Cathedrals of the surf zone: regulating access to a space of spirituality

Abstract

This paper explores the place of the surfed wave as not simply a site of human–nature relations, but also as a space of spirituality. Surfing is widely considered as a sport of hedonism and risk, but this paper suggests it can also be understood as a means to experience the transcendent. By first introducing the surf zone as a space of liminality and transformation, this paper illustrates how the surfed wave is a cathedral for surfers' ‘aquatic nature religion’ (Taylor, B. (2007a) Focus introduction. Aquatic nature religion. Journal of the American Academy of Religion 75 (4): 863–874; Taylor, B. (2007b) Surfing into spirituality and a new, aquatic nature religion. Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 75 (4): 923–951). Due to the religious nature of the surfed wave, the paper suggests that the informal (b)orders surfers use to regulate the surf zone—understood here as the codes of surfer-provenance and surfer-positioning—do not simply regulate access to the surf zone in a territorial sense, but also they effectively regulate access to the experience of relational spirituality.

Las catedrales de la zona de surf: la regulación del acceso a un espacio de espiritualidad

Este artículo explora el lugar de las olas de surf no sólo como un sitio de relaciones entre los humanos y la naturaleza, sino también como un espacio de espiritualidad. En general el surf es visto como un deporte hedonista y de riesgo. Sin embargo, este trabajo sugiere que el surf también puede entenderse como un medio para experimentar lo trascendente. Primeramente me referiré a la zona de surf como un espacio de liminalidad y transformación, para luego mostrar cómo la ola surfeada es una catedral para la ‘religión de naturaleza acuática’ de los surfistas (Taylor 2007a, 2007b). Dada la naturaleza religiosa de la zona de surf, este trabajo propone que los fronteras¹⁰ informales que los surfers utilizan para controlar la zona de surf –representandas por los códigos que regulan la procedencia y la posición de los surfistas – no sólo regulan el acceso a dicha zona en un sentido territorial, sino que además regulan efectivamente el acceso a la experiencia de la espiritualidad relacional.

Les cathédrales de la zone surf: La régulation de l'accès à un espace de spiritualité

Cet article examine le rôle de la vague surfée au-delà celui d'un site de relations entre humains et nature pour la considérer comme un espace de spiritualité. Le surf est largement considéré comme un sport d'hédonisme et de risque, mais cet article suggère que l'on puisse le comprendre comme un moyen d'exprimer le transcendant. En présentant en premier la zone surf comme un espace de liminalité et de transformation, cet article illustra comment la vague surfée sert de cathédrale pour la « religion de la nature aquatique» (Taylor 2007a, 2007b) des surfeurs. Vu la nature religieuse de la vague surfée, l'article suggère que les ordres/frontières dont les surfeurs font usage pour réguler la zone surf – ici compris comme les codes de « provenance surfeur » et « positionnement surfeur » ne régulent pas tout simplement l'accès à la zone surf d'un sens territorial, mais ils régulent efficacement l'accès à l'expérience de la spiritualité relationnelle aussi.

Keywords::

• surfing
• place
• spirituality
• religion
• regulation
• emotion

Keywords::

• le surf
• lieu
• spiritualité
• religion
• régulation
• émotion

Keywords::

• surfear
• lugar
• espiritualidad
• religión
• regulación
• emoción

Notes

^1. Rather than being ‘The Great Between’, which Roberts suggests usefully describes the sea between two land masses, the surf zone is the ‘Great In-Between’, formed and located besides the land and sea (Roberts, in Mack 2011).

^2. At least for terrestrial, Western cultures.

^3. In this way, the experience of the space of the surf zone offers a mild ‘family resemblance’ (in the Wittgensteinian sense of the term) to Badiou's concept of ‘event’ (for a detailed overview see Badiou 2001, 2005, 2006). I do not wish to overplay the mapping of the surfing experience onto the notion of event; however, there are parallels between the Badiou's ‘eventful’ stages of ‘irruption’, ‘transformation’, ‘fidelity’ and ‘subject formation’ (see Badiou 2001, 2005, 2006). Examples of similar ‘events’ may include falling in love (as argued by Bensaid 2004: 98).

^4. As Moriarity and Gallagher note, surfing is, ‘an art by the way you express yourself on a wave. It's a sport because you compete with it, and it's spiritual because it's just you and Mother Nature’ (2001: 10).

^5. As Shields notes, the presence of rideable surf is, ‘highly dependent on the nature and pattern of incoming waves—their height, undertow, whether they break parallel or at an angle to a beach, and so on’ (2004: 45). Waves' unpredictability is so pronounced that even in accepted surf-spots and surf-breaks they do not always happen. As surfer and writer Kimball Taylor identifies with respect to a flat day in Hawaii—a place famous for its world class surf zone, ‘the reality is that even in paradise, conditions aren't always ideal’ (2005: 119). This meeting place of land and sea is thus responsible both for the presence and the absence of surf in a particular area.

^6. Buckley (2002) estimates that more than 10 million people around the world enjoy surfing in its many forms.

^7. Such enforcement occurs in the famous surf beaches of California and Hawaii, but also in the UK at breaks in South Wales and Cornwall. Scheibel (1995) offers a seminal account of how Californian beaches were taken and made by locals in order to keep out ‘Vals’ (or those from the San Fernando ‘val'leys who wished to surf on these waves). As Schiebel puts it,

Legend says that one summer day in the early 1965, a group of ‘locals’ who were expecting good waves attempted to block the canyon roads in order to keep surfers from the Valley—the Vals—off the beach. Over the next thirty years, ‘Vals’ were routinely-victimized by ‘local’ surfers at numerous Southern California beaches’. (1995: 256)

As Schiebel has noted, the term ‘Vals’ has now found widespread use in North America as a derogatory term denoting ‘outsiders’ with an inferior status to surfers not from a local area. Not dissimilar to the term ‘grockle’ in the UK, these labels denote individuals not of the coastal area, and somehow less deserving and less ‘in place’ in such territory (see Cresswell 1996). These terms have thus a generalised geographical reference—individuals are not from ‘here’—but also a social ordering too—these individuals are not a legitimate person to be surfing ‘here’. Provenance is primary in these cases, it confers a social identity (who you are is where you are from) and with it a social entitlement to beach access (‘you’ will never be as deserving as ‘us’ to ride these waves).

^8. As Duane outlines, a kook is a

a universal surfing term for the unknown, unimpressive other, and suggesting the ridiculous jerking motions of an incompetent surfer; Surfer magazine even runs a regular cartoon about a hapless idiot named Wilbur Kookmeyer. Barney, meaning roughly the same thing, seems to derive from Fred Flintstone's little buddy, Barney Rubble. (1996: 12)

^9. From the discussion thus far it could be understood that non-locals cannot surf on waves outside their area. This is not the case. As implied in the quotations above, if you respect localism, and show deference to the provenance of surfers, it is possible to gain acceptance within a local surf community. As one Welsh surfer outlines:

We tell the young surfers look, if you go away surfing you gotta play the game, you just can't go wading in, thinking you're a pro cos it won't work and… you'll have bad vibes, let's say. Basically you go in…just don't move, just watch them get some waves, watch them get a couple, and when you've seen one of them and he's had a really good wave and they're really happy, that's probably a good time to say hello to him, you know ‘how's it going?’ ‘yea nice wave’ you know. ‘What board you riding?’ Start a conversation, get your foot in the door. You can go be the outsider who says nothing to none of them, or you can go and make friends. And it's a skill, there's an art to that in itself….If you show disrespect, you know you can be a long way from home, on your own and have a really bad time. (Interview Respondent)

It is therefore possible to enter into the liminal world of the surf zone. As a ‘place of crossing’ there is the opportunity to traverse the boundaries of outsider to insider by ‘abiding to the unwritten rules of the surfer's code…paddle in the right place and observe the natural rhythm of a line up…’ (Fordham 2008: 229). In this way, it is possible for any surfer to prove themselves to be, although a non-local surfer, a liminal character—a legitimate member of the globalised surf zone. Geographical provenance on the land can thus be superseded; observing the liminal rules of the surf zone grants liminal status to the surfer—someone legitimately entitled to surf these waves.

^10. Indeed, this interpretation resonates with research in environmental psychology and geography on place attachment and community campaigns (see, for example, Bricker and Kerstetter 2000; Seamon 1984; Vitterso, Vorkinn, and Vistad 2001).