Abstract

The article explores the need to eat as a biological and social practice among children in a preschool in Norway. The children in this preschool are aged from one to two years of age, and some of them have just started there. Different events from mealtimes relate to Derrida's concept of touch and Grosz's notion of bodies in‐place and out‐of‐place. How food touches the children and the practitioners is further discussed through a consideration of body/place relations, which are both material and reflect pedagogical discourses. Its overall context is not only touching the food in a concrete sense, but also food as touch seen as a philosophical concept. Analyzing touching relations around the table including movements in materiality, bodies and discourses of eating may empower the youngest children in a preschool setting.