ABSTRACT
I first admired Jean Mandler, not because I knew her in person, but because of her wonderful titles: “Remembrance of things parsed,” “A tale of two structures,” “A code in the node,” “The cradle of categorization,” “Separating the sheep from the goats” … through to the wonderful “How to build a baby.” And it is this latter that inspired the title of my chapter for this volume in her honor. Jean's impact on my life both personally and professionally goes well beyond cute titles, of course. First, she has been a constantly inspiring colleague on deep issues about how infants and children represent the world. But just as important, Jean has been an inspiring woman who over the years has become a very dear friend. How I look forward to the second half of each year when the Mandlers hit London and move back into their charming Hampstead home. But will Jean ever forgive me for moving away from Hampstead to be within walking distance of my office? As a regular half-yearly visitor to the Medical Research Council's Cognitive Development Unit (CDU) from 1982 to 1998, there was no topic on which Jean didn't express a critical but constructive opinion. She added a very special dimension to our unit discussions, one that was deeply missed each year during January to June. The CDU closed in 1998, and I often find myself wondering what Jean's input would be to the work of my team at the Neurocognitive Development Unit at the Institute of Child Health. But I and my colleagues have moved almost entirely into atypical development and to relations between genes, brains, and cognition and, as Jean reminded me in a recent email
I am not even sure the study of the brain will help us understand the mind. As for atypical development, I never thought that was the way to go, because we don't know enough about normal development for it to guide us as to what went wrong. But it is clear that I am hopelessly biased in this regard, and probably am missing important insights as to how to proceed. More importantly, we all have to do what excites us …. (J. Mandler, personal communication, April 3rd, 2000)
