Childing

Childing is a verbal form of a hypothetic verb to child that does not exist in English nor in most of modern languages. But this verb does exist in ancient Greek, as shown in Heraclitus fragment 52, which reads aion pais paizo … basileus paizou, or “Time is a child childing, a childish kingdom.” What Heraclitus is saying is that childing is the action of a child that takes place in aionic time—a time inherently connected to childhood. This entry examines children’s unique relationship to time and questions whether childing has a place in contemporary institutions, including schools.