Culture, meaning and sustainability in surfing

Lazarow, Neil; Olive, Rebecca

doi:10.4324/9781315680231-13

Cited by 8 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 1 publication

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In contrast, it is much harder for athletes to scale down on travelling, which seems to be a high-cost situation—situations that are more important to the athletes. As Lazarow and Olive ( 2017 , p. 215) states “…what surfers are willing to give up to secure better environmental and social conditions is difficult to know, and decisions are often influenced by various social and cultural trends.” However, participating in low-cost situations apparently might be seen as helping surfers get rid of their dissonance. Another way of justifying travelling is by stating that they actually learn a lot about the environment when they travel.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One consequence of this method is that surfers who do not use Facebook are not represented in the survey. Also, as Lazarow and Olive ( 2017 ) notes, self-selection can lead to a bias towards core participants. In our case this could also mean that our respondents are surfers that are more concerned about the environment than the average surfer.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Cultural Dissonance: Surfers' Environmental Attitudes and Actions

Langseth

Vyff

2021

Front. Sports Act. Living

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Surfers often see themselves as “green”. In this study we examine Norwegian surfers' attitudes and actions towards the environment. The article is based on a questionnaire (n = 251) and six qualitative interviews. The results show that most surfers see themselves as environmentally conscious. Oppositely, the data also show that they also buy a lot of surf-related apparel and equipment and travel a lot, and thereby contribute with a lot of CO2-emissions. In the article we investigate the apparent attitude-action gap amongst surfers. Does the gap give rise to emotional conflicts? And, if so, to what degree and how do they cope with it. In the article we start out by analysing such potential conflicts by using the concept cognitive dissonance. Further, we analyse the phenomena from a cultural, Bourdieusian perspective where values within the surf-field is highlighted. On the one hand, surf culture highly values connexion to nature and “green” thinking, on the other hand it also values and gives recognition to surfers that travels to and explore exotic destinations. Hence, values within surf culture leads surfers to conflicting actions. We end the article by discussing if these conflicts could be framed as cultural dissonance.

show abstract

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cultural Dissonance: Surfers' Environmental Attitudes and Actions

Langseth

Vyff

2021

Front. Sports Act. Living

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…This individual interest is also demonstrated in New Zealand research, which indicated that for many surfers, the purpose of surf break management beyond their own surfing interests is largely obscure [49]. However, other studies have found that the relationships between surfers and the natural environment can vary widely across demographies [25,50], which suggests that an understanding of the wider surfing community is required.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Development and Application of Local Coastal Knowledge: Insights from New Zealand Surfers

Campbell

Orchard

2023

Coasts

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Through their accumulated experiences with coastal environments, surfers may be uniquely qualified as a source of local knowledge on surf breaks and wider coastal management topics. Despite popular associations between surfers and the environment, critical enquiries are needed to establish the scope and depth of surfers’ knowledge and the processes that may influence its development. In this study, we expected that relationships between surfers and the coastal environment would be highly variable and dependent upon several outside factors, including individual motivations and biases. This broad hypothesis was tested through an oral history study of 15 New Zealand surfers, which examined the development of coastal environment knowledge through surfing experiences and explored its applications to resource management in New Zealand. Surfers can develop a unique local knowledge of the coast that is often specific to their favourite locations but can also include regional insights obtained through site-scale comparisons. These may include relatively detailed observations that are typically difficult to detect or measure and that are primarily generated through sustained surfing experiences. Socio-cultural factors, including gender stereotypes, localism, equipment bias, and interaction with accessibility, were identified as key influences on individual motivations and knowledge generation contexts. This study argues that surfers’ perspectives are critical to informing management decisions in the coastal environment. Knowledge residing in the surfing community is dependent on individual associations with surf breaks, yet it can be harnessed across meaningful scales to inform coastal management. Moreover, the generation of local knowledge through surfing experiences adds to the societal benefits of protecting surf breaks.

show abstract

“…In addition, Wheaton et al.’s (2017) review identified strongly positive developmental and health/well-being aspects of surfing programs associated with the capacity-building potential of lifestyle sports that can challenge more instrumental and structured sports programs. Yet, they and others note that such surfing sites and experiences are also contested (Lazarow & Olive, 2017). For example, a separate U.K. study of youths with social behavioral problems noted the social norms that can persist around watersports and surfing with youth from lower income backgrounds feeling socially and culturally excluded (Hignett et al., 2017).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensing Water: Uncovering Health and Well-Being in the Sea and Surf

Britton

Foley

2020

Journal of Sport and Social Issues

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article considers how different recreational users engage with and utilize blue spaces as health-enabling. Informed by empirical and participatory fieldwork with surfing and sea swimming groups, we explore embodied and emotional experiences while researching directly within blue space. Given a focus on health and well-being, we identify different dimensions of how surfers and swimmers narrate those experiences while directly immersed in water during a sport/recreational activity. Such questions resonate with geographical thinking around phenomenology, active relational geographies, embodiment, emotion, and sport and leisure practice. We use a broad health promotion or enabling spaces approach to capture different emotional and embodied accounts of immersions in blue space, recognizing that this capture is emergent in and from place.

show abstract

Culture, meaning and sustainability in surfing

Cited by 8 publications

References 1 publication

Cultural Dissonance: Surfers' Environmental Attitudes and Actions

Cultural Dissonance: Surfers' Environmental Attitudes and Actions

Development and Application of Local Coastal Knowledge: Insights from New Zealand Surfers

Sensing Water: Uncovering Health and Well-Being in the Sea and Surf

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About