Young children's grief: Emotionally intense encounters in early childhood setting

This paper investigates how very young children experience grief through moments of separation, absence, and reunion in an early childhood setting. Drawing on data from a study in Australia, the analysis focuses on ethnographic video observations of siblings Grace and Rosy, collected over four months. The sisters were observed during everyday routines, including arrivals, mealtimes, play, and sleep transitions. Using a cultural-historical approach, the study employs the concepts of the social situation of development and perezhivanie to examine grief as an emotionally lived, embodied, and relational process. In this study, perezhivanie also plays a central analytical role in understanding how emotionally intense moments are experienced and interpreted as they unfold within social relationships and institutional contexts. Two emotionally significant situations are highlighted: one depicting separation followed by a joyful reunion between the sisters, and another showing heightened emotion during the loss of a familiar everyday object. The findings suggest that grief, as a form of perezhivanie is a deeply lived emotional experience that is dynamic rather than fixed, continuously shaped by cultural practices, institutional routines, and sibling relationships.