Thesis Format
Monograph
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy
Program
Anthropology
Supervisor
Clark, Kim
Abstract
In this thesis, I explore embodied, experiences of boxers at gyms in Southwestern Ontario—this analysis of boxing, community, and identities illustrates a vernacular poetics and works out from boxers’ quotidian theories. Sports are an important site to produce cultural identity, understandings of gender and sexual dimorphism, and the definition of ability/disability. I draw on critical theory that emphasises the ‘theory’ produced through stories. Fieldwork, guided by the concept of ‘emergent design’, was conducted between 2017 and 2021. Research problematics included: disability and injury in athletes, the self-application of disciplinary techniques, embodied experiences, and the meaning of ‘community’ for participants. I used a methodological ‘toolkit’ of emergent design. Research was guided by ‘an anthropological sensibility’: participant observation, auto-ethnography, and unstructured interviews. Emergent design allowed me to respond to unanticipated directions—gym closures, the COVID-19 pandemic, my medical leaves/disability. Participants’ narratives are presented in a way shaped by experimental narrative formats in contemporary anthropology. This approach is inspired by an eclectic mix of social studies of sport, illness, disability, masculinity, race, and trauma. I became a part of the local boxing ‘community’ by going to boxing classes, sparring, watching fights, and participating in community events. Participants’ narratives illustrate the complexities of ordinary, intersubjective life, the role of boxing and sport in efforts to make-up identities. Sport is assumed to be ‘productive’ of opportunities: athletes were constrained by injuries, trauma, and the hierarchical structure of competition. I explore the myriad ways participants and I have been differently interpellated by various sports ideologies—the ‘pain principle’, discipline and ‘character’, the hierarchical institutional structure of sports. Boxers were conscious of the potential risks of participation (including concussions, injured hands, broken bones), but negotiated participation around the disciplinary discourse of ‘character’—they had a sense that sport would make them more disciplined/successful in their careers and relationships. Participants’ narratives explore the complexities of embodiment: boxing offered participants a lens to make sense of their daily, embodied practices, make friends and be a part of a ‘community’; at the same time, however, boxers experienced injuries, physical trauma, and hierarchical pressures of sport.
Summary for Lay Audience
I explore data collected from a participant-observation based study of boxers in gyms in London, Ontario (2017-2021). Anthropological methods of emergent design, participant observation, auto-ethnography and unstructured interviews were used to gather data. Delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic and complications to my physical health extended the period over which the data was collected. Throughout fieldwork, boxers were followed through their daily practices in the gym. There I made observations, participated in gym activities, and listened to their stories—here a sense of the ‘ordinary’ emerged. One goal of the research was to understand the ‘ordinary’ as an important part of cultural experience. Initial research questions and guiding themes included pain and injury in athletes, gender experience, discipline, and the embodiment of identity. The importance of community, character, and the hierarchies emergent from sports, emerged as important themes during analysis.
The data and analysis is presented using a framework of ‘cells’ modelled on the organic metaphor of the ‘honeycomb’ as a way of illustrating the intersectionality emergent from the ‘everyday’ or ‘ordinary’—it is a non-hierarchical part-whole structure. The analysis is intentionally eclectic. It purposely draws on a wide range of approaches and theorists from the social studies of sport, illness, disability, masculinity, race, and trauma.
The organic metaphor that underlies my analysis represents boxers’ quotidian theories that emerged from their local, ‘ordinary’ experiences while mapping connections with cultural processes and the institutional realities of sport—I explore the duality, and co-production, of improvisation and fragmentation throughout.
The experimental, improvisational, and puzzle-like aspects of boxing were at the forefront of participants’ consciousness. Boxers were aware of the risks of participation and negotiated these in terms of ‘character’. Discipline and character were multifaceted but were generally important themes in the lives of the boxers. Participants understood that others saw boxers as brutish, dull, or violent—they used intellectual metaphors, such as ‘boxing is like chess’, to resist this representation. Other themes they discussed focus on community, friendship, personal identity and aesthetics, race, and masculinity; these were important elements of participants’ ability to navigate life inside and outside the boxing gym.
Recommended Citation
Galler, Patrick, "Experience on the Ropes: Embodiment, Narrative, and Boxing" (2024). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 10449.
https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/10449
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