“It used to be called an old man’s game”: Masculinity, ageing embodiment and senior curling participation (original) (raw)
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‘Buff boys’ with brooms: shifting representations of masculinity in Canadian men’s curling
NORMA, 2017
This paper explores a shift in masculine sporting identities associated with the sport of curling in Canada. We argue that as curling has become increasingly professionalized, there has been a corresponding shift in representations of male curlers that valourizes youth, strength and aggression, in contrast to a previous emphasis on maturity and sportsmanship. After a review of the history and context of curling's popularity as a sport in Canada, we recount these representational shifts, drawing on official documents of curling associations and media coverage of the sport. At the same time, we suggest that extending conventional forms of sporting masculinity to curling sits uneasily beside new initiatives to encourage lifelong participation in sport. We draw on critical masculinity studies and sport studies to argue that age needs to be taken into account when mapping the diversity of masculinities. We further argue that sport is an important context for understanding complex intersections of age and gender, especially as physical activity is increasingly posited as essential to 'successful aging'. We suggest that curling provides an instructive and under-studied example of how these issues conjoin in constructing aging male embodiment, and suggest some directions for further study.
“I Don’t Think That’s Special to Curling:” Older Men’s Experiences of Curling’s New Rationality
Sociology of Sport Journal, 2019
Curling was perhaps once the sport the least associated with discipline and athleticism, instead having a reputation for drinking and smoking, an ethos prizing conviviality over competition, and a structure enabling amateurs to compete at the highest levels. However, during the gold-medal-winning performance of Team Brad Jacobs, a group of muscular young Canadian men, at the 2014 Winter Olympics, the public and media began celebrating changes in the sport that were already well under way. As curling enters a new era of rationalized training, fitness, and professionalization, this paper draws on interviews with older male curlers in two mid-size Canadian cities, and Ratele’s work on tradition, to ask what has been lost. Participants often embraced curling’s new emphasis on physical fitness. However, they also worried about the diminishing traditions of sociability, sportsmanship, and accessibility within the sport.
Canadian Graduate Journal of Sociology and Criminology, 2014
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Sociology of Sport Journal, 2008
The purpose of this article is to examine issues relating to desirable hockey masculinity and how they are played out within the Canadian Hockey League (CHL). My aim is to explore how the presentation/representation of hegemonic Canadian hockey masculinity within the CHL works to marginalize non-North American hockey players. I examine how gender is performed by the players, how the CHL as an institution supports dominant notions of gender, and how ideas about gender are taken up by the media. I draw from ten semistructured narrative interviews conducted with non-North American hockey players who competed in the CHL, as well as the scholarly literature, media representations and commentary on the game, supplemental interviews, and an examination of North American and international hockey policy.
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2010
This article contributes to recent debates between supporters of the concept of hegemonic masculinity, as exemplified by R. W. Connell, and a new generation of gender scholars, as to how best explain the dynamic and fluid relationships between men, and men and women, in the early 21st century. Here, the author concurs with many of Connell's critics and proceeds by arguing that recent feminist extensions of Bourdieu's original conceptual schema-field, capital, habitus, and practice-may help reveal more nuanced conceptualizations of masculinities, and male gender reflexivity, in contemporary sport and physical culture. This author examines the potential of such an approach via an analysis of masculinities in the snowboarding field. In so doing, this article not only offers fresh insights into the masculine identities and interactions in the snowboarding field but also contributes to recent debates about how best to explain different generations and cultural experiences of masculinities.
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Masculinity, ageing bodies, and leisure
Annals of Leisure Research, 2011
In the shift towards understanding the lived leisure experiences of women, the experiences of men have generally been left under-studied, particularly from a gendered analysis perspective. As such, we know less about the leisure experiences of men, especially the lives of older men. In response to this gap, the purpose of this research was to explore the meaning of masculinity in old age and to understand ageing for men, focusing primarily on their leisure experiences. Using constructivist qualitative methodology, 14 older men were interviewed about their experiences of ageing and as older men. A significant site or context through which ageing was experienced was during leisure, with the primary vehicle for experiencing ageing being the body. These experiences included physical limitations to activity participation and social interactions in leisure settings that reinforced identities as 'old men', with the end result being a narrowing of leisure activities and opportunities. The body, ageing, and leisure experiences were phenomena that were inextricably entwined as the men described their experiences of ageing. The possibility that leisure may be a site where men's traditional masculine identities are contested and identities of 'old men' are ascribed suggests that the experiences of leisure may be more complex than leisure has traditionally been described in literature. The importance of expanding the dimensions of leisure and paying closer attention to the body in leisure studies is discussed.