Pedagogy 1(1): 11–17.

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