J Bradley Wigger

Invisible Companions

Encounters with Imaginary Friends, Gods, Ancestors, and Angels

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

J. Bradley Wigger teaches religious education and childhood studies at Louisville Seminary. An ordained Presbyterian minister and a recent Henry Luce III Fellow in Theology, Dr. Wigger has served churches in Colorado, Wisconsin, and Mexico. His most recent publications are the picture book for children, Thank You, God (2014), and Original Knowing: How Religion, Science, and the Human Mind Point to the Irreducible Depth of Life (2012).

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Stanford University Press
• Seitenzahl: 256
• Erscheinungstermin: 23. Juli 2019
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 232mm x 152mm x 21mm
• Gewicht: 502g
• ISBN-13: 9781503609112
• ISBN-10: 1503609111
• Artikelnr.: 53537166

Autorenporträt

J. Bradley Wigger teaches religious education and childhood studies at Louisville Seminary. An ordained Presbyterian minister and a recent Henry Luce III Fellow in Theology, Dr. Wigger has served churches in Colorado, Wisconsin, and Mexico. His most recent publications are the picture book for children, Thank You, God (2014), and Original Knowing: How Religion, Science, and the Human Mind Point to the Irreducible Depth of Life (2012).

Inhaltsangabe

Contents and Abstracts
Introduction: See-through Knowing
chapter abstract
The book opens with the author, twenty years earlier, discovering his
daughter has an imaginary friend, Crystal. The scene brings together the
origins of his interest in invisible friends (IFs) as both personal and
professional. Wonder and curiosity forge the motivation driving the
research and book: Why do children make up such companions? And beneath
this psychological question is a religious one: Is there a connection
between a relationship to an invisible friend and one to an invisible God?
The notion of "see-through knowing" is inspired by the name Crystal, which,
like the glass, is see-through. The narrative style of the chapter
introduces the style of the entire book, which itself is inspired by the
children it presents, based upon firsthand interviews. Children take in the
world around them and create scenes and characters much as novelists (or
narrative nonfiction writers) do.
1Life-Givers
chapter abstract
The chapter immediately jumps into descriptions of IFs based upon
interviews with children over the course of a year: "Meet Quack Quack." It
uses children's own words and drawings to highlight large themes that are
explored throughout the book: play and pretense, unpredictability and
flexibility, and the intensity of childhood relationships. Addressed as
well are the ways the research was carried out, previous studies (which are
very limited), ethical considerations, definitions of IFs, and the ways
children with IFs were recruited (through parents). It draws upon a notion
of saints as "life-givers" to frame the friends and the children who
created them.
2Flexibility
chapter abstract
The chapter presents more descriptions of IFs, focusing upon the theme of
flexibility. Categories such as gender and form are less rigid among the
IFs of many of the children: Jeff, a boy, is sometimes a girl, Jeffette;
Dino is sometimes a dinosaur and at other times a space alien. Space and
time are fluid as well: an IF is here one moment, in Florida the next;
another IF is thousands of years old. Even life and death are stretched: an
IF died but has returned; another went away to be with an aunt who died;
another is a girl's grandfather who died but comes back to comfort her when
she's sad. The chapter makes connections to a religious imagination (also
not limited by death), which, in turn, sets up a discussion of the work and
influence of Freud and the parallels between his view of religion and
childhood imagination.
3Logic and Imagination
chapter abstract
The chapter makes clear that children know the difference between their
imaginary friends and "real-life" people. A prevalent fear stoked by
Freud's and Piaget's assumptions about early childhood is that children
with IFs may be psychologically troubled. Both believed young children were
unable to differentiate fantasy from reality and the developmental task is
to move from such confusion to a real-world orientation. Drawing upon a new
wave of research into early childhood development, the chapter demonstrates
how the Freudian/Piagetian framework got the picture wrong, backwards.
Imagination is the developmental achievement and actually aids the
development of logic and real-world rationality.
4Sharing
chapter abstract
Beginning with brothers who share an IF named Baby Bear, the chapter draws
out the social dimensions of imaginative play. It provides a brief
description of the evolutionary emergence and importance of the deeply
social qualities of the human mind. The roots of this mind likely grow in
the evolutionary soil of care-taking and food sharing; and the chapter
highlights themes of sharing and eating found in the interviews (e.g., IFs
eat dinner with the family). The chapter takes the notion of a deeply
social mind even deeper and makes soft connections to the theme of sharing
and eating in religion.
5Wild Mind
chapter abstract
The chapter returns to the phenomenon of shapeshifting among some
children's IFs. Lucy is a mom, a tiger, a rabbit, a mouse, and more,
depending upon the day or hour. But she is still Lucy. Childhood studies of
psychological "essentialism" help illumine how and why the essence of Lucy
could remain even as her appearance changes. Moreover, the chapter focuses
upon play itself in learning and development. When children pretend or
imagine, they are "playing with mind." That is, children are playing with
the points of view, motivations, and knowledge others have in order to
understand the social world with more agility.
6Who Knows What?
chapter abstract
The chapter builds a bridge between Parts I and II and provides a more
direct discussion of religion. Not only did the author interview children
about IFs, he conducted theory-of-mind cognitive tests with them. Theory of
mind refers to the ways in which children (or adults) think about the
knowledge others possess. "Would Quack Quack know what's in this box if
nobody showed him?" The author describes the significance of this research
(especially in relation to religion) through his travels and work at the
University of Oxford. "Would God know what's in this box?" The results
create important challenges to Piaget's theory of development. Primarily,
children are not nearly as "concrete" or "egocentric" in thinking as had
been thought. They easily think about a mind (like God's) who has never
been encountered concretely and can differentiate such a special mind from
those of ordinary (limited) humans.
7Ancestors and Angels
chapter abstract
The chapter describes interviews conducted among over 300 children in Kenya
and Malawi. Over 20% of the Kenyan children had IFs, and over 25% of the
children in Malawi did, answering the first question: Do children in
developing countries even have IFs? Lack of recreational facilities or toys
did not seem to inhibit imagination. Using theory-of-mind tests, the author
asked not only about an IF or Christian God in Kenya but about the
ancestors and the Sun (both important to the local culture) as well. In
Malawi, children were asked about the minds of spirits and angels as well
as Allah (among Muslims) and God (among Christians). Results showed strong
similarities between the ways children in Kenya, Malawi, and the US think
about ordinary and extraordinary minds, including the minds of IFs.
8Gods and Godsibbs
chapter abstract
The chapter describes interviews in Nepal (Hindu and Buddhist) and the
Dominican Republic (Christian). Only 5% of Nepali children had IFs, while
in the DR over a third had them. Reasons for the differences are explored,
but generally there seems to be a cultural emphasis upon realism in Nepal
that discourages fantasy and imagination. Nonetheless, children in this
polytheistic culture tend to think of the minds of gods and goddesses in a
way similar to the way children in monotheistic cultures think of God's
mind. The deities know in extraordinary ways. In the DR, over a third of
the children described IFs and drew pictures of them. In the DR,
theory-of-mind results challenge even further Piaget's theory of childhood
egocentrism. The chapter turns to evolutionary theories of gossip as a
suggestive angle on IFs and our deeply social, if not religious natures.
9Original Knowing
chapter abstract
The chapter explores, from an evolutionary perspective, the type of mind
that can imagine, and it focuses upon the power of a "social imagination"
that not only learns but intentionally teaches and cooperates, which is
unique among primates. The capacity leads to "accumulated cultural
learning" and the vast differences between humans and others (especially
chimps) despite being so similar in DNA makeup. The chapter makes a moral
point that our cognition and cooperation do not make us inherently better,
but make us dangerous. The temptation is to reduce others and claim our own
beliefs ultimate. Religion can do this too. But religion can also resist
the temptation and stoke the ability to recognize the irreducible nature of
others, the world. Religion can stoke wonder.
10Friends of God
chapter abstract
The chapter opens with a friend who has imaginary conversations with his
late father (over coffee). It looks at the parallels between novelists with
their characters and children with IFs. But the chapter uses these to raise
the big question: Are they real? This leads to the question, Is God just an
imaginary friend? Some evolutionary psychologists use theory of mind to
explain (away) religion. The chapter acknowledges the possible truth of the
claim but also some shortcomings: one philosophical (it does not wrestle
with why there is a world at all), the other psychological (it does not
address the prevalence of unbelief or skepticism even among the religious).
Ultimately, drawing upon Jewish mysticism, the chapter turns the question
around, raising the possibility that we are God's imaginary friends, born
of the Creator's imagination (like an author) for the sake of relationship.