Body and aging perceptions in the project ‘Our Healthier City’

Abstract

Aim: We aim to develop this study with the main objective to discuss perceptions about body and aging from the context of the 'Our Healthier City' project. Method: We use the phenomenological method to develop the research. Through a strategy of the situated phenomenon, we visit the place where it is experienced. We observed the lived world of the people there and interviewed 10 project participants. Results: In this way, we perceive that the aging body is ruled by taboos and prejudices, but develops every day, weaving meanings from movement, work, family, experiences, pleasures, and displeasures, caring for oneself by the understanding that life continues after old age and that death is an irreversible phenomenon. We also understand that it is a part of the body that ages fall, wrinkles, declines as a natural process but that cannot be considered just this, meaning that the body that grows older also develops in a polysemic cultural context with different meanings since old age is understood and lived in different ways by each one. Conclusion: We identify that the area of Physical Education has an academic production in the area of aging and old age that still need to be discussed in order to broaden the eyes for these bodies, so that they can not only be understood in their physiological and their effective responses to exercise, adaptation to physical activity and the types of training programs but also as beings that produce meanings from their experiences.