The Natural: An Autoethnography of a Masculinized Body in Sport.

Stories about individual's lives in relation to sport, and the body have intrigued me. This is due in part to my significant involvement in sport throughout my life and its central role in shaping my masculine identity. I have been particularly interested in autoethnographies as a means through which such stories are conveyed. It is the intense personal meaning that has captivated me most. I often contemplated the capacity to tell my story of a life so heavily invested in sport. The following article is an autoethnography of my body involved in elite level sport. I use a life historical approach to articulate the way in which my body became the focus of my existence within sport and how this impacted my masculine identity. This is a story about my life, and my body in sport. I invite the reader to share my story in the desire that it will elicit a similar response to those engendered in me when I am engaged with a meaningful story. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]