Corpo e envelhecimento: reflexões a partir do Projeto Nossa Cidade Mais Saudável em Natal-RN e suas implicações para a Educação Física

Abstract

In the current circumstance in which the occidental society has faced the ageing, we realize that this phase of life is waited and avoided in a negative way, being ignored several times. The field of Physical Education discusses the ageing of the body with some views considered reductionist in many cases, have quite few productions that aim to broaden this idea to a natural and cultural perspective about this body. Thus, our aim is to develop this study, which has as objective make a discussion about the comprehensions of old age and ageing, from participants of the project “Nossa Cidade Mais Saudável” (Our Healthier City) in Natal/RN, in order to list implications to Physical Education. We used the phenomenological method to develop the researching. Through the strategy of the perceived phenomena we went to the place where it is lived. We observed the lived world of people presenting and we interviewed 10 (ten) participants of the project. Thereby, we realized that the body which ages is guided by taboos and prejudices, but is developed everyday building meanings from the movements, work, family, experiences, enjoyment and displeasure, the self-care, the understanding that the life goes on after the ageing and the death is an irreversible phenomena. We also understand as part of the body that ages the falls, the wrinkles, and the declines, as a natural process, in fact, understanding that the body that age is also developed in a cultural and polysemic context, because the ageing is understood and lived in many ways by each subject. Lastly, we identify that the area of Physical Education possess a academy production in the field of ageing and old age that need to be discussed in order to broaden the viewpoints, to be comprehended not only in their physiological decline, their affective answers to the exercises, the physical activity adaptation, and the types of training programs, but also as beings which produce meanings through their experiences.