Abstract

In this dissertation, the essence of the early mother infant relationship as a mutual holding and being held is clarified through phenomenological description based on the work of Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger. This relationship shows itself to be deeply inter-corporeal, mutually co-constituting and active, and as having its origins in pregnancy. ;The first chapter introduces Winnicott's psychoanalytic concepts of 'primary maternal preoccupation' and 'holding' which ground the work. As his insights are limited by this approach, a deeper ontological sense of mothering is opened up through the Heideggerian concepts of 'experience', phusis and logos. Mothering ultimately shows itself to be a caring compartment of devoted holding shared by hearkening, harboring, and preserving. ;In the second chapter, the main claims are laid out based on Merleau-Ponty's concepts of the phenomenal or lived body, flesh, and chiasm. The newborn is described as an active co-participant in this early relationship intertwined bodily with his mother and the world. This bodily structures become specified and differentiated through this intertwining, and he, in turn, initiates further deepening and specification of his mother's perceptions, skills, thinking, and sociality. Winnicott's holding relationship is then reconceptualized and phenomenologically described as a chiasmic one in which both partners are simultaneously holding and being held. ;Chapter three critically evaluates current conceptions of pregnancy as a possession of either mother or infant. In opposition to the more common stance that marks birth as the beginning of inter-corporeality and perception, pregnancy is instead phenomenologically delineated as a chiasmic relationship between mother and her pre-infant. This dissertation then maintains that during pregnancy both mother-to-be and her pre-infant are deepened and modified through their intertwining. In this light, the beginnings of a phenomenology of pre-infancy are described