THE CENTRAL IMPORTANCE OF THE NOTION OF BODY SCHEMA AS CHIASM BETWEEN SPACE AND MOVEMENT

Body schema" is a central notion in the analysis of Phenomenology of Perception. Nevertheless, in the working note entitled "Dualism-Philosophy", Maurice Merleau-Ponty holds that in 1945 he has still not overcome the dualist point of view, which allegedly would determine that notion. Considering this fact, how could you explain the continuous presence of that notion in the later analysis of space and movement? In this paper I will consider the notion of "body schema" proposed by Merleau-Ponty in three different periods: first, the chapter devoted to the space and the human motricity in Phenomenology of Perception, second, the lecture "The Sensible Word and the World of Expression", and, finally, the unfinished work Visible and Invisible and the working notes from 1959-1960. My present goal is to reconstruct the evolution of the notion of "body schema" in order to clarify how it becomes integrated into the ontology of flesh.