Daps,Dykes and Five Mile Hikes: Physical Education in Pupils' Folklore

This paper explores the relationship between the school and the body. It does so by considering the transfer from primary to secondary school. Analysing children's and young adult's stories about transfer reveals that physical education (PE), and more generally the body, are central to pupils' anticipations and anxieties about the move to secondary school. The paper argues that the fears pupils express about the dangers associated with secondary school PE should be placed within the context of the transition to adulthood. Secondary school PE is an integral part of the status passage to adulthood, during which the recognition of the body as physical, social and sexual is central.