Allen-Collinson, J. & Hockey, J. (2007) ‘Working Out’ Identity: Distance Runners and the Management of Disrupted Identity. Leisure Studies (original) (raw)
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Leisure Studies, 2007
This article contributes fresh perspectives to the empirical literature on the sociology of the body, and of leisure and identity, by analysing the impact of long-term injury on the identities of two amateur but serious middle/long-distance runners. Employing a symbolic interactionist framework, and utilising data derived from a collaborative autoethnographic project, it explores the role of 'identity work' in providing continuity of identity during the liminality of long-term injury and rehabilitation, which poses a fundamental challenge to athletic identity. Specifically, the analysis applies Snow and Anderson's (1995) and Perinbanayagam's (2000) theoretical conceptualisations in order to examine the various forms of identity work undertaken by the injured participants, along the dimensions of materialistic, associative and vocabularic identifications. Such identity work was found to be crucial in sustaining a credible sporting identity in the face of disruption to the running self, and in generating momentum towards the goal of restitution to full running fitness and re-engagement with a cherished form of leisure. Keywords: identity work; symbolic interactionism; distance running; disrupted identity
Identity challenges and identity work: sporting embodiment and disrupted identity
2015
This paper addresses a topic of long-standing concern to symbolic interactionism: identity challenges and the role of ‘identity work’ in coping with identity disruptive happenings (Allen-Collinson, 2011; Hockey, 2013). In the case considered here, disruption to identity was generated by long-term injuries experienced by two recreational, non-elite but nevertheless very ‘serious’ and highly committed distance runners. Employing a symbolic interactionist framework, we analyse data from a two-year autoethnographic project examining the injury and rehabilitation process, and the identity challenges provoked by enforced withdrawal from a core element of identification. Here, we explore the role of identity work in providing a much-needed degree of continuity of identity during the liminality of long-term injury, drawing on Snow and Anderson’s (1995) and Perinbanayagam’s (2000) conceptualisations of identity work. These focus on the dimensions of materialistic, associative and vocabularic...
This paper addresses a topic of long-standing concern to symbolic interactionism: identity challenges and the role of ‘identity work’ in coping with identity disruptive happenings (Allen-Collinson, 2011; Hockey, 2013). In the case considered here, disruption to identity was generated by long-term injuries experienced by two recreational, non-elite but nevertheless very ‘serious’ and highly committed distance runners. Employing a symbolic interactionist framework, we analyse data from a two-year autoethnographic project examining the injury and rehabilitation process, and the identity challenges provoked by enforced withdrawal from a core element of identification. Here, we explore the role of identity work in providing a much-needed degree of continuity of identity during the liminality of long-term injury, drawing on Snow and Anderson’s (1995) and Perinbanayagam’s (2000) conceptualisations of identity work. These focus on the dimensions of materialistic, associative and vocabularic identifications. We illustrate these key forms of identification via rich data extracts from the research project. Our extended quotes cohere around the themes of: 1) the use of settings, props and appearance; 2) selective association with subcultural others; and 3) identity talk. In its varied and complex forms, identity work was found to be of great salience in sustaining a credible, if modified, running identity in the face of considerable identity challenge, and in generating much-needed momentum toward our goal of restitution to full running selves. References Allen-Collinson J. 2011. Assault on Self: Intimate partner abuse and the contestation of identity. Symbolic Interaction, 34 (1): 108-127. Hockey, J. 2013. Knowing the 'Going': The sensory evaluation of distance running. Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health, 5 (1): 127-141. Perinbanayagam, R.S. 2000. The Presence of Self. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield. Snow, D.A., and L. Anderson, L. 1995. The Problem of Identity Construction among the Homeless. In Symbolic Interaction: An Introduction to Social Psychology edited by N. J. Hermann and L. T. Reynolds, pp. 239-258. New York: General Hall, Inc.
2001
This article examines the importance of narrative activity in the construction of the injured and rehabilitated sporting body and the successful reconstruction of positive athletic identity. It is based on collaborative autoethnographic research undertaken by the authors, both of whom are middle/long-distance runners, during a two-year period of injury and gradual rehabilitation. The paper delineates certain narratives which were generated during the process of injury and recovery, commencing with narratives of suffering and sacrifice, through those of pilgrimage and blame to the more positive narratives of compensation and subsequent empowerment and progress. We examine the role played by these narratives in enabling us to make sense phenomenologically of our injured bodies, to achieve momentum and to maintain positive running identities in the face of threat to the running selves. Via narrative exchanges, as ‘co-tellers’ we achieved a high degree of intersubjectivity which was crucial to our eventual return to full running fitness and athletic identity.
It is appropriate to begin this brief introduction with an acknowledgement to Herbert Richardson of Edwin Mellen Press. The idea for the volume on ’Sport and Identity’ was Herbert’s, arising, as it did, during a pre-dinner conversation we had at the Film & History conference in Chicago in November 2008. I am sometimes wary about telling people that I am a professor within the relatively new academic domain of sport studies, as this usually leads to assumptions about a background in phsyiology (or a related scientific field) or, even when associated with the social sciences, pyschology. Given the subject matter of the conference that we were attending, such an assumption was not as likely as in other contexts, but I was nevertheless gratified by Herbert’s enthusiastic response to my declared professional interest in the social, cultural and historical study of sport. I cannot quite recall how the conversation developed, but do remember Herbert quickly putting forward the idea of a book on sport and identity; Herbert correctly recognising the topicality of identity as a theme within the social sciences and humanities and of sport as a subject matter to which considerations about identity are highly relevant.
The Routledge International Handbook of Organizational Autoethnography, 2020
Extract from Introduction: Whilst there is a paucity of running research – and sport-related research more generally – within sociologies of the everyday, the converse also holds: there has until recently been scant attention paid to analyzing the everyday within the sociology of physical cultures, sport, and exercise. In recent years, a small research literature has begun to develop, which explores the mundane, embodied, sensory, and “emplaced” experiences, and practices of sport and physical cultures (Groth & Krahn, 2017; Hockey & Allen-Collinson, 2009; Pink, 2011). The autoethnographic research project portrayed here contributes to this developing corpus, by focusing on the experiences of two non-élite, amateur, middle/distance runners, one female/one male. This research charts the injury process introduced in the autoethnographic fragment at the start of the chapter. Both authors have been employed full time (and intensively) in UK universities for most of their working-lives, including substantial periods of time working at the same three institutions, and training together over many thousands of miles. Employing a symbolic interactionist theoretical framework, here we chart and explore the role of “identity work” (Allen-Collinson & Hockey, 2007; Perinbanayagam, 2000; Snow & Anderson, 1995) in undertaking the identity shifts that are “worked” and negotiated in order to facilitate the sometimes difficult transition between two very different lifeworld spheres: full-time paid employment, and distance running.
It is appropriate to begin this brief introduction with an acknowledgement to Herbert Richardson of Edwin Mellen Press. The idea for the volume on ’Sport and Identity’ was Herbert’s, arising, as it did, during a pre-dinner conversation we had at the Film & History conference in Chicago in November 2008. I am sometimes wary about telling people that I am a professor within the relatively new academic domain of sport studies, as this usually leads to assumptions about a background in phsyiology (or a related scientific field) or, even when associated with the social sciences, pyschology. Given the subject matter of the conference that we were attending, such an assumption was not as likely as in other contexts, but I was nevertheless gratified by Herbert’s enthusiastic response to my declared professional interest in the social, cultural and historical study of sport. I cannot quite recall how the conversation developed, but do remember Herbert quickly putting forward the idea of a book on sport and identity; Herbert correctly recognising the topicality of identity as a theme within the social sciences and humanities and of sport as a subject matter to which considerations about identity are highly relevant.
Qualitative Research on Sport and Physical Culture, 2012
Purpose To introduce autoethnography as an innovative research approach within sport and physical culture, and consider its key tenets, strengths and weaknesses. For illustrative purposes, the chapter draws upon two specific autoethnographic research projects on distance running, one collaborative and one solo. Design/methodology/approach The design of the two projects is delineated, including methods of data collection and analysis: tape-recorded field and ‘head’ notes, personal and analytic logs, phenomenological, thematic and narrative data analysis. Issues of representation are addressed and the chapter explores salient, but often-overlooked, ethical considerations in undertaking autoethnographic research. Findings Key findings of two research projects are presented, cohering around issues of identity construction and identity work, together with lived body and sensory experiences of distance running. Research limitations/implications (if applicable) The limitations of using an autoethnographic approach are discussed, including in relation to fulfilling traditional, positivistic judgment criteria such as validity, reliability and generalizability; more appropriate criteria are discussed, particularly in relation to evocative autoethnographies. Novel forms of the genre: collaborative autoethnography and autophenomenography, are suggested as future directions for autoethnographic research in SPC. Originality/value The chapter provides a succinct introduction to the use of autoethnography in sport and physical culture, for those unfamiliar with the genre. The author also suggests an innovative variation - autophenomenography. Keywords Autoethnography; collaborative autoethnography; autophenomenography; distance running; embodiment
Distance Running: A socio-cultural examination, 2015
Introduction In this chapter we draw on a theoretical and methodological approach to the study of endurance and the lived distance-running body: sociological phenomenology, which to date has been relatively under-utilised in sports studies generally. Given the highly embodied nature of endurance running as lived experience, the phenomenological quest to uncover and explore the essential structures of embodied experience seems highly applicable. Here, for those unfamiliar with its tenets, we introduce a ‘sociologized’ variant of the phenomenological approach (see Allen-Collinson, 2011b, for a discussion), and situate our own research within the context of a literature we have been developing on the sociological phenomenology of distance running (Hockey, 2005; Hockey & Allen-Collinson, 2007; Allen-Collinson, 2009; Allen-Collinson & Hockey, 2011; 2013). We then describe the autoethnographic and autophenomenographic project on distance-running, from which our data derive. The project’s findings are subsequently theorised, drawing upon insights from sociological phenomenology, and phenomenologically-inspired work, such as that of Drew Leder (1990).