Technologies of the Gendered Body: Week 9

Rising gym use ( cited in Crossley 2006: 23) 18% increase in the number of health clubs from % of population belong to a gym (in 2002)

Surveillance and discipline Gym-going as self-surveillance – producing the docile, disciplined body Duncan (1994) (re: Shape magazine) The efficacy of initiative Feeling good means looking good Confession

Minute measurement…

Barker-Ruchti and Tinning (2010) Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Docile subjects – “active passivity” Paradox (p. 246): “may offer gymnasts the potential for kinesthetic experiences, physical strength and corporeal expertise not traditionally possible for women.” “the degree of discipline and submissiveness required by gymnasts is key in preventing these athletes from reflecting upon themselves as individuals, their conduct, as well as their sport, and thus using their experiences as a space to invent themselves”

Charitable bodies “If citizenship involves a commitment to social engagement and individual responsibility for health, then the city marathon both symbolises and reinforces the image of the active citizen. Thus fit bodies may also become “charitable bodies” and manifest both public policy and private self-fulfilment.” (Nettleton and Hardey 2006: 447)

Crossley (2006) The ideal type described in Discipline and Punish doesn’t reflect practice / lived experience – a “witches brew” Need to move away from a static, single factor as explanatory of all gym use (e.g. body image pressures)

Crossley (2006) Motives for joining: Athletes seeking to enhance performance Weight loss (+ toning up) “The reference point of the agent was not a social standard, accessed through advertisements, celebrities or some other conduit of common culture, but rather their own past self, as revealed by experiences that effected contrast.” (p. 31) - Body work as episodic

Crossley (2006) Motives for continuing: habit Social interaction Moral pressure Escape: “[…] they could, to some degree, turn off consciousness and absorb themselves in exercise” (p. 43) “ogling”

Cannons Gym

Crossley 2006 Relaxation /stress release: (citing Becker re: marijuana smoking): “For most people it is horrible at first. Agents persevere and learn, however. They acquire the taste, learn the techniques and learn to frame the experience in such a way as to render it positive. So it is with working out.” - Physical self-hood - Guilt - Sport

Gendering Working Out Women’s physical capacities viewed through the lens of reproduction (e.g. Balsamo)

Dworkin and Wachs (2004) The pregnant body is seen as maternally successful but aesthetically problematic The third shift – getting back in shape Language of empowerment whilst inscribing women to the privatised realm of bodily practices, domesticity and family values.

Women’s gyms

“Is gymphobics for you?” “Would prefer an air-driven exercise circuit that is easy to use and that has no clanking weight machines, no pounding treadmills and no lung- busting aerobics classes?”

Hanold (2010) Female ultrarunning bodies Focus on Foucault’s notion of power as producing “effects at the level of desire” (p. 165) Pushing bodily limits to enhance sense of self The normalisation of pain and injury. Disruption of conventional gendered distribution of participation and outcomes Body type doesn’t predict success – focus on “what they can do rather than what their bodies look like” (p. 170) Very white / middle class

Body building

A challenge to normative femininity? Muscularity is seen as incompatible with femininity (within western cultural norms) Women are encouraged not to take up space Sandra Bartky (1990) sees it as an empowering practice that challenges normative femininity Susan Bordo (1990) – compares body building to anorexia Anne Balsamo – the “naturally” female body is “culturally reconstructed according to dominant codes of femininity and racial identity” (p.41)

Conclusion The creation of a “sporting body” involves bodily discipline / docility There are limits to a Foucauldian reading of these practices Sporting bodies are always gendered, but not in fixed ways The sporting body can be experienced as empowering (usually on an individual level) Sports can offer a route to alternative / multiple / novel subjectivities.

Further readings Barker-Ruchti, M and Tinning, R (2010) “Foucault in leotards: corporeal discipline in women’s artistic gymnastics” Sociology of Sport Journal 27: Gimlin, D (2010) “Uncivil attention and the public runner” Sociology of Sport Journal 27: Hanold, M T (2010) “Beyond the marathon: (de)construction of female ultrarunning bodies” Human Kinetics 27: Young, K and White, P (1995) “Sport, physical danger and injury: the experiences of elite women athletes” Journal of Sport and Social Issues 19(1): 45-61