Opening up dialogues and airways: using vignettes to enrich asthma understandings in sport and exercise

Journal of Contemporary Ethnography

2021

Self Cite

As recently highlighted, despite a burgeoning field of sensory ethnography, the practices, production, and accountability of the senses in specific social interactional contexts remain sociologically under-explored. To contribute original insights to a literature on the sensuous body in physical–cultural contexts, here we adopt an ethnomethodologically sensitive perspective to focus on the accomplishment, social organization, and accountability of sensoriality in interaction. Exploring instances of the senses at work in social interaction, we utilize data from two ethnographic research projects to investigate the production of running-together and swimming-together by skilled, experienced practitioners. We focus on two interlinked sensory modalities: auditory attunement, and vision and intercorporeality, identified as key dimensions of sensory embodiment and “togethering” in these particular domains.

Section: Vision and Intercorporealitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensoriality, Social Interaction, and “Doing sensing” in Physical–Cultural Ethnographies

Journal of Contemporary Ethnography

2021

Self Cite

“…These shared experiences of mind-body discomfort and 'dys-ease' (Leder 1990) can serve to generate forms of embodied understanding and develop 'somatic empathy' (Allen-Collinson et al 2016) with others who inhabit the same physical-cultural lifeworld.…”

Section: Intersubjectivity and Endurancementioning

confidence: 99%

‘Ploughing on’: a sociological investigation of ‘endurance work’ in competitive swimming and distance-running

Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health

2020

Self Cite

Despite a burgeoning corpus of qualitative studies of sport and physical cultures, indepth and embodied investigations of those requiring sustained engagement with 'endurance work' remain relatively under-developed. These physical cultures are sociologically interesting as they often demand of practitioners intense commitment in terms of time, energy, and (for many) finances devoted to endurance-training regimes.They also require substantial sacrifice with regard to social activities and family life, even for those not competing at elite levels. The nature of endurance and enduring still remains under-researched from a sociological and qualitative perspective, however, and we directly address this gap in the research literature by contributing fresh theoretical insights and empirical data on the lived experience of endurance in two different lifeworlds: competitive swimming and distance running. Employing a sociologicalphenomenological framework, we analyse and conceptualise data derived from two separate ethnographic and autoethnographic research projects, and explore interesting commonalities in the shared lived experience of endurance and 'endurance work' in these two distinctive physical cultures.

“…But, the first initial change, it, it throws you a bit, like your like, 'ok my stroke feels a bit weird now' but then you get back used to it again. This process of developing somatic ways of knowing (Allen-Collinson et al, 2016),…”

Section: Wade (20)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This process of developing somatic ways of knowing (Allen-Collinson et al, 2016), involving change, refinement and evolution, is far from linear, and often results in repetitive steps backwards and forwards, as Peter (21) emphasized:Doing technique is probably the most awkward thing that you can do in swimming, because when you swim for so long, you get into a routine of what ‘normal’ is. So, you get into the rhythm .…”

Section: The ‘Mindful’ Changing or Development Of Techniquementioning

confidence: 99%

“…But, the first initial change, it, it throws you a bit, like you're like, 'OK my stroke feels a bit weird now' but then you get back used to it again. This process of developing somatic ways of knowing (Allen-Collinson et al, 2016), involving change, refinement and evolution, is far from linear, and often results in repetitive steps backwards and forwards, as Peter (21) emphasized:…”

Section: The 'Mindful' Changing or Development Of Techniquementioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

‘Doing’ competitive swimming: Exploring the skilled practices of the competitive swimming lifeworld

International Review for the Sociology of Sport

2020

Self Cite

Despite a developing literature on various facets of sporting embodiment, there is currently a research lacuna with regard to in-depth analyses of actually ‘doing’ sporting activities within specific physical cultures. In this article, we address that gap by drawing on a developing theoretical literature in sociological phenomenology to investigate a particular physical–cultural domain. Here, we present and analyse data from an ethnographic study of competitive swimmers undertaken in the UK. Responding to calls to explore the domain of ‘body pedagogics’, we investigate the embodied work involved in the skilled practice of ‘doing’ and learning how to ‘do’ competitive swimming. This embodied work plays a key part in the swimmers’ ability to inhabit the competitive swimming lifeworld. In the analysis, we highlight how the acquisition and ‘habituation’ of these body techniques and skilled behaviours are not achieved simply through the repetitive rehearsal of coherent movements over time. These processes are complex, demanding practical experimentation, discovery and the ability to adapt constantly to changes in the environment and the swimmer’s own corporeality.