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Abstract
This paper is our concerned response to the tendency in critical studies of physical culture and alternative sport to reduce experience to language, discourse, texts or representation. We consider the potential of British social theorist and cultural-geographer Nigel Thrift's ‘non-representational theory’ for shedding new light on the lived, affective and affecting experiences of participants in contemporary sport and physical cultures. In this paper we discuss Thrift's seven tenets of non-representational theory, offering numerous examples from the literature relating to an array of alternative sport cultures. We also introduce the constructs of ‘politics of affect’ and ‘politics of hope’, which combine, amalgamate and extend the seven tenets – and are the essence of Thrift's most recent work. These two politics hold great promise for revealing some of the complexities of the nexus(es) between power, power/knowledge, affect, experience, movement, consumption, representation and new forms of politics, in sport and physical culture, in the early twenty-first century. Here we are particularly interested in the implications of these constructs for understanding the developments of various social justice movements (e.g., health, educational, environmental, anti-violence) that have recently proliferated within alternative sport.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank an archipelago of colleagues for their helpful comments and suggestions in developing this paper, including Belinda Wheaton, the anonymous reviewers, and members of the ‘alternative sport’ session at the 2008 North American Sociology of Sport Conference in Denver (Colorado). We would also like to acknowledge our colleagues at the University of Waikato and University of Brighton, and Jose Borrero and Jayne Caldwell, for their support.
Notes
1 CitationHowe, (Sick), ix–x.
2 Notable exceptions include Evers, ‘Men Who Surf’ and ‘How to Surf’; CitationRinehart, ‘Sk8ing’; CitationThorpe, ‘Boarders, Babes and Bad-asses’. There are, of course, a variety of popular-culture attempts at recounting experiences both visually and in written form. Such technologies as YouTube, iPhone, and the like, as well as many of the slick, niche alternative sport magazines encourage participants to share their experiences. Many alternative sport-related websites also provide participants space to wax lyrical about their experiences. Poems and personal narratives are popular representational styles, however, paintings, songs and photographs also feature (often temporarily) on such pages. Moreover, fictional texts (e.g., CitationLenz, Snowboarding to Nirvana), memoirs (e.g., CitationZiolkowski, On a Wave), and biographies and autobiographies (e.g., CitationBasich with Gasperini, Pretty Good for a Girl), about alternative sports athletes and participants employ an array of evocative writing styles. To date, however, there is a paucity of scholarly research that attempts to unravel these kinds of embodied experiences.
3 Anne Witz, cited in CitationEvers, ‘How to Surf’, 233.
4 CitationHowson and Inglis, ‘Body in Social Theory’; also see CitationFord and Brown, Surfing and Social Theory.
5 CitationKirmayer, ‘Body's Insistence on Meaning’, 380.
6 CitationMassumi, Parables for the Virtual, 90.
7 See Ford and Brown, Surfing and Social Theory; CitationHargreaves and Vertinsky, ‘Introduction'; Howson and Inglis, ‘Body in Social Theory’.
8 CitationBurkitt, Bodies of Thought; CitationHowes, Sensual Relations; Massumi, Parables for the Virtual; CitationRail, ‘Physical Contact in Women's Basketball’.
9 Massumi, Parables for the Virtual, 3; also see CitationAnkersmit, Sublime Historical Experience; CitationDant and Wheaton, ‘Windsurfing’; CitationDenison and Markula, Moving Writing; Evers, ‘How to Surf’; CitationMarkula and Pringle, Foucault, Sport and Exercise; CitationStoller, Sensuous Scholarship.
10 Nigel Thrift is currently the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Warwick. Prior to this he was the Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of Oxford. According to his personal website, Thrift is ‘one of the world's leading human geographers and social scientists’ whose current research spans a broad range of interests including international finance, cities and political life, the history of time, affective politics, and NRT (see http://nigelthrift.org); many others reinforce his primacy within these areas.
11 TCitationhrift, Non-representational Theory, 148.
12 CitationLorimer, ‘Cultural Geography: The Busyness of Being’, 84.
13 While the primary intent of this paper is to sketch out the bold strokes of NRT and point out the potential of looking at Thrift's ‘politics of affect’ and ‘politics of hope’, in subsequent work we will flesh out more specifically the politics of affect and the politics of hope as they are utilized by several alternative sport-based social justice movements.
14 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 2, emphasis in original.
15 The problematic of pre-cognition, cognition, and ‘the moment’ is a very interesting and key element of Thrift's ‘theory’; however, due to space constraints, we will leave that discussion for another time. Suffice to say, ‘the moment’ of realization aligns neatly with a kind of existentialism that is complicated by anticipation, apprehension and recollection.
16 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 19.
17 CitationKundera, Unbearable Lightness of Being.
18 Many of Thrift's key concepts have palpable philosophical, sociological, psychological and geographical antecedents; sometimes the origins of these concepts are acknowledged in his work (e.g., ‘bare life’ is explicitly built upon the work of Giorgio Agamben), occasionally they are not (e.g., Thrift does not reference Csikszentmihalyi's extensive work on ‘flow’ in his discussion of ‘on-flow’). Indeed, while many of his tenets echo the work of others, he tends to use them in idiosyncratic ways (e.g., ‘on-flow’ is quite distinct from ‘flow’). While discussions surrounding the origins of Thrift's tenets reveal the remarkable interdisciplinary nature of his thinking, it is beyond the scope of this paper to offer a genealogy of each of the tenets of NRT; we direct those interested to Thrift's original work.
19 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 20.
20 CitationLaw, After Method, 101.
21 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 5.
22 CitationBooth, ‘(Re)reading the Surfers’ Bible', 21; also see Evers, ‘How to Surf’.
23 CitationCoakley, Sport in Society.
24 Cited in CitationGalbraith and Marcopoulos, ‘Terje Haakonsen’, 83.
25 CitationMidol and Broyer, ‘Towards an Anthropological Analysis’, 207.
26 John Smythe, cited in CitationBorden, Skateboarding, Space and the City, 170.
27 Cited in CitationWillig, ‘A Phenomenological Investigation’, 697.
28 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 19.
29 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 8.
30 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 8 (emphasis added).
31 CitationBooth and Thorpe, ‘Meaning of Extreme’, 186.
32 CitationBooth and Thorpe, ‘Meaning of Extreme’.
33 Cf., CitationRinehart, Players All.
34 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 9.
35 See, for example, work by CitationMike Michael, Reconnecting Culture, Technology and Nature: From Society to Heterogeneity and CitationBruno Latour, Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network Theory.
36 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 9.
37 CitationBooth, ‘(Re)reading the Surfers’ Bible', 27.
38 Cited in CitationLewis, ‘Climbing Body’, 70.
39 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 59.
40 Ford and Brown, Surfing and Social Theory, 162.
41 Borden, Skateboarding, Space and the City, 100.
42 CitationHaldrup and Larsen, ‘Material Cultures in Tourism’, 285.
43 CitationDant, Material Culture, 118.
44 Cited in Borden, Skateboarding, Space and the City, 200.
45 Booth and Thorpe, ‘Meaning of Extreme’.
46 See Booth and Thorpe, ‘Meaning of Extreme’; CitationRinehart, ‘Emerging/Arriving Sport’.
47 Evers, ‘How to Surf’, 232.
48 CitationKwinter, Architectures of Time, 28.
49 Lyng, ‘Edgework’, 861.
50 Cited in Booth and Thorpe, ‘Meaning of Extreme’, 189; see also CitationKochetkova, ‘Spirituality’; Midol and Broyer, ‘Towards an Anthropological Analysis’.
51 Mendelsohn, cited in Kochetkova, ‘Spirituality’, 308.
52 See Booth, ‘Expression Sessions’.
53 Rinehart, ‘Emerging/Arriving Sport’.
54 CitationBeal and Weidman, ‘Authenticity’; CitationThorpe, ‘Snowboarding’.
55 CitationWheaton, Understanding Lifestyle Sports.
56 CitationThorpe, ‘Beyond “Decorative Sociology”’.
57 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 18.
58 Law, After Method, 2.
59 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 12.
60 Thorpe, ‘Boarders, Babes and Bad-asses’, 4.
61 CitationMarkula and Denison, ‘See Spot Run’; CitationRinehart, ‘Fictional Methods in Ethnography’.
62 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 5.
63 The conceptual definition (like the theoretical explanations) of affect continues to be hotly contested; however, for the purposes of this paper, affects might be broadly understood as ‘properties, competencies, modalities, energies, attunements, arrangements and intensities of differing texture, temporality, velocity and spatiality, that act on bodies, are produced through bodies and transmitted by bodies’. CitationLorimer, ‘Cultural Geography’, 552.
64 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 13.
65 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 14.
66 CitationEvers, ‘Men Who Surf’, 36; also see Borden, Skateboarding, Space and the City; CitationLeBreton, ‘Playing Symbolically with Death’.
67 CitationThrift, ‘Still Life’, 42.
68 CitationThrift, ‘Still Life’, 42.
69 CitationThrift, ‘Still Life’, 35.
70 CitationThrift, ‘Still Life’, 42.
71 Cited in LeBreton, ‘Playing Symbolically with Death’, 9, emphasis added.
72 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 24.
73 Thrift, ‘Still Life’, 45.
74 CitationSchechner, Future of Ritual, 42.
75 CitationShusterman, Practicing Philosophy, 187.
76 CitationHamm, Scarred For Life, 113.
77 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 237, emphasis added.
78 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 237, emphasis added, 25.
79 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 237, emphasis added, 26.
80 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 237, emphasis added, 243.
81 CitationThrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 67.
82 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254.
83 Booth, ‘(Re)reading the Surfers’ Bible'.
84 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 67.
85 Sean Davey, ‘Shooting the Surf’, Photopreneur, 20 February 2008, http://blogs.photopreneur.com/shooting-the-surf, para. 6.
86 Booth, ‘(Re)reading the Surfers’ Bible', 22.
87 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 68.
88 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 192.
89 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 68.
90 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 68, 68.
91 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254.
92 CitationDenzin and Giardina, ‘Elephant in the Living Room’, 38.
93 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254.
94 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 65.
95 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 65. A plethora of literature on contemporary social movements, and identity and social movement participation, is currently available. See, for example, CitationChesters and Welsh, Complexity and Social Movements: Multitudes at the Edge of Chaos; CitationLaraña, Johnston and Gusfield, New Social Movements: From Ideology to Identity; CitationMelucci, Challenging Codes: Collective Action in the Information Age.
96 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254.
97 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254, 254.
98 See, for example, CitationCarr, ‘Media Equation’; CitationDickinson, ‘Machinery of Hope’; CitationFetherstonhaugh, ‘New Media Key’; CitationSchifferes, ‘Internet Key to Obama Victories’.
99 CitationDavis-Delano and Crosset, ‘Using Social Movement Theory’.
100 The concomitant cynicism or altruism inherent in such political gestures is beyond the scope of this paper; however, the intuitive linkage between cynicism and commercial, for-profit organizations and between altruism and not-for-profit organizations is worth further exploration.
101 See, for example, Davis-Delano and Crosset, ‘Using Social Movement Theory’; CitationHarvey and Houle, ‘Sport, World Economy’; CitationSugden, ‘Anyone for Football’; CitationWilson, ‘New Media, Social Movements’.
102 See CitationLaviolette, ‘Green and Extreme’; CitationWheaton, ‘Identity, Politics, and the Beach’.
103 There is, of course, also a veritable proliferation of commercially based ‘social issue’-oriented groups, whose aims are decidedly based primarily upon the marketplace: these include, but certainly are not limited to, Benetton®, Nike®, Billabong®, Dakine®, and Reef® (whose ‘Project Blue’ campaign, which purports to ‘keep [oceans, waves, and beaches] safe and thriving’ by this simple mantra: ‘The math is easy. You buy. Your beach wins’. Project BLUE postcard, www.betruetoblue.com, 2008.
104 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 254. Despite the seemingly affirmative actions of these organizations, the possible social justice implications of tourism, travel and global networks that are integral to some international alternative sport-related organizations (e.g., Central Asia Institute, SurfAid International) deserve further critical analysis. For a critical discussion of the social justice implications of surf-tourism travel to the Mentawai Islands, see CitationPonting, McDonald and Wearing, ‘Deconstructing Wonderland’.
105 SurfAid International Annual Report 2006/2007', SurfAid International, 6. http://www.surfaidinternational.org.
106 In 2006, the Malaria Control Program expanded to become the Malaria Free Mentawai Program, with the new goal of extending ‘core malaria control activities to all 203 villages in the Mentawai's, a total of nearly 75,000 people’. This program involves providing community members with ‘effective means of preventing malaria and cutting edge technologies for quickly detecting and treating malaria when necessary’. For more information see www.surfaidinternational.org.
107 The Mentawai Community-Based Health Program targets 23 communities spread throughout the individual islands with the goal of ‘disseminating training and supporting implementation of new health practices’ via activities that ‘promote understanding, at community level, of how health can be improved through behavior modification’. For more information see www.surfaidinternational.org.
108 The SurfAid Emergency Preparedness (E-Prep) programme was initiated after the tsunami and earthquakes that hit Nias and the Mentawai Islands in December 2004 and March 2005. According to the SurfAid website, ‘SurfAid was irrevocably impacted by these events and emergency preparedness now constitutes an important part of our work. Funded by the Australian Government, through AusAID, E-Prep is a three-year program to provide escape routes, first aid posts, and access to food and clean water in vulnerable villages’; See www.surfaidinternational.org.
109 Funded by surf-industry conglomerate Quiksilver, the Katiet Village Program is ‘about pioneering future community development projects’. The village currently serves as a ‘testing ground’ for strategies and activities (i.e., health education syllabus in schools; to improve hygiene and sanitation practice; to improve the immunization and nutritional status of community members; to create a ‘malaria free’ zone in Katiet, to decrease morbidity and mortality due to acute respiratory infections and diarrhoea; to increase the capacity of the established Mentawai Health Department health centre to provide service to Katiet community members), and will ultimately be a model that can be replicated in other villages, as well as a training centre for village leaders from other islands. Katiet Village is a ‘living experiment that is exploratory, participative and action-oriented’. For more information visit www.katiet.org.
110 Founded in 2007, the SurfAid International Schools Program, supported by surf-industry giant Billabong, is a ‘five-year global educational program available for free online to teachers and students in Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the United States’. The program is a collaborative project between SurfAid International, Billabong, the education sector, students, parents and teachers, and seeks to ‘provide students the opportunity to examine important global issues, raising their social awareness and encouraging them to become better global citizens while learning about life in the Mentawai Islands’. For more information see http://schools.surfaidinternational.org.
111 ‘SurfAid International Annual Report 2005/2006’, SurfAid International, 3. www.surfaidinternational.org.
112 Taj Hamad, World Association of Non-Governmental Organizations Secretary General, cited in ‘SurfAid International Wins Prestigious Global Humanitarian Award’, SurfAid International, 12 November 2007, para. 5. www.surfaidinternational.org
113 Luke Egan, professional surfer and SurfAid ambassador, cited in ‘CitationSurfAid Frequently Asked Questions’, SurfAid International, para. 42, emphasis added. www.surfaidinternational.org.
114 Dave Jenkins, cited in CitationBarilotti, ‘Jungle is Looking Back’.
115 Thrift, ‘Intensities of Feeling’, 68.
116 Interestingly, SAI Chairman Dr Steve Hathaway recognizes differences in surfers' affective responses based on age. He proclaimed that core surfing culture is ‘not exactly peppered with humanitarian values’: ‘In the early days we tried to raise money from surfers on boats with promo pamphlets, and we would talk to them, but all they really wanted to do was go surfing.…A 22-year-old surf-rat doesn't really care about global issues. We don't get our support base from younger surfers, most of them are just not aware and mature enough, but it is their very attitude and anarchy, that in a way grows into them giving back later on in life. We get a lot of support from older surfers…As they get a bit more affluent…and they start seeing things beyond the surf break…they start wanting to give something back’ (personal communication with the first author, 27 October 2008).
117 Cited in CitationWilson, ‘Interview’, para. 8.
118 CitationAguerre, ‘Letter to the Editor’.
119 Cited in Wilson, ‘Interview’, para. 8.
120 Cited in Wilson, ‘Interview’, para
121 Cited in ‘Australia Board’, SurfAid International, para. 4 (www.surfaidinternational.org). Shortly after the SIMA meeting, Quiksilver helped fund the Katiet Quiksilver SurfAid Community Health Training Centre. Unfortunately, a discussion of the corporate philanthropy of surf, and other alternative sport-related companies is beyond the scope of this paper. For a fascinating discussion of the complex relationship between sport, health, corporate philanthropy and the growing ‘market for generosity’, see CitationKing, Pink Ribbons, Inc.
122 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 223.
123 Thrift, Non-representational Theory, 173.
124 CitationCsordas, ‘Embodiment and Cultural Phenomenology’, 146.
125 CitationLorimer, ‘Cultural Geography’, 90.
126 The story goes: In 1999, New Zealander Dr Dave Jenkins (MD) took a break from his job as educational director of a multinational health organization in Singapore and, with a group of friends, chartered a luxury yacht in the surf Mecca of the Mentawai Islands with the sole purpose ‘to find perfect waves’. However, Jenkins found more than perfect waves. After a surf-filled day he did what few surfers had done before him; he ventured beyond the ‘palm-fringed shores of this so-called surf paradise’ and, to his horror, discovered ‘dreadful misery, poverty, and death’ (‘SurfAid International Annual Report 2005/2006’, SurfAid International, 4). The radical disjuncture between the hedonistic pursuit of surfing and the extreme poverty of the local peoples had a profound affect/effect on Jenkins; within weeks he had left his six-figure salary, sold his house and, with a small group of like-minded surfing friends, established SurfAid International.
127 And this story is: In 1996, after a failed attempt at climbing K2, American mountain climber and trauma nurse Greg Mortenson established Central Asia Institute (CAI) – a non-profit organization ‘aimed at promoting and providing community-based education, especially for girls, in remote mountain regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan’. When Mortenson ‘stumbled out of the high Karakoram Mountains in Northern Pakistan and into the tiny village of Korphe’ the local people ‘embraced him like family’ and nursed him back to health. To thank the local residents he built a school in a region where the literacy rate was less than 4%. Since then, CAI has established more than 60 schools, educating over 25,000 students, including 14,000 girls; CitationRonow, ‘Journey of Hope’, 2. For more information see CitationMortenson and Relin, Three Cups of Tea.
128 While such organizations differ considerably, there are often some interesting commonalities. For example, both SAI and CAI were established by western, privileged, white male alternative sport participants (New Zealand doctor and surfer Dave Jenkins founded the former, and American mountaineer Greg Mortenson the latter) when they were confronted with the inconguities between the hedonistic pursuit of their leisure activities – surfing and climbing, respectively – and the poverty of local residents. Employing the concepts of politics of affect and hope, we look forward to exploring the commonalities and differences between such organizations in a future project.