Search

El impacto y las respuestas de COVID-19 ha dominado la discusión en todas las áreas de la vida y campos de la actividad académica. En este artículo abordo algunos de los impactos y consideraciones en relación a las actividades que han sido conceptualizadas como deportes de aventura. Mi intención no es mostrar cómo se hace la aventura de manera diferente, sino utilizar las circunstancias excepcionales del confinamiento para resaltar las experiencias "cotidianas" multifacéticas, significativas y afectivas de quienes practican deportes de aventura como parte de sus prácticas cotidianas. Mi enfoque es la investigación empírica realizada en Aotearoa Nueva Zelanda durante los diversos confinamientos (2020-21) que se centra en las comunidades costeras y el surf específicamente. Este "viaje a través del confinamiento" ilustra las formas en que los espacios costeros se experimentan como paisajes terapéuticos que pueden fomentar la salud física y emocional y el bienestar de los que están en la costa, hasta actividades de inmersión total como el surf, lo que influye en el sentido de bienestar de las personas y las identidades colectivas. y formas de pertenencia. Sin embargo, de la misma manera que COVID ha agravado muchas inequidades en salud, es importante estar atento a las formas en que los beneficios para el bienestar de los espacios costeros no están disponibles y se extienden a todos. Una variedad de factores culturales, económicos, sociodemográficos y políticos contribuyen a una desconexión o exclusión de varios espacios azules. Diversos sujetos y cuerpos acceden y experimentan los espacios azules de formas diferentes y desiguales, lo que afecta quién puede usar los espacios azules y cómo se pueden usar. Por último, la situación del confinamiento también contribuyó a comprender la naturaleza a menudo romantizada de la relación de los participantes de los deportes de aventura con el mundo natural y, más ampliamente, cómo esto se traduce, o no, en respuestas más amplias a nuestra emergencia climática., The impact of, and responses to COVID-19 has dominated discussion in every area of life, and fields of academic activity.In this paper I consider some of the impacts and considerations in relation to activities that have been conceptualised as adventure sports. My intention is not to show how adventure is being done differently, rather to use the exceptional circum-stances of lockdown to highlighted the multifaceted, meaningful and af-fective `everyday¿ experiences of those who engage in adventure sport as part of their everyday practices. My focus is empirical research conducted in Aotearoa New Zealand during lockdowns (2020-21) focusing on coastal communities and surfing specifically. This `journey through lockdown¿illus-trates the ways in which coastal spaces are experienced as therapeutic landscapes that can foster physical and emotional health and wellbeing from those on the shore, to full-immersion activities such as surfing, in-fluencing people¿s sense of wellbeing, collective identities, and forms of belonging. However, in the same ways that COVID has exacerbated many health inequities, it is important to be attentive to the ways in which the wellbeing benefits of coastal spaces are not available and extended to all. A range of cultural, economic, socio-demographic, and political factors con-tribute to a dis-connect with, or exclusion from various bluespaces. Diverse subjects and bodies access and experience bluespaces in different and un-equal ways, impacting who can use blue spaces, and how it can be used. Lastly, the lockdown situation was also informing in understanding the of-ten-romanticised nature of adventure sport participants relationship with the natural world, and more widely how this translates, or not, to broader responses to our climate emergency., Universidad Pablo de Olavide

Located at the intersection of two key literatures—refugee and sport migration studies—this article offers original insights into the lived and embodied experiences of young men migrating from Gaza to Europe. Drawing upon interviews with young Gazan men throughout the migration process and upon digital ethnography conducted from 2013 to 2018, it explains how these men used their physical prowess in the informal sport of parkour, combined with digital entrepreneurialism, to navigate alternative routes of migration to Europe. In prioritizing the young men’s narratives and offering rich empirical insight into the creative actions and strategic decisions made by youth at various stages throughout migration journeys, we challenge dominant portrayals of young refugees as “victims.” Migration is, thus, revealed as an ongoing and multi-dimensional process of becoming that operates within and across physical and digital spaces and over time. The first to evidence the struggles, creativity, and agency of Gazan youth in their efforts to escape lives of conflict and poverty, the article also prompts conceptual and methodological questions for youth and sport migration research. In particular, it highlights the need to explore the possibilities of digital methodologies for understanding the experiences of those in “hard to reach” places and those “on the move.”

This article introduces the special issue (JSSI 45.1 and 45.2) on ‘Understanding Blue Spaces’ which examines relationships between blue spaces, sport, physical activity, and wellbeing. The articles progress conversations across humanities, social sciences and inter-disciplinary areas of research on diverse sporting practices, that span local to trans-national contexts. This collection offers new insights into politics, possibilities, and problems of the role of blue spaces in our wellbeing—individually, socially, and ecologically. In addition to outlining the 10 articles in the SI, which include ocean swimming, surfing, sailing/yachting, and waka ama paddling, we contextualize this work, discussing key thematic areas both across these papers, and in the wider interdisciplinary body of work on blue spaces, wellbeing, and sport. Specifically, we outline the role of physical activities and leisure practices in how we access, understand, experience, and develop relationships to seas and oceans, as well as to self, places and communities of human and non-human others. We also discuss the ways in which particular bodies, individuals, and communities (human and more-than-human) are marginalized or excluded, and the need for understanding concepts such as wellbeing, place, and self beyond dominant European traditions. This SI highlights how localised experiences of blue spaces can be, while emphasising the need to recognize diverse cultural, economic, geographic, sociodemographic, and political factors that contribute to a disconnect with, or exclusion from blue spaces, impacting who can use blue spaces, how they can be used, how they can be researched, and how power is reproduced and contested.

We briefly set out our vision for our roles as joint Management Editor of Annals of Leisure Research and introduce the selection of articles for this, our first Editorial collection of the journal.

In this paper we focus on coastal blue spaces and the ways in which they have been advocated as beneficial for health and wellbeing in the context of leisure practices. We offer a reassessment of s...

This article examines the power and politics involved in the process of including three new action sports–surfing, skateboarding and sport climbing–into the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. Drawing upon i...

Activewear (clothing designed specifically for fitness and functional movement) has become a hugely popular fashion style for women around the world. Scholars have critiqued the activewear industry for reproducing postfeminist and neoliberal discourses, with advertising and marketing primarily featuring heteronormative women’s bodies (thin, toned, white, young), with a strong emphasis on consumption and choice. In this article, we contribute to the literature on activewear and feminist consumption practices to examine how women consumers of activewear clothing understand and respond to postfeminist discourses inherent in the industry. In so doing, we speak to how the often-critiqued idealised femininity is ‘taken-up’ and interrogated by women activewear consumers. Specifically, we draw upon focus groups and interviews conducted with women from New Zealand, examining how some women are complicit in the production of particular femininities, while others are critical of the industry partaking in an array of everyday ‘acts of resistance’ against (and within) the industry. We conclude with a brief discussion of some of the women-led changes occurring within the activewear market. Ultimately, this article highlights the complexities and attitudes of some women activewear consumers and their contribution (and challenges) to the production of femininity within society.

Researching gender across Physical Education (PE), sport and physical activity (PA) has firm associations with feminism. As a political movement for gender justice, feminist research examines the ways in which active bodies are dynamic and evolving. This feminist scrutiny is underpinned by scholarship that explores both formal educational and sporting contexts as well as informal activities. The term sport incorporates a range of physical practices and a review of extant literature demonstrates the persistence of gendered power relations and the consequences this has for PE, Sport and PA. While the disengagement of girls in formal PE has been recognised as a long-standing and on-going challenge, PE remains narrowly conceived and defined, often with negative consequences for the young people involved. Attempts to be inclusive in research practice expose a persistent dominance of the western/global north in knowledge production in sport, PE and PA scholarship and highlight prevailing discourses that impact negatively on engaging with complex issues in different contexts. Empirical research studies inform praxis whereby feminist researchers analyse barriers to participation across a wide range of contexts that are not limited to young people and that extend to policy matters far beyond PE, such as public health and numerous sites of negotiation for access at community level and to a vast array of informal activity. Key themes for researching active bodies include space and alternative contexts; shifting gender boundaries and disrupting binaries; intersections and difference; exclusion and inequalities; healthism and wellbeing agendas. In this chapter, examples including masculinities and dance, parkour and changing gender choices, swimming and transgender, and public health discourse illustrate complexity and contradictions that move debates beyond a ‘women in sport’ focus. The chapter is premised on feminist perspectives of sport and PE; the focus on active bodies enables informed discussion of the body, physicality and movement both theoretically and in relation to praxis.

The chapter shows the potential and promise of technological innovation for more environmentally sustainable practices, while recognizing the ongoing challenges in changing attitudes in the surf industry, and among many participants/consumers. It echoes broader literatures showing that attitudes and behaviors around environmental issues are complex and paradoxical.

Sports feminists have exposed international sport as an important and visible site where female body boundaries are policed, and a range of regulatory practices have been endorsed. In this chapter we focus on the outstanding African middle-distance runner Caster Semenya, and the most recent (2019) set of assertions from International Sport’s governing authorities, athletes and the media, that she is not a ‘real’ woman, and that her athletic achievements are somehow ‘unfair.’ Our feminist approach focuses on understanding the sport, scientific, medical, ethical and media issues in the Semenya case following her challenge to the International Association of Athletics Federation’s (IAAF) ruling (1st May 2019) to enforce new regulations for athletes who naturally produce higher levels of testosterone than those considered to be ‘normal’. The case of Semenya illustrates how women’s sexed, gendered and racialised bodies continue to be surveyed in and through elite sport. We outline the scientific-based justifications that have been made for this discriminatory regulation of Semenya’s body, and demonstrate that the arguments claiming women with naturally high testosterone levels have an unfair advantage function to serve the authority of particular science and sport perspectives. We argue that the ways in which Sport Governing bodies operate within these conceptual debates constitutes powerful and privileged knowledge that needs to be challenged through critical, transdisciplinary feminist approaches.

The ageing demographics of Olympic viewers is a key concern for the International Olympic Committee. The inclusion of action sports into the Olympic programmes has been a key strategy to try and connect with youth consumers, most recently through the inclusion of skateboarding, surfing, and sport climbing into the Tokyo 2020 summer games. Drawing on a questionnaire distributed online in nine languages, and contextualized with analysis of the action sport media, our research explores international and multigenerational action sport consumers’ sport viewing preferences and attitudes to the Olympic inclusion of action sports. Our findings suggest that action sport participants across different countries, ages, and genders are avid consumers of action sport media but also keen consumers of the Olympics. The majority of survey participants were enthusiastic about the inclusion of action sports (and particularly skateboarding) into the Olympic Games, although there were important trends across nationalities and ages. Nonetheless, reflecting debates in the subcultural media, participants also have concerns about the processes and politics of action sports inclusion. Action sports may well provide the International Olympic Committee with new lucrative markets, but to maximise the engagement of complex intergenerational audiences, their viewing preferences will need continued attention and understanding.

Commentators have suggested that action sports have provided space for more progressive gendered power relations than many more traditional, institutionalized sex-segregated sports. However, as action sports become institutionalized via Olympic inclusion, what are the potential opportunities and challenges for girls and women as both athletes and industry leaders? Drawing on interviews with male and female leaders in surfing and skateboarding industries, media and cultures, and an analysis of niche media, we assess the opportunities for women as the sports prepare for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. The two case studies reveal the different struggles and strategies of women in these two sporting cultures, as well as the roles played by men in supporting cultural change. This article contributes to the critical literature assessing the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) claims to provide opportunities for diverse groups of women and, more widely, the challenges in establishing effective policies to “empower” girls and women in and through sport.

While research shows a positive association between participation in organized sports and youth development, research on alternative and unorganized sport settings is lacking. This paper analyzes d...

Globalization has led to the increased sportization of parkour, one of the world’s newest lifestyle sports. This paper investigates the parkour scene in New Zealand, where attempts to develop and s...

Surfing has consistently been framed as a youth focused, male-dominated sport and culture. Despite surfing’s ageing demographic, neither the ways in which age impacts on surfing identities and mobilities, nor older surfer’s experiences and subjectivities, has been given scholarly attention. In this paper, I discuss research exploring the experiences and identities of middle-aged and older recreational male and female surfers in the south and south-west of England. The research illustrates that participation in surfing as a sport and lifestyle remains highly significant for some men and women through middle-age and into retirement. I consider the cultural barriers and challenges in dealing with a loss in physical performance through ageing, such as adaptations to their equipment, performance, and style, and the implications for how individuals negotiate bodily capital, space and identity. Nonetheless, older surfers also embrace different ways of being a surfer which challenge some of the more exclusionary aspects of surfing identities. Theoretically the paper develops an intersectional approach to sporting identity that explicitly recognises and accounts for the contribution of age to social identity. The research also contributes to the growing literature on physically active ‘post-youth’ leisure lifestyles, illustrating how shifting definitions of ageing have given ‘rise to new expectations, priorities and understandings’ of sporting lifestyles amongst those in middle age, and beyond.

Understanding sport through the lens of social benefit has become a mainstay of sport policy analysis. A wealth of research has considered how sport contributes to achieving wider social benefits, ...

Initiatives using parkour and parkour-inspired hybrid activities are emerging in increasingly varied settings from formal physical education to the performance arts. This proliferation in England h...

Images of surfing have tended to reflect consumer culture’s fascination with youthfulness, simultaneously perpetuating a myth that participants are reckless, male risk-seeking hedonists. This image, however, is being challenged with increasing numbers of older male and female surfers taking to the water. Drawing on empirical research conducted in the UK, I explore the meanings that recreational surfing plays in participants’ lives and identities as they grow older. The research involved interviews with male and female British recreational surfers from ‘middle-age’ through to what the media have dubbed ‘silver surfers’. I examine both life-long surfers and those who have taken to surfing in mid-life. While ageing is often conceptualized as a phase of cognitive and physical decline, recreational surfing is being used as an identity resource in the extension of ‘mid-life’ and in the process of negotiating anxieties about ageing [Tulle 2008. Ageing, the Body and Social Change: Running in Later Life. B...

I often see, hear and read people connecting surfing with freedom: Surfing makes me feel free. Surfing can be described by one word: freedom. Surfing is freedom.

Over the past decades there has been a boom in women’s and girls’ interest in surfing as consumers and as participants, including increasing participation across different social classes and age groups, as well as minority ethnic groups. However, research has tended to focus on the experiences of young white men who short board, or the representation of the normative heterosexual female. This chapter attempts to explore the existing limitations of research about women and surfing. We draw on our own empirical research on female surfers in surfing spaces in the UK, California and Australia to consider the multiple ways of being a female surfer. Our research explores different surfing subjectivities, including different abilities, crafts, ethnicities, sexualities and ages. We advocate intersectionality as a productive research framework, which is a mode of feminist thinking that engages with differences between groups and between individuals and the dynamic process of marginalisation (and at times, privilege). Emerging from critiques by women of colour, as well as queer and trans, of the historically white, middle-class and heterosexual focus of feminism, intersectionality pushes researchers to account for more diversity and complexity in the scope of feminist work. An intersectional approach that interrogates the complexity and diversity of subjectivities has much to offer feminists exploring embodiment, difference and belonging in the dynamic context of surfing spaces. Our paper illustrates how intersectionalities play out in surfing spaces, and offers some of the shared experiences of belonging and exclusion for minority ethnic, lesbian and ‘local’ women. As feminist surf researchers, it is our aim with this chapter to invite a more deliberate delving into the possibilities of intersectionality within future analyses of surfing identities and culture.

On the 50th anniversary of the ISSA and IRSS, Belinda Wheaton, a key figure in understanding emerging, high-risk, and lifestyle sports and their cultures, assesses developments in the sociology of sport that concern the politics of identity and action sport. In reflecting on the trajectory of inquiry, Wheaton notes the struggles of scholars to determine what constitutes sport and reflects on the ways in which action sport both challenges and reproduces dominant relations and meanings. Because many forms of action and informal sport continue to grow rapidly and outpace the expansion of many traditional sports in many Western nations, they represent an important lens for understanding sport in contemporary settings because they are characterized by boundary-crossing activities that traverse sport and art, play and games. Key challenges for the field include understanding the paradoxes that come with commercialization and professionalization as well as understanding how emergent sport subcultures may evolve in non-Western settings. Key on the agenda for the future will be a need for scholars to continue to expose the political formations and to link identity politics in emergent sport to broader structural forces to better understand power and inequality.

Feminist researchers, scholars and activists have always been concerned with contemporary issues. At the heart of feminist approaches are critical challenges to gendered inequality manifest in social, political and cultural ideas, policies and practices at particular moments in time. Contemporary issues in feminist thought and political action include a complex array of social problems connected to social inequality. The issues that matter most to feminists differ according to the organization and experience of social life at any one point in time. Some contemporary feminist issues have an enduring quality to them and appear as important across generations or re-emerge in different social and political contexts at different historical moments. For example, perhaps the most pressing feminist issues globally in twenty-first-century life concern: the division of domestic labour, gendered inequality in pay and position in the workplace, media representation of women, violence against women, and the significance of intersectionality and inequality in shaping the lives of diverse groups of women and girls. Yet each one of these so-called contemporary issues has some connection to the historical trajectory of feminist scholarship and activism, and to the lived experiences of women over time. As Reger and Taylor (2002) point out, early feminist campaigns focusing on suffrage, civil rights, reproductive rights and citizenship have provided legislative and political gains for many women yet there remain legacies of these issues still to challenge and resolve in contemporary contexts.

In the UK in 1989 Joan Smith, the acclaimed feminist journalist, novelist and human rights activist wrote her book Misogynies. Some 25 years later women activists and journalists continue to make public the level and depth of everyday sexism and misogyny in many of the world’s societies. More recently, Laurie Penny (2014), UK columnist and editor, writes powerfully about sexual freedoms and social justice for women and girls around the world. Both women offer texts that appeal to a readership beyond the confines of academia. As such they provide modes of feminist political intervention into popular culture. In this theme of the handbook, we aim to provide similar contributions through a focus on feminist activism and feminist praxis as opposed to explicit feminist theorizing and conceptualizing.