The Puck Stops Here: an Inquiry Into the Manufacture of Goalie Masks

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The Puck Stops Here: An Inquiry into the Manufacture of Goalie Masks

Guilherme Nothen

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Exercise Sciences University of Toronto

The Puck Stops Here: An Inquiry into the Manufacture of Goalie Masks

Guilherme Nothen

Doctor of Philosophy

Department of Exercise Sciences University of Toronto

2019

Abstract

The present inquiry seeks to document the changing landscapes of the manufacture of ice hockey equipment in Canada. This was once a burgeoning branch of industrial activity, but has more recently been heavily impacted by outsourcing and offshoring tendencies (especially from the early 1990s onwards). In little less than two decades, imposing manufacturing plants have been systematically shut down, thoroughly reducing Canada´s share in the production of the equipment needed for the practice of what is often deemed its national game. Today, estimates suggest that roughly ninety percent of the hockey gear consumed in Canada is manufactured in the Global

South.

This research unfolds in the aftermath of this geographical transformation, paying particular attention to the perspective of the small manufacturers of hockey equipment that are still based on

Canadian soil. For six months, I carried out participant observations and interviews in a factory where goalie masks are produced. Drawing upon the findings that derive from my experience in this setting, as well as from attending mask shows and similar events, I try to bring into light the daily routine of the factory floor; the progressive steps in the assembly line; the relationships that ii

the workers entertain with the game of hockey; and, most fundamentally, the uncertainties faced by small companies attempting to survive at the margins of a market dominated by major corporations. In addition, I discuss the specificities of goalie masks as sporting commodities, seeking to illustrate the residues of artisanship that, in some special cases, pervade the manufacture of these objects to this day – thus resisting the general drive towards standardization that characterizes the sports equipment industry more broadly. To conclude, I engender an exploratory analysis of the different meanings that goalie masks are invested with – including as a projection of a goaltender’s identity.

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Acknowledgments

I am very grateful to my family and friends for the patience and unwavering support throughout this rather demanding and time-consuming scholarly journey. To my cohort at the University of Toronto for providing what I have experienced as the most encouraging, supportive, and innovative research environment. And especially to the members of my thesis committee – Peter and Mike – for the valuable advice and counseling over all the years during which this thesis was in the making.

I would also like to express my deepest gratitude to all of the participants in this research – and especially to those engaged in the production of goalies masks who, so generously, allowed me to become a part of their team. I will always carry with me the lessons that I learned in the factory floor.

Above everything else, I would like to thank my mentor and friend Dr. Bruce Kidd. Every time I felt I was beginning to venture into uncharted academic grounds, it was only to subsequently find out – with great delight – that he had already been there before.

Table of Contents

PART I: THE FIELD OF STUDY AND THE METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH...... 01

Chapter One: New and ‘old’ materialisms…….…………………….………………..02

1.1 The object of study……………………….…………..………………………11 1.2 The commodity in its general form ………….…………….….……………..14 1.3 The study of material culture.………….……………………….……………22 1.4 The significance of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada……...... 26 1.5 Why goalie masks? The scope, relevance, and objectives of the study….…..31 1.6 An outline of the study…………………………………………….…………38

Chapter Two: Methodology……………………………………………………………40

2.1 Doing research in Canada as an outsider…………………………………….44 2.2 Challenges in entering the factory floor……………………………………..48 2.3 Participant observation…………………………………………………...….50 2.4 Semi-structured and object-based interviews………………………………..60

PART II: THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT...... ……………………………...... 65

Chapter Three: The world of the small hockey equipment entrepreneur….………66

3.1 The decline of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada………………78

Chapter Four: The birth of the goalie mask………………………………………….89

4.1 Three major phases in the history of mask making………………………….94

PART III: FACTORY LIFE………………….………………………………………………..102

Chapter Five: Mas(k)s Production…………………………………………………..103

5.1 An inside look………………………………………………………..……..104 5.2 The manufacturing process……………………………………………..…..110 5.3 Assembling the masks………………………………………………………116 5.4 Goalie masks dissected: The ‘Made in Canada’ claim……………………..120 5.5 Goalie masks dissected: Latent signifiers…………………………………..124 5.6 Ice hockey on the factory floor…………………………………...………...129 5.7 Politics on the factory floor…………………………………………………131

Chapter Six: Custom-made masks………………………………….………………..133

6.1 Casting the mold……………………………………………………………137 6.2 The sculpting process……………………………………………………….139 6.3 Replicas……………………………………………………………………..143

PART IV: THE WAY OF THE GOALIE MASKS…………...... …………….……………147

Chapter Seven: Goalie masks as a projection of a goaltender’s personality…..…..148

7.1 Goaltenders…...... 148 7.2 The artworks……………………..…………………………………………152 7.3 Alter-egos…………………………………………..……………………….156

Conclusion: The commodities of sport...... ……………………………….………159

REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………168

List of Appendices

Appendix A: An overview of the scholarship on ice hockey in Canada…….………...………180 . Appendix B: University of Toronto ethics approval letter………………..……….……..……183

Appendix C: University of Toronto ethics amendment approval letter………………..…...…185

Appendix D: Interview Guide (Current Workers and Small Business Owners)…………....…186

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PART I: THE FIELD OF STUDY AND THE METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH

Chapter One: New and ‘old’ materialisms

Over the course of the last three decades, the critical study of sport and physical culture has been thoroughly reconfigured by what one could perhaps refer to as a growing sensitivity towards the ‘material world’.

On the one hand, this tendency found expression through a renewed interest on the human body and how it intersects with wider social and political forces. According to several authors working in kinesiology and physical education departments, this shift in orientation first appeared, around the mid-1980s, as a further development of the so-called ‘return to the body’ concurrently taking place within the social sciences more broadly (Duncan, 2007; Andrews, 2008). Over time, the preoccupation with ‘body politics’ came to define much of the scholarship associated with the sociology of sport. Such a gradual transformation in the scope of the discipline could be verified not only with regards to the problems under investigation; in effect, the whole discourse of the field came to be progressively galvanized by the introduction of a terminology geared towards the representation of physicality (Andrews & Silk, 2011). Still, to account for the elusiveness of the embodied experience – which, by its very nature, resists so conspicuously to be captured in words – remains to this day a key challenge for scholars carrying out research on the entanglements between the body, sport, and physical culture.

By the early-mid 1990s, on the other hand, an analogous move towards materiality started to take shape: Namely, a burgeoning concern with the production of sports spaces (Van Ingen, 2003). The driving force behind this line of inquiry has been the interest on the built environment – in other words, how its organization and administration largely privilege certain hegemonic sporting practices, thus marginalizing other forms of physicality. Notable in this sense has been the scholarship dealing with the distribution of (public) sports facilities throughout various major cities (e.g., Silk, 2004; Misener & Mason, 2008; Horne, 2011), as well as the numerous pieces focusing on specific sports venues, such as stadiums (e.g., Kidd, 1990), gymnasiums (e.g., Vertinsky & McKay, 2004), and arenas (Hanningan, 2006; Dennis, 2009). There has been, too, a smaller avenue of research which has concentrated not so much on the built environment per se,

but on how sports spaces have been revered1 (as quasi-sacred sites), imagined, and, most importantly, “experienced” (e.g., Vertinsky & Bale, 2004). Particularly relevant for the argument being developed here is the latter one, that is, the scholarship on ‘lived’ sports spaces. This appears to be so because it brings together the two materialistic tendencies that I just briefly mentioned: Specifically, the concern with ‘bodies’ and the concern with ‘spaces’. Indeed, it has become customary, in the field of kinesiology and physical education as well as in the social sciences more broadly, to speak about “bodies-in-space” (e.g., Friedman & Van Ingen, 2011).

In the guise of introduction, it should suffice to say that the realm of objects – or, to put it differently, of material culture – has (paradoxically) remained somewhat alien to these ‘materialistic’ tendencies. It is true that objects have been often conceived as an integral part of a given ‘space’. It is in this specific sense that they have on occasion been given certain prominence within the literature on sports spaces. Indeed, most of the studies mentioned in the previous paragraph engage, to some degree, with different pieces of material culture. As the argument goes, when analyzed against the backdrop of a particular spatial setting, objects may serve different functions: They can either reinforce the ‘legitimate’ uses of a given space or, less likely, resist them. Meanings associated with objects are, according to this understanding, in a dialectical relationship with the meanings associated with the spaces that they inhabit. If an object disturbs too heavily the overall purpose assigned to a specific sport-related site, it may even have to be eliminated. As Fusco (2005) observed, for example, the presence of urine or hairballs within the sanitized boundaries of a locker room generated all sorts of anxieties and feelings of abjection among users. The dominant view on how a locker room should be administered was thus defined not only by the things it might contain, but also by the things it must preclude.

1 Very few analogies have been able to exercise so much fascination among scholars concerned with physical culture as the comparison between religious places of worship and the amphitheaters of contemporary sports. Researchers have, for instance, employed metaphors such as “cathedrals” (Trumpbour, 2007) or “temples” (Gaffney, 2008) to make reference to stadiums or arenas. These comparisons have usually been grounded in the understanding that fans and supporters may experience certain sports sites as “sacred” spaces, in relation to which they nurture a strong sense of belonging. ‘Topophilia’ is one of the terms that has commonly been utilized to account for such spatial attachments – a notion that implies, as well, that these revered spaces “may be defended against adverse forces” (Bachelard, 1969, p. 31). This is, in effect, a behavior that has become quite characteristic of various ‘die- hard’ fans, across different mainstream sports. 3

Another fashion of inquiring into objects that has received some attention in the sociology of sport literature is the attempt to grasp their co-presence from a phenomenological standpoint. Springing mostly from ethnographic narratives, these studies have sought to offer elaborate descriptions on how certain physical objects are perceived when brought into contact with one’s senses, helping to shape and give meaning to the researcher’s experience in a particular sporting context.

Of course, paying attention to the general dispositions of the sensorial world – including with respect to material culture – seems, generally speaking, a rather trivial feature of any ethnographic enterprise. The degree to which researchers have been able to incorporate such sensorial data into the structure of arguments is, however, a thoroughly different matter. Ethnographic studies in sporting contexts tend to speak about objects frequently; yet seldom beyond description.

Furthermore, insofar as the efforts to account for the material world from a multi-sensorial standpoint are concerned (generally meaning, beyond the prevalence of visual data), scholars in the sociology of sport have usually given much greater emphasis to body-to-body interactions, rather than to body-to-object engagements. Still, there have been good illustrations of the latter: For example, Allen-Collinson and Hockey’s (2010) piece on scuba diving or Atkinson’s (2010a) study on fell running, in which the authors constantly bring forth the encounter with various material elements – in the first article: the water, the special clothing, the diving equipment; in the second: the grass, the mud, dirty socks and shoes – in the attempt to reconstruct, with greater substance, the embodied experiences that they went through while partaking in the activities in question.

The sport ethnographer has been, in such cases, concerned with the immediacy of objects and, in some instances, with the roles that objects may assume in the process of “identity formation” (Donnelly & Young, 1988). To frame it even more broadly, what has typically mattered in such investigations is the production of meanings that derives from the ongoing entanglements between the body and material culture.

Following a similar path of reasoning, a branch of scholarship has lately been established focusing on how prosthetics and technological assets have largely blurred more traditional ways

of understanding the human body. Without question, to better understand the ways in which certain physical objects can be experienced as ‘extensions’ of human bodies has become a pressing theme in the realm of kinesiology and physical education (e.g., Butryn & Masucci, 2009; Woodward, 2016).

More ethnographically grounded approaches in the context of sport and physical culture have on occasion considered, in addition, the feelings and memories that the interaction with specific physical objects might evoke. For example: While recalling an episode in which he purchased new soccer shoes for his son, in whose presence he found himself, Sparkes (2009) recognizes in the smell and texture of the boots the shadows of his own past experiences of visiting a sports store with his father:

I bend the boot and run my fingers over its surface. Next, I lift the boot to my nose and inhale the smell of leather. In so doing, the scene is transformed. I move back in time, and it is me trying on my first ‘proper’ pair of football boots when I was 11 years of age in a small sports shop miles away from here in a different city. Seated close by is my father, himself a former semi-professional footballer. He watches me intensely and asks me to stamp my feet with the boots on. He asks me where my toes are and to wiggle them. As I wiggle my toes he holds the ends of the boot to check that they are not cramped. They feel so good. I take them off and hand them to him. My father bends them and feels the leather. He also, like me a generation later, smells them. Having spent many years as a shoe cutter in a factory, he knows about leather (p. 23).

A few paragraphs later, Sparkes (2009) concludes: “The smell and feel of leather football boots connects the bodies of a grandfather, a father and a son across time” (p. 23). Both these fragments seem to illustrate what, in my estimation, constitutes a second important way in which material culture has been taken into consideration within the literature on sport and physical culture. That is, insofar as it intersects with the question of embodiment.

Hence, assuming that this succinct characterization of the general trends underlying the sport and physical culture scholarship (insofar as material culture has been concerned) proves accurate enough, the matter can be synthesized in the following fashion: In the sociology of sport, inquiries into objects have typically been undertaken in the sidelines of the study of bodies and/or spaces.

But what type of object Sparkes has in mind in the latter quote? Of course, he cannot be referring to any singular pair of soccer shoes, for it would make no sense for him to encounter the

very same boots in the two scenarios that he describes, separated by the time-span of a generation. He can only be talking about “leather football boots” in abstraction. Here one begins to grasp the difficulties of inquiring into things: It is possible to speak about objects – indeed, to carry out an entire research project – without ever making reference to a ‘singular’ object or even coming into contact with one of them!

Such has been the case of the scholarship on the productive output of sports manufacturing industries and on the allure exercised by certain brands of sport-related merchandise. When Jean Harvey, for example, examines the development of “hockey sweaters” in seeking to provide a concrete illustration for the growing commercialization of Canadian hockey (Harvey, 2005) or when he (alongside two colleagues) talks about “running shoes” in connection to the emergence of the Nike conglomerate (Harvey, Rail & Thibault, 1996), what concerns him is not the specificities of any singular sweater or shoe. In both cases, he is exploring the tacit possibility of quantifying and generalizing about these commodities.

Similarly, when Norman Denzin (1996), Brian Wilson and Bob Sparks (1996, 2001) analyze the commercial messages associated with “Air Jordan sneakers”, they do not trace their arguments back to any actual, existing shoes, however more specific this example may be. Of course, they are all well aware that individual shoes exist. But the point that they are trying to make focuses, rather, on “Air Jordan” sneakers as a semiotic construction. What demands their attention is neither a single commodity nor, for the most part, the commodity itself, but its “spectacular image”, as Guy Debord (1983) would frame it.

One encounters a different set of difficulties if turning the attention to the opposite direction, that is, towards the objects themselves, as they (qualitatively) exist in the ‘material’ world. It is an axiom of Western philosophy that there cannot be two completely identical objects, if anything because they are unable to occupy the very same spot in relation to time and space (Heidegger, 1968, p. 16). Insofar as ontology is concerned, every object represents (or is represented as) an ‘existence’ of its own, and is irreducible to any other. There seems to be, however, good practical reasons to both quantify and generalize about objects. In everyday life, objects are often recognized not by the physical qualities and functions that make them unique, but by the qualities and functions that some of them may bear in common. For example: Whereas there cannot be such a thing as two (or more) identical soccer shirts, it is likely that minor

differences will go unnoticed for those wearing them. What matters when soccer shirts are used, for instance, to homogenize players into a single team, is not the fact that all these shirts exist as singular, individual entities; instead, one tends to pay attention to the characteristics that they share. In other words, ‘different’ soccer shirts can be experienced in a very similar fashion. Their qualities and functions are, in a sense, comparable. It is in this regard that it is possible to talk about them as a ‘class of objects’, so to speak.

There are occasions, nonetheless, in which the ‘uniqueness’ of the object at hand stands in contradiction with most efforts towards generalization or quantification. In the world of the arts, as Walter Benjamin (1992) remarks, this ‘uniqueness’ derives chiefly from the impossibility of reproducing a work of art in its entirety: “Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: Its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be” (p. 298). Both the “cult value” and the “display value” of a work of art, so he argues, cannot be fully determined by the distinctive artistic techniques that might have been employed in its production (or, perhaps one should say, its aesthetic content), but are also necessarily linked to the unique historical trajectory that a particular piece of art has undergone (he speaks about “changes in its physical condition”, “changes in ownership”, etc.). To put it differently, the ‘genuineness’ of a work of art can only be asserted in historical terms.

I embarked on this rather intricate detour simply to suggest that, in the realm of sports, the historical trajectory of certain physical objects has also been of utmost interest. For example: Whereas, in principle, every soccer jersey remains an ‘existence of its own’, this matter is likely to raise far greater social interest when one considers soccer jerseys that were used, let us say, by famous players. These jerseys become, in a sense, even ‘more unique’ if such players wore them in important matches. The social significance attributed to certain sport-related artifacts has not escaped the attention of sport scholars. John Hughson and Kevin Moore (2012), for instance, provide an interesting case study about the jersey used by Diego Maradona in the 1986 FIFA Soccer World Cup quarterfinal match between Argentina and England, currently under display in the (British) National Football Museum in Manchester. They say:

The significance of Maradona’s shirt is not a closed subject. The shirt, as an item on display, is prone to varying interpretations and its symbolic meanings stem from a range of socio-political associations. Yet, for some, the ultimate reverence for the shirt and its appreciation resides in the fact that it signifies Maradona’s pure artistry as a footballer. This interpretation may come to override all others 7

to the extent that even the English man or woman infuriated by the ‘Hand of God’ goal may accept the shirt’s existence as evidence of football as ‘the beautiful game’ (p. 223).

However disparate these “varying interpretations” may be, one sees in this fashion how sports artifacts are sometimes invested with symbolic meanings that widely transcend their utilitarian, general purposes; they come to represent, as it were, the historical events that they have ‘lived through’. And insofar as these objects are conceived as reminiscences of the past, they may as well be thought to personify, to some extent, the individuals who previously engaged with them. Both sports historians and museum curators have been prominent in exploring such nuanced human-object connections when dealing with sports artifacts.

It is important to note, nonetheless, that the ‘uniqueness’ of similar objects is only a matter of social interest insofar as they remain, to a lesser or greater extent, within the social context that (symbolically) produced them. A classical topic in ethnography has been, for example, to show how an object regarded as magical in a given social formation might be dismissed as trivial in another. Similarly, Maradona’s jersey may be of very little interest in places where soccer does not enjoy great cultural significance – although globalization has been making such instances increasingly scarce (when it comes to a handful of mainstream sports). As Benjamin (1992) puts is, “The uniqueness of a work of art is inseparable from its being imbedded in the fabric of tradition” (p. 300).

Interestingly enough, scholars have also suggested that the ‘uniqueness’ of certain sports artifacts, if combined with other such objects, can be mobilized to convey precisely the opposite feeling – that is, of a general association with sporting cultures. In the ‘postmodern sports bar’, Lawrence Wenner (1998) claims, collectible items are carefully brought together to produce an all-inclusive atmosphere: “The postmodern sports bar does not seek to simulate the ‘authenticity’ of a local place. Designed as much for ‘out-of-towers’ to catch the game and for the realization that fewer and fewer people live in the places they were from, the postmodern sports bar offers memorabilia ‘in the generic’. A wide net is cast so there is some identity hook for everyone” (p. 325). It follows from these remarks that an assemblage of ‘singular’, ‘historically loaded’ objects is able to produce a generality that is fundamentally different from the ‘object in general’. This generality springs, as it were, from a trivialization of the ‘unique’.

But just as one assumes to have rendered the sport-related scholarship on objects a little less diffuse by (conceptually) placing, on one side, the study of individual objects and, on the other side, the study of objects in general, a third problem enters the scene: How to account for the question of replicas, which have become, in different ways, such a common feature of the world of sports?

Replicas are, by definition, a depreciated version of the original, for they lack, based on what was indicated above, its ‘genuineness’. Yet, as I will seek to illustrate in greater detail later, replicas are also differently situated in relation to each other: A replica may possess greater value depending on how faithfully it is able to emulate the original, or depending on who produced it. Generally speaking, the replica occupies an ambiguous position in the domain of material culture: It tends to retain a link to the original object, at the same time that it can be mass-produced.

In the realm of sports, moreover, one may find mass-produced replicas of mass-produced objects – soccer jerseys, for example. Here the matter has often taken legal contours: From the standpoint of the market, these have been typically referred to as “counterfeited” products. John Sugden (2003), for instance, provides an interesting account of the degree of sophistication with which part of the counterfeited sports industry now operates, particularly in Southeast Asia, where a robust underground economy has developed at the expense of major sports equipment multinationals:

In the beginning most of the stuff used to be straightforward copies. A grafter could take a particular shirt to a Thai tailor and ask him to copy a couple of hundred. The tailor would take his best guess at the design and quality of the material and produce an order of forgeries that would look fine from a distance but that would not usually stand up to closer scrutiny. Today, however, they don’t just fake the design and the logo, but they also use virtually identical materials, so much so that some of the better stuff cannot be detected as counterfeit by look and feel alone (p. 136).

In the social sciences and humanities, inquiries into physical objects are, in conclusion, largely pervaded by ongoing tensions between the qualitative and quantitative properties; between the singular and the general; and, ultimately, between existing objects and their representation through language. When looking, specifically, at the scholarship dealing with the intersections of sports, physical culture, and material culture, three interconnected tendencies seem to take shape:

First, it should be pointed out that, although the study of material culture has not gone unnoticed in the sociology of sport, it has never evolved into an autonomous branch of study2 – at any rate, at least not comparable to the scholarly emphasis given to other materialistic concerns.

Second, when objects have been considered, it has for the most part been in association with the study of bodies and/or with the study of spaces. The review presented here intended not to be exhaustive, since it would be nearly impossible to systematize, in any coherent manner, the numerous studies in which objects, given their prevalence in everyday life, appear. Instead, its aim was to indicate – through a few examples – the general patterns that, to the best of my knowledge, appear to derive from this scholarship.

Third: Even though some inquiries exist in the field of sport studies focusing primarily on objects, these investigations have tended to privilege either the ‘mass production’ or the ‘unique artifact’ side of the equation. In other words, the object of study has been largely circumscribed to either the ‘object in general’ or the ‘object in particular’.

In the present inquiry, I sought to explore a somewhat different route: I opted to keep moving back and forth between the analysis of individual objects and the analysis of a ‘class of objects’ – to be more specific, I tried to account for goalie masks in their material as well as in their symbolic form3. To my understanding, most of the shortages in this study spring from my refusal to concentrate exclusively on one of these realms, for a narrower scope would have facilitated the examination of the data considerably. Yet it may be that the interesting part lies precisely on how these different ‘forms of presentation’ are, as it were, related. In any case, I trust the reader will find some value in this dialectical exercise.

2 I suspect this gap will be bridged very soon, particularly given the growing interest in the framework of Action Network Theory (ANT) and the focus on ‘New Materialisms’ that have begun to thrive in the field (although inquiries in which objects figure prominently are still very incipient). 3 Perhaps a good example of the approach that I tried to implement is a display strategy adopted at the University of British Columbia’s Anthropology Museum, in which series of Native American masks are arranged in a manner that seeks to highlight the generic features of each group of masks, yet not loosing sight of the individual artist/craftsperson’s distinctive style. 10

1.1 The object of study

What is an object? Any attempt to address this rather fundamental question would of course entail a great deal of trouble. At first glance, the answer to this query appears to be self-evident, for objects tend to be familiar entities. People engage with them on a daily basis, seemingly accounting for them with a fair degree of certainty and coherence. From a philosophical standpoint, however, the matter is far more complicated. To begin with, the question of what constitutes an object is subjected to several different interpretations. Is the question of scale important? Is a house, for example, as much of an object as a chair? Should we discern between natural and human-made objects? There have been, moreover, some efforts (e.g., Harman, 2005) to differentiate the object as it is conceived by the natural sciences (its structure, composition, materials, etc.) from the object as it is socially produced (its meanings, purposes, uses, etc.). At an even deeper level, one can take into consideration, as well, the different theoretical approaches to the relationship between the subject and the object. Indeed, this dichotomic fashion of framing the problem, whose supersession has been often called for (e.g., Marcuse, 1983), remains to this day one of the central conundrums in the social sciences and humanities.

It may therefore be useful to begin not so much by posing the question of objects in general, but by characterizing the specific type of object in which I am interested. At a later stage, after exposing the findings of the present inquiry, I should be able to return to some of these broader questions – hopefully with a stronger empirical footing.

For the purposes of this study, I am concerned with the domain of the commodities. But what is a commodity? Here one must again deal with a myriad of different definitions. In the financial market, for example, the term ‘commodity’ typically denotes one of the raw or partially processed products that serve as the basis of modern industry and international trade – oil, copper, gold, etc. In everyday life, this is probably the most common use of the term, yet it tends to overlook an essential aspect of the commodity as it will be understood in the context of this inquiry: Namely, its unity. In effect, a commodity is always a unity, even if a purely conceptual one. What economists have in mind when they talk, for example, about the rise or the decline in the price of a ‘commodity’ is neither oil, copper, or gold per se; they are actually referring to barrels of oil, pounds of copper, or ounces of gold. It is thus possible to discern two ways in which commodities present themselves. First, there are the ones whose unitary existence is set by convention, even

though their materialization remains always within the realm of the possible (one may trade barrels of oil without ever using an actual barrel, etc.). Second, there are those commodities that already come into being as single, concrete units. It is the latter ones that constitute the substratum of this study.

In the discipline of sociology, commodities have been broadly defined as the products of human labour – which, under the capitalist mode of production, amounts to ‘alienated’ labour, the Marxists would add. In any case, this very basic definition already points towards an important distinction: Even though every commodity is an object, not every object is a commodity. The world of commodities is, in essence, a human-made world. Its analysis must therefore be attentive to ways in which human intentionality becomes inscribed in the goods that people routinely consume.

In the Marxist tradition, a further refinement has been drawn: Even though every commodity is the product of human labour, not every product of human labour is a commodity:

A thing can be useful, and the product of human labour, without being a commodity. Whoever directly satisfies his wants with the produce of his own labour, creates, indeed, use values, but not commodities. In order to produce the latter, he must not only produce use values, but use values for others, social use values (Marx, 2011, p. 47-48).

In the first chapter of Capital (2011), Marx stresses that commodities can possess a qualitative and a quantitative dimension: That is, use-values and exchange-values. Commodities are experienced as use-values when they can fulfill a particular need or desire, whatever the source of these wishes may be: “A commodity is, in the first place, an object outside us, a thing that by its properties satisfies human wants of some sort or another. The nature of such wants, whether, for instance, they spring from the stomach or from fancy, makes no difference” (Marx, 2011, p. 41-42). Yet, since labour is, generally speaking, socially divided (thus implying that individuals are dependent on each other for the production of the things they mutually need), consumption tends to happen only following a commercial exchange. “All commodities are non-use-values for their owners, and use-values for their non-owners. Consequently, they must all change hands” (Marx, 2011, p. 97). According to this perspective, a commodity only constitutes itself as such through the realization of its exchange value: “To become a commodity a product must be transferred to another, whom it will serve as a use value, by means of an exchange” (Marx, 2011,

p. 48). The consumers, therefore, typically experience commodities qualitatively, while the producers are more likely to engage with them from a quantitative standpoint.

It follows from these remarks that the meanings that social actors attach to commodities are prone to vary significantly as these objects move from one social setting to another – in short, from the realm of production to the realm of consumption4. For some, as I had the opportunity to verify at first hand on the factory floor, little interest is placed upon the usefulness of the things that they craft; while for others the same product is much more valuable, for it represents the satisfaction of a given necessity or will.

Since the early days of industrialization, sports have played (at least) a part in the production of similar wills – a flourishing part, it must be noted. Nowadays, the participation in numerous sporting activities increasingly entails the acquisition of sporting goods, no matter whether this is done for practical purposes or self-affirmation. As such, the fact that this branch of industry has developed vigorously over the course of the twentieth century is not to be overlooked. It actually testifies to the growing legitimation of sports in contemporary life. In effect, it would be even possible to demonstrate that the sports manufacturing industry has historically been constituted not only as a further development of more traditional industrial branches; but that it has also, in many respects, been instrumental to the emergence of various leading global economic trends – offshoring and outsourcing, for example. Even more to the point: The establishment of the notion of ‘global brands’ has been thoroughly indebted to the bold expansion policies put forward by companies like Nike, Adidas, or Reebok5. I am stressing the burgeoning relevance of this domain of industry for a very specific reason: It sets the broader stage for the development of the present inquiry.

4 This is, of course, a crude generalization tailored for the purposes of this study, since the chains through which commodities typically flow tend to be far more complex. Already in the Grundrisse (1973), Marx himself spoke about the spheres of "material production”, “distribution”, “exchange”, and “consumption”. 5 Curiously enough, the critics of neo-colonialism in the realm of sports have been far more concerned with the cultural dominance of Western games (like soccer or basketball) than with the ways in which similar companies have ventured deeply into the Global South in a more material sense – by which I mean, through the introduction of sporting commodities. Some scholars observed, for instance, how certain Native American groups in Brazil made use of pieces of American sporting apparel even when they were engaging in their own endemic physical cultural practices (Almeida & Suassuna, 2010). 13

Further still, from the countless types of commodities that are produced in the context of the sports manufacturing industry, only a small fraction of them will be taken into consideration in this study. More precisely, I am interested in the products marked under the rubric of hockey equipment and, in particular, goalie masks. In section 1.4, I will seek to articulate why I believe these are fascinating objects to investigate. But before I elaborate on how I went about studying the manufacture of goalie masks, let me briefly situate the present inquiry in relation to the broader scholarship on commodity production and material culture.

1.2 The commodity in its general form

In structuring and making sense of my research incursion into the hockey manufacturing industry, I borrowed heavily from two theoretical frameworks: Namely, well-established Marxist accounts of the labour process and more incipient interpretations of objects that seek to pay greater attention to their, so to speak, ‘materiality’. In the following sections, I will elaborate a little further on each of these theoretical perspectives.

Karl Marx´s account of the process of commodity production keeps informing rigorous economic research to this day. More contemporary Marxist thinkers, including influential figures such as David Harvey, Guy Debord, and Fredric Jameson, keep echoing many of Marx’s original insights in this respect – almost verbatim. This is also true in the context of the sociology of sport, in which leading scholars such as Rob Beamish (2009) and Ian Mcdonald (2015) have employed traditional Marxist concepts such as ‘alienation’ or ‘praxis’ in their analyses of the labour relations that currently pervade the world of sports. Of course, I intent not to suggest that Marx´s theory of value has gone without its critics, both from philosophical and economic standpoints. Rather, what I am trying to indicate here is simply that it appears to constitute a safe starting point for an inquiry into the production of commodities.

Marx operates under the assumption that commodities are the most fundamental pieces in the edifice of the capitalist mode of production. Every commodity, so he argues, embodies a certain

amount of ‘useful’6 human labour7 – in other words, all commodities emerge, at least in part, as objectivations8 of human activity. The process of commodity production therefore entails the crystallization of labour into the sphere of things9. Labour is understood in this connection as the transformation of the material world10 in accordance with human needs and desires11. On a different note, but still with respect to this same matter, it should be cautioned that “human labour power in motion, or human labour, creates value, but is not itself value. It becomes value only in its congealed state, when embodied in the form of some object” (Marx, 2011, p. 59).

Different kinds of commodities, of course, express different use values, thus suggesting that the form of labour embedded in these objects must be qualitatively distinct. The type of labour necessary to produce a goalie mask is essentially different from the labour employed in the manufacture of hockey sticks, and so tends to be the time and skill needed for the completion of

6 “The labour, whose utility is thus represented by the value in use of its product, or which manifests itself by making its product a use value, we call useful labour. In this connection we consider only its useful effect” (Marx, 2011, p. 48). 7 “In the use value of each commodity there is contained useful labour, i.e., productive activity of a definite kind and exercised with a definite aim” (Marx, 2011, p. 49). 8 I have employed the term according to the definition provided by Berger and Pullberg (1965): “By objectivation we mean that process whereby human subjectivity embodies itself in products that are available to oneself and one's fellow men as elements of a common world” (p. 199). Particularly important in this connection is how such an interpretation is framed in distinction to the notion of “objectification”, which they define as follows: “By objectification we mean the moment in the process of objectivation in which man establishes distance from his producing and its product, such that he can take cognizance of it and make of it an object of his consciousness. Objectivation, then, is a broader concept, applicable to all human products, materials well as non-material. Objectification is a narrower epistemological concept, referring to the way in which the world produced by man is apprehended by him” (p. 200). Both are, in this respect, different ‘moments’ in the process of production, but which remain nonetheless connected in a dialectical sense. 9 “The bodies of commodities are combinations of two elements – matter and labour. If we take away the useful labour expended upon them, a material substratum is always left” (Marx, 2011, p. 50). 10 Time and again one feels compelled to remind scholars in the field of kinesiology and physical education that there appears to be just as much physical investment in this “transformation of the material world” as in what we typically denote by physical culture. The reasons why these have come to be treated as two entirely separated spheres of inquiry are to be found, I believe, in the much deeper ideological cleavage between labour and leisure. 11 “The labour-process, resolved as above into its simple elementary factors, is human action with a view to the production of use-values, appropriation of natural substances to human requirements” (Marx, 2011, p. 204-205).

each task. Yet this distinction is scarcely important in the sense that these two human-made objects may be framed in terms of their (exchange) value. What is common to these two things, as well as to any other commodity, is that they possess not only a material shape, but also a value form. As Marx (2011) articulates it:

Commodities come into the world in the shape of use values, articles, or goods, such as iron, linen, corn, etc. This is their plain, homely, bodily form. They are, however, commodities, only because they are something two-fold, both objects of utility, and, at the same time, depositories of value. They manifest themselves therefore as commodities, or have the form of commodities, only in so far as they have two forms, a physical or natural form, and a value form (p. 54-55).

The value form of commodities, in principle, refers simply to the quantity of one commodity that may be exchanged for another. Some commodities enjoy greater value than others, fundamentally because, in their production, more ‘socially necessary labour time’12 has been invested. Ultimately, however, for commodities to be exchanged, they need to be arranged in relation to each other in a given proportion. Suppose, for instance, that the value of one goalie mask is equivalent to that of three hockey sticks. What is expressed through this ratio (1:3) is, in essence, that the different forms of labour embodied in each of these objects must be relativized so that they may become comparable13. But how can this be accomplished? “The equalization of the most different kinds of labour can be the result only of an abstraction from their inequalities, or of reducing them to their common denominator, viz. expenditure of human labour power or human labour in the abstract” (Marx, 2011, p. 78). According to this perspective, the exchange

12 “Some people might think that if the value of a commodity is determined by the quantity of labour spent on it, the more idle and unskilful the labourer, the more valuable would his commodity be, because more time would be required in its production. The labour, however, that forms the substance of value, is homogeneous human labour, expenditure of one uniform labour power. The total labour power of society, which is embodied in the sum total of the values of all commodities produced by that society, counts here as one homogeneous mass of human labour power, composed though it be of innumerable individual units. Each of these units is the same as any other, so far as it has the character of the average labour power of society, and takes effect as such; that is, so far as it requires for producing a commodity, no more time than is needed on an average, no more than is socially necessary. The labour time socially necessary is that required to produce an article under the normal conditions of production, and with the average degree of skill and intensity prevalent at the time” (Marx, 2011, p. 45-46). 13 “When we bring the products of our labour into relation with each other as values, it is not because we see in these articles the material receptacles of homogeneous human labour. Quite the contrary: whenever, by an exchange, we equate as values our different products, by that very act, we also equate, as human labour, the different kinds of labour expended upon them” (Marx, 2011, p. 85). 16

value of commodities is therefore determined by the amount of “human labour in the abstract” congealed in them.

Yet, today, one rarely trades commodities in such fashion. As a matter of fact, “Every one knows […] that commodities have a value form common to them all, and presenting a marked contrast with the varied bodily forms of their use values. I mean their money form” (Marx, 2011, p. 55). Contrary to what may appear at first sight, the money form of commodities also expresses a ratio between two things – which, historically speaking, springs from the use of gold and other precious metals as universal equivalents14. I intend not to discuss such complex historical process in too much detail. For the purposes of this study, it suffices to say that the money form of commodities – for it denotes a relationship set by convention – tends to obscure the back-and-forth flow of things embedded in every commercial exchange. To put it differently, “In so far as exchange is a process, by which commodities are transferred from hands in which they are non- use-values, to hands in which they become use-values, it is a social circulation of matter. The product of one form of useful labour replaces that of another” (Marx, 2011, 116-117).

This theoretical approach thus brings attention to the social relations inherent to the circulation of commodities. As Appadurai (1986) remarks, “Few will deny that a commodity is a thoroughly socialized thing” (p. 6). At a more immediate level, the commodity, when exchanged, mediates the relationship between producers of different use values15 – which also act as consumers, insofar as they exchange, in principle, the values that they produced for the things that they need. It connects, as it were, individuals situated in the realm of production and individuals situated in the realm of consumption (even if purely in abstraction).

14 “Gold is now money with reference to all other commodities only because it was previously, with reference to them, a simple commodity. Like all other commodities, it was also capable of serving as an equivalent, either as simple equivalent in isolated exchanges, or as particular equivalent by the side of others. Gradually it began to serve, within varying limits, as universal equivalent. So soon as it monopolises this position in the expression of value for the world of commodities, it becomes the money commodity” (Marx, 2011, p. 81) 15 “Since the producers do not come into social contact with each other until they exchange their products, the specific social character of each producer’s labour does not show itself except in the act of exchange. In other words, the labour of the individual asserts itself as a part of the labour of society, only by means of the relations which the act of exchange establishes directly between the products, and indirectly, through them, between the producers” (Marx, 2011, p. 84). 17

This is one dimension of the circulation of commodities to which I will pay special attention throughout this study, particularly for one reason: It has become increasingly evident, in my understanding, that the culture of (frantic) consumerism that now dominates most Western societies relies heavily on the obliteration of the conditions under which things are produced. “With the advent of the so-called second industrial revolution”, so Guy Debord (1983) argues, “alienated consumption is added to alienated production as an inescapable duty of the masses” (p. 42). Following Burawoy (2012) – and, by extension, Marx – I will refer to this as a “mystification” of the relations of production – by which I denote, primarily, the deliberate attempt to enclose and disguise what in effect takes place in the context of production, which at times include a number of (unfair) labour practices that, if fully revealed, would make the consumption of certain goods very hard to uphold16.

The sports manufacturing industry, it should be emphasized, has been implicated in such dubious endeavors all too frequently, even if studies documenting similar issues have been almost absent in the sociology of sport discipline17. Among the noticeable exceptions to this tendency are, for example, Donnelly’s (1997) and Donnelly and Petherick’s (2004) pieces exposing the prevalence of child labour in the sports manufacturing industry, as well as Sage’s (1999) examination of the transnational advocacy networks that strive to promote the amelioration of wages and labour conditions in Nike factories situated in Asia.

To be sure, there is nothing particularly original about pointing out that productive activities are often performed under harsh conditions – this is probably the most obvious way in

16 Interestingly enough, the direct opposite of this process may take shape in what is today often referred to as ‘corporate responsibility’ – that is, the practice of advertising fair labour relations as a mean to stimulate the consumption of a particular good. See, for example, Slavoj Zizek’s (2009) take on Starbucks and how it promotes its products: “The price is higher than elsewhere since what you are really buying is the ‘coffee ethic’ which includes care for the environment, social responsibility towards producers, plus a place where you yourself can participate in communal life (from the very beginning, Starbucks presented its coffee shops as an ersatz community)” (p. 53-54). 17 This appears not to be the case with respect to the social sciences more broadly. In his examination of the relevance of the Communist Manifesto today, for example, David Harvey (2000) draws a parallel between the poor laboring conditions faced by workers in Nike factories and the hardships confronted by British workers from the mid 19th century. He then affirms: “The material conditions that sparked the moral outrage that suffuses the Manifesto have not gone away. They are embodied in everything from Nike shoes, Disney products, GAP clothing to Liz Claiborne products” (p. 44). 18

which the opposition between capital and labour acquires an exploitative nature. Marx and Engels (1956, p. 22) have time and again characterized the labour process through expressions such as ‘extremely exhausting’18, and the concern with the physical and psychological integrity of workers certainly remains to this day a central tenet in the field of labour studies (e.g., Peters, 2012). What is perhaps relatively new, as it will be discussed at greater length in Chapter Three, is how widely the degree of legal protection to which workers are entitled now greatly varies based on national borders19.

One of the key insights in Marx’s work is the idea that labour, under capitalism, takes on an alienating character. Those who participate in the productive process, Marx claims, do not recognize themselves in the products of their own labour. Their ‘world producing activity’ is not directed towards their own needs and aspirations; instead, it is experienced as a process of ‘estrangement’. The workers therefore do not affirm themselves in the things that they create, but deny themselves. The affluence that they produce confronts them as something alien, which does not belong to them. They sell their labour for the benefit of others. At the heart of this process, in summary, is the understanding that alienated labour engenders a rupture in the link between the producers and the product – not a de facto fissure, but a symbolic one. According to Guy Debord (1983), “The generalized separation of worker and product has spelled the end of any

18 An excerpt of the German Ideology is even more pointed: “It is true that labor produces for the rich wonderful things – but for the worker it produces privation. It produces palaces – but for the worker, hovels. It produces beauty – but for the worker, deformity” (Marx & Engels, 1998, p. 110). 19 Still, as David Harvey (2000) contends, some workers, such as illegal immigrants living in wealthier countries, fall outside these spheres of protection, occasionally being subjected to unfair labour conditions as well: “Put in more direct contemporary terms, the creation of unemployment through down-sizing, the redefinitions of skills and remunerations for skills, the intensification of labour processes and of autocratic systems of surveillance, the increasing despotism of orchestrated detailed divisions of labour, the insertion of immigrants (or, what amounts to the same thing, the migration of capital to alternative labour sources), and the coerced competitive struggles between different bodily practices and modes of valuation achieved under different historical and cultural conditions, all contribute to the uneven geographical valuation of labourers as persons. The manifest effects upon the bodies of laborers who live lives embedded in the circulation of variable capital is powerful indeed. Sweatshops in New York mimic similar establishments in Guatemala and subject the workers incorporated therein to a totalizing and violently repressive regime of body disciplines. The construction of specific spatiotemporal relations through the circulation of capital likewise constructs a connection between the designer shirts we wear upon our backs, the Nike shoes we sport, and the oriental carpets upon which we walk, and the grossly exploited labor of tens of thousands of women and children in Central America, Indonesia, and Pakistan (just to name a few of the points of production of such commodities)” (p. 109-110). 19

comprehensive view of the job done” (p. 26). Berger and Pullberg (1965), on their part, account for the matter in the following fashion:

By alienation we mean the process by which the unity of the producing and the product is broken. The product now appears to the producer as an alien facticity and power standing in itself and over against him, no longer recognizable as a product. In other words, alienation is the process by which man forgets that the world he lives in has been produced by himself (p. 200).

The notion of ‘surplus value’ derives precisely from this perceived disconnect between the value one produces and the value one is allowed to appropriate. The mathematical expression of this process carries little interest for the present study. And so do the critiques which expose the insufficiencies of Marx’s theory of value in accounting for the burgeoning role played by privatized knowledge in the production of wealth20. Given that the bulk of this inquiry took place inside the factory, I chose to adopt a more orthodox – if unfashionable – frame of analysis. Still, it may be worth noting that (Marxist) concepts of this kind, despite their compelling explanatory power and historical bearing, remain, at least insofar as my fieldwork was concerned, entirely absent from the vocabulary of the workers. Hence, I also tried to apprehend how the workers and management engage with these questions in a more spontaneous, immediate sense.

Most distinctively in North America, Harry Braverman’s magnum opus – Labor and Monopoly Capital (1998), published originally in 1974 – was quite influential for some time, providing a reassessment Marx´s account of the labour process and infusing it with more contemporary elements. The central thesis herein advanced by Braverman was that, over the course of the twentieth century, labour came to be increasingly subjected to scientific management and

20 Consider, for example, Slavoj Zizek’s (2009) account on the rise of Microsoft: “Take the case of Bill Gates: how did he become the richest man in the world? His wealth has nothing to do with the cost of producing the commodities Microsoft sells (one can even argue that Microsoft pays its intellectual workers a relatively high salary). It is not the result of his producing good software at lower prices than his competitors, or of higher levels of ‘exploitation’ of his hired workers. If this were the case, Microsoft would have gone bankrupt long ago: masses of people would have chosen programs like Linux, which are both free and, according to the specialists, better than Microsoft's. Why, then, are millions still buying Microsoft? Because Microsoft has succeeded in imposing itself as an almost universal standard, (virtually) monopolizing the field, in a kind of direct embodiment of the ‘general intellect’. Gates became the richest man on Earth within a couple of decades by appropriating the rent received from allowing millions of intellectual workers to participate in that particular form of the ‘general intellect’ he successfully privatized and still controls” (p. 145-146). 20

the forces of rationalization. He paid particular attention to the role of Taylorism in setting these processes in motion, ultimately arguing that this approach was instrumental in generating a cleavage between ‘conception’ and ‘execution’ in the realm of production – and, by extension, between white- and blue-collar workers. Further refining this argument, Braverman claimed that the fragmentation of productive activities into ever-smaller tasks (or, to put it in different terms, a progressive sub-division of labour) lowered the general level of skill necessary for the performance of work-related duties. This trend, coupled with the growing control exercised over the workers as an outcome of emerging managerial strategies, was among the root causes for what he famously described as the ‘degradation of labour’ in advanced capitalist societies.

Braverman’s perspective proved quite useful in helping me examine the findings that I derived from the factory floor, preeminently because of what I experienced as a marked division between the composition of the designs and the more technical stages in the production of goalie masks. The ensuing analysis relied, as well, on a few other more contemporary, refined renditions of Marx’s account of the process of commodity production. These include E. P. Thompson’s (1967) take on the changes in the management of time in industrial settings and Michael Burawoy’s (1979) considerations on the nuanced dynamics that underpin the relationships on the factory floor. In the composition of this dissertation, I also drew significantly on the work of Guy Debord, including with respect to some of the wording. I decided to take this approach fundamentally because of how distinctively this author apprehends, in my opinion, the ambivalence of the commodity as both a material entity and an as an ideological force21.

21 I am not implying that Debord somehow manages to resolve this contradiction in any definitive fashion. On the contrary, the precise inner workings of this dialectical process, in my opinion, remain, to a significant extent, open questions – which, it could be added, also loom large over the present inquiry, constantly resurfacing here and there. A substantial part of Debord’s scholarship has yet to be translated into English; but I made sure to cover whatever could be reasonably obtained, also familiarizing myself with some pieces by his colleagues in the Situationist International.

Whether my characterization of Debord’s style and analytical cannon will endure heavy scrutiny is yet to be assessed. But a deeper look on the concepts he articulates may be considered timely at least in one sense: To help to expose the common misconception, which every now so often reemerges in the field of sport studies, that his definition of the ‘spectacle’ can be readily applied – in a crude, underdeveloped fashion – to the analysis of ‘sporting spectacles’. Debord’s take on the ‘spectacle’, in reality, hardly alludes to any grandiose, celebratory dynamics; what he is seeking to describe relates, rather, to the fabric of everyday life under capitalism: 21

At this juncture, a final clarification would perhaps be opportune. It has lately become more usual for scholars in the sociology of sport to refer to the process of ‘commodification’, whereby they seek to account, generally speaking, for the manifold ways in which sports and physical culture have been increasingly privatized and commercialized. To put it differently, they have in mind the enclosure of various sporting spaces and practices that had heretofore been widely perceived as parts of the (cultural) “commons” (Donnelly, 2014). I would certainly not argue against the idea that sports can be advertised, ‘packaged’, and sold like any other product. However, as I already remarked previously, what interested me, over the course of this study, were not such elusive processes of commodification, but sporting commodities that can be easily reduced to their objective, unitary existence.

1.3 The study of material culture

The axiom that one can derive meaningful inferences from the analysis of objects is certainly nothing new in the social sciences and humanities. Archeology, history, and anthropology are among the disciplines that have traditionally engaged with things from a methodological standpoint. For the most part, such efforts have been undertaken with the aim of reassembling, as thoroughly as feasible, past occurrences and the ways of life of ancient/indigenous social

“The commodity's dominion over the economy was at first exercised in a covert manner. The economy itself, the material basis of social life, was neither perceived nor understood – not properly known precisely because of its "familiarity." In a society where concrete commodities were few and far between, it was the dominance of money that seemed to play the role of emissary, invested with full authority by an unknown power. With the coming of the industrial revolution, the division of labor specific to that revolution's manufacturing system, and mass production for a world market, the commodity emerged in its fullfledged form as a force aspiring to the complete colonization of social life. (...) The spectacle corresponds to the historical moment at which the commodity completes its colonization of social life. It is not just that the relationship to commodities is now plain to see – commodities are now all that there is to see; the world we see is the world of the commodity” (Debord, 1983, p. 41-42).

A further clarification: The Situationist International was a political movement that came into being around the mid-fifties and which lasted formally until the early seventies. Gathering mostly French-speaking intellectuals and artists from continental Europe, it played an important role in re-assessing the relevance of classical Marxist categories and in proposing new, concrete political strategies for the Left. Its decline coincided with the rise in conservative politics that followed the popular uprisings of May 1968 in France. It was not until a few of years later that the group started to gain some notoriety in the English-speaking world. 22

formations. Objects have been prominently framed, in this connection, as part of a constellation of sources from which suppositions can be drawn, particularly through an approach that researchers have customarily referred to as ‘triangulation’ (e.g., Denzin, 1989).

The notion of triangulation of data implies, fundamentally, the understanding that the cogency of a particular conclusion tends to be enhanced if it is supported by evidence arising from different sources – say, for example, that the individual analysis of a fragment of a written text, a song, and a piece of object all seem to yield similar, converging interpretations. Of course, it is possible – indeed very likely – that the evidence with which the researcher must deal was obtained through the engagement with different methods. It is in this sense that some scholars have argued that the practice triangulation concerns not only the data, but also the methods employed throughout the research process (Denzin & Giardina, 2010) – a “dialogue between methods”, as Sophie Woodward (2016, p. 361) states. This is, in effect, a methodological assumption that I tried my best to uphold throughout the development of this inquiry.

But let me return to the matter at hand: The study of material things, so I suggested, may be carried out from a more conventional, scholarly-established standpoint. This approach is, in essence, largely anchored in the understanding that objects are physical entities upon which meanings have been “impressed” (Geertz, 1973, p. 387) – meanings that may be brought into light if scholars work hard to dissect them.

In recent years, however, a revamped interest in the study of objects emerged in the social sciences and humanities – yet with a slightly different emphasis. Be it under guise of what has been called, to name three major tendencies, ‘new materialisms’, ‘actor network theory’, or, perhaps the most usual term, ‘material culture’, a burgeoning field of study has developed by focusing, more specifically, on the relationships that people entertain with things. Speaking about the birth of the Journal of Material Culture, Geismar, Küchler and Caroll (2016) write as follows:

The editors staked a ground for a non-sectarian, undisciplined approach to the study of the material world that they construed as inherently social. They also proposed that the methods, and theoretical frames, to draw out meaning from within objects, be grounded with relational perspective that they framed as a dialectic – in which persons and things are involved in a cyclical process of mutual constitution (p. 3).

I will not venture here into the rather contentious debate of whether objects are endowed with a certain degree of ‘agency’, as some scholars have claimed (e.g., Gell, 1998); this appears to be a fruitless discussion unless enough consensus could be achieved with respect to what exactly one means by the term ‘agency’. And yet I believe it is safe to point out that the present inquiry was carefully structured around the understanding that objects are not inconsequential, passive entities. Quite on the contrary, I took the view that objects are vibrant presences, which I sought to examine from two complementary angles.

On the one hand, I subscribed to the more traditional approach on the study of objects, thus analyzing how goalie masks present themselves as crystallizations of human labour and intentionality. According to this perspective, thorough an analysis centered upon the raw materials, physical features, and broader structural designs of the masks (in sum, their ‘materiality’), much can be uncovered about what they represented within the broader cultural context in which they are immersed – the universe of Canadian hockey, so to say.

On the other hand, I also sought to shed some light on how goalie masks are meaningfully signified, to some degree affecting the lives and identities of those who engage with them. Studies dealing with analogous matters have tended to focus around the entanglements between people and things at a more immediate level. In an inquiry about how individuals relate to the denim pants that they use, for example, Sophie Woodward (2016) portrays this as “a tactile relationship of bodies, skin and fabric. Changes in both the garment and the fibres enact relations between people and encode memories, as the material and the social are entangled and co-constituted” (p. 360). Similarly, other authors have discussed the growth of the customized running shoes market and “the processes through which trainers and the wearing of trainers can help ‘make’ the individual through their contribution to key dimensions of identification” (Hockey et. al., 2015, p. 39).

The sensorial experience of objects has thus been featured quite prominently in the emerging branches of scholarship on material culture. I also devoted significant effort to this task, paying attention not only to the impact that the physical presence of goalie masks generated upon others; but also – and especially – upon me, as I navigated the everyday routine of the factory floor. In Chapter Five, the reader will be able to see how, in my ethnographical descriptions, I constantly tried to represent, in spite of the difficulties to do so in writing, my subjective experience of engaging with the masks through various sensorial standpoints. These notes considered, mostly,

individual masks; yet sometimes I also attempted to grasp their influence upon one’s experience when ‘collectively taken’.

I need not go at length here to make the case that objects also populate and shape the lives of individuals in a more abstract sense. While this may be far harder to account for from a methodological angle, it remains nonetheless there: The owner of the mask factory where I carried out most of my fieldwork, for example, framed some of his future career aspirations in terms of original mask designs, which have not yet even been born.

Inquiries into objects need not, by their very nature, be apolitical. Quite on the contrary, I favored the view that the analysis of material culture can in reality be linked to the critique of social inequality. As Fowles (2016) suggests,

Undoing the subject-object divide thus emerges as central to undoing all manner of insidious inequalities between humans. The critical study of things and the subjectification of objects, then, might be imagined as contributing to the political project in which the final goal remains the emancipation and self-determination of subaltern people (p. 22).

Considering, in particular, how the production of goalie masks nowadays unfolds in an industrial landscape shaped by geographical and cultural divides (that will be discussed at greater length later), it becomes instantly clear how the materiality of masks is itself infused with political significance, depending on where and under which conditions the items were produced.

Among the most distinctive features of the present study is also, to conclude this section, the conscious effort it entails to advance, as it were, a form of critical materialism that could “build political-theoretical alliances across the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ versions of materialism” (Lettow, 2017, p. 118). Drawing heavily on the legacy of historical materialism, expressed in particular by the emphasis in the process of production as one of the driving forces structuring the fabric of social and political relations (including, to be sure, when it comes to sport and physical culture), it also seeks to incorporate an analysis of commodities which was heavily context-sensitive and alert to the specificities of the objects being examined. Still, I would hope not to sound like someone who nurtures too bold expectations about the undertaking: What I offer here is rather a singular, original effort to bridge materialistic approaches; other forms could also be attempted.

1.4 The significance of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada

Thus far I only discussed the commodity – and the world it arguably creates – in its general form. Most scholars in the Marxist tradition have done so, for they tend to be, as a rule, more concerned with patterns and commonalities than with the individual character of objects. But the labour process, despite its relevance when considered as a ‘totality’ (i.e., as the total sum of the productive activities in a given historical context), everywhere unfolds at a micrological level. Hence, what I would now like to do is to focus on the specificities of the industrial context that I set myself to study.

What is the cultural and political significance attributed to (certain) pieces of hockey equipment in the context of Canada? Whereas it would be impossible to address this query in any exhaustive fashion, it appears to be safe to assert that, on the whole, these are objects that matter. To different degrees, they have become enmeshed in the official rhetoric as well as in non-official accounts of what it means to be a Canadian citizen. To unpack the intricate connections between material culture and national identity, however, is no straightforward task. Thus, my take on the subject is not intended to be conclusive in any respect. I only want to raise some pertinent questions.

I would like to begin by recounting a short anecdote, aimed at providing some context. In the winter of 2015, an unusual transaction made the headlines of most Canadian newspapers. The item in question was a wooden stick, assessed to be the oldest known ice hockey stick on planet Earth. Estimates suggest that it had been manufactured around the mid-1830s, somewhere in the vicinity of the small town of North Sydney, Nova Scotia. The gentleman responsible for the finding, Mr. Mark Presley, spent several years working to determine the origin of the artifact, which he acquired in 2008 from a retiring barber (it was reported that he paid a thousand dollars for the item). The stick was used to decorate the walls of the barbershop for several decades, remaining largely unnoticed – as the barber himself suggested in an interview to the Globe and Mail – by the clientele (Adams, 2015). After the authenticity of the artifact was established, Mr. Presley decided to auction it online, but was eventually convinced to withdraw the offer by the representatives of a Canadian museum, who persuaded him by arguing that “they’d like to find a way to keep the artifact in Canada” (Adams, 2015, p. 51). The rest of the story was told as follows:

Hockey is sometimes described as a secular religion for Canadians, and now its worshippers have a new relic to oooh and ahhh over, courtesy of the Canadian Museum of History. Admittedly, the world’s oldest-known hockey stick isn’t much to look at – scarred, paint-flecked, just 105 centimetres tall with a long, curved blade, hewn about 180 years ago from a single piece of Nova Scotia sugar maple – but its significance is immense. Which is why the Gatineau-based museum announced with great fanfare Friday that it had acquired the artifact for its permanent collection for a heady $300,000. (…) The museum’s plan is to display it on July 1, 2017, Canada’s 150th birthday, in the renovated Canada Hall space. Pressure, of course, may build for an earlier debut (Adams, 2015, p. 51).

I already pointed out that the broader cultural significance of certain sports artifacts is generally determined by the historical trajectory of these objects. But this historical trajectory is seldom self-evident; most of the times, it must be constructed, deliberately, in intelligible terms. What seems remarkable about the example presented above is how clearly it makes the point that the cultural meanings in question do not ‘passively’ emerged from the stick itself, but were largely imposed upon it. The same stick that once rested insignificant in the barbershop suddenly became the centerpiece of a museum gallery. In effect, as historians of physical culture have noted, halls and museums22 have been instrumental in establishing narratives around iconic objects that pertain to the world of sports (Phillips, 2012; Kidd, 1996b). Yet, some of these narratives far transcend this domain. When it comes to hockey, specifically, narratives are also prone to be linked to a largely idealized (if not mystified) understanding of the cultural and political landscapes of Canada.

I intend not to provide a thorough discussion on the intersections between hockey and Canadian national identity. This has been a recurrent theme in almost every major inquiry into ice hockey, from enthusiasts to academics. In one of the appendices to this study (Appendix A), I offered a more detailed account of the matter, alongside a brief overview about the treatment of ice hockey in the realm of the sociology of sport. For the purposes of this chapter, it will only be necessary to reiterate two significant points. First: Based on most of the scholarship that deals with the matter (see Appendix A), the centrality of hockey in the Canadian collective imaginary can be interpreted as an established fact, regardless of its (often problematic) historical, social, and

22 In my own research, I found that goalie mask shows organized by collectors and enthusiasts tend to perform a similar function, albeit on a smaller level. 27

political underpinnings. Second: It is precisely this centrality that appears to confer a special character to the hockey manufacturing industry in relation to most other branches of production.

Let me elaborate a bit further on the latter point. In the passage reproduced earlier, some emphasis is placed upon the type of wood used in the production of the hockey stick. In doing so, the journalist is not only establishing its geographical origins, but also evoking another familiar Canadian motif: The maple tree. It would therefore appear that not only the remarkable age, but also the place of manufacture (provenance) and the raw materials employed in its production are important in determining the cultural and political significance of the stick. The fate of the stick seems thus linked to Canada in a twofold manner: In terms of its materiality as well as with respect to what it represents to the infancy of hockey23. That is to say, in both concrete and symbolic forms.

Of course, the story I just outlined concerns solely a single, unique stick – a very special one, indeed. But to which degree (if any) one might be able to translate the underlying sentiments of national entitlement that transpired in that particular case to the hockey stick industry as a totality and, even further, to the notion of hockey equipment ‘in general’? Throughout the development of the present research, I engaged with many participants who voiced sharp disappointments about the lesser part currently played by Canada in the making of hockey equipment, thus meaning that there may be a lot of truth to these extrapolations. In other words, feelings of national pride can be linked not only to unique, storied pieces of hockey equipment; but also to the output of the hockey manufacturing industry as a whole, conceived, for the lack of a more precise term, as a ‘class of objects’.

A similar sentiment echoes on a number of newspaper articles and popular publications about hockey. Pitts and Keenan (2004), for example, refer to the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada in the following fashion:

23 Further complicating the matter, here another controversial question needs to be taken into consideration – this time concerning the internal politics of Canada. The ‘birthplace’ of hockey is an issue that often triggers passionate debates among hockey enthusiasts, including within the academic sphere. At the heart of this dispute lies not so much a desire to establish the precise origins of the game, but the wish to determine whether it first appeared in the English or French portions of Canada. The claim that the oldest known hockey stick was carved in Nova Scotia, of course, reverberates in that long-held conversation as well. 28

Nortel’s decision to exit manufacturing comes at a time when Canadian industry is already bleeding profusely, wounded by soaring currency and the emergence of a low-cost production powerhouse in China. The body blows have pummeled a swath of industry sectors – from apparel to auto parts to capital goods – and reached several regions of the country, but the manufacturing heartland of Ontario had been especially hit hard. Even the quintessentially Canadian industry activity of making hockey equipment has been affected (p. B4).

In his insightful book about the historical development of the hockey stick industry in North America, Bruce Dowbiggin (2001) also credits the hockey stick as “a quintessentially Canadian symbol”. Mourning the decision of a major hockey stick manufacturer to move its production entirely overseas, moreover, Bertrand Marotte (2011) claims that “Intense global competition is laying low an industry dear to the heart of every Canadian who ever grabbed a hockey stick and laced up a pair of skates” (p. B1). A few paragraphs later, in this same piece, the author quotes Robin Burns – founder of the hockey equipment maker Itech: “It’s not something that we as Canadians like to see happening, especially for a product that’s so closely associated with Canada. The traditional Canadian-made hockey stick is certainly becoming a thing of the past” (Marotte, 2011, p. B2). According to Dowbiggin (2001), in addition, some nostalgia remains about “the days in which hockey sticks said something distinctly Canadian – the days when they emanated directly from the towns and villages of the country’s heartland” (p. 93). In different ways, all these passages underline the importance of certain pieces of hockey equipment within the constellation of Canadian motifs.

Some of these accounts seem to reflect, as well, the frustration that caused the public sphere in North America to witness a backlash against the largely unregulated development of the processes of offshoring and outsourcing. From Donald Trump to Bernie Sanders, the pledge to halt these economic trends was one of the few issues that connected the rhetoric of Republicans and Democrats in the 2016 presidential elections in the United States. Regardless of whether this point was articulated in terms of American exceptionalism or in terms of protecting labour rights overseas as a strategy of reducing offshoring, it brought substantial public interest to questions that were previously largely absent from the political debate, lifting the Rust Belt once again to the forefront of American politics.

It should be noted, however, that the attacks directed towards the processes of offshoring and outsourcing, whether springing from the right or from the left of the political spectrum, have been typically formulated in terms of the loss of jobs that these economic strategies entail. In the 29

case of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada, another key element becomes relevant, which further highlights its peculiarities in relation to most other industrial domains: What needs to be defended in this case, it is widely believed, are not only the jobs that this industry generates, but also the perceived cultural attachment to some of the products it yields.

The general sentiment of frustration associated with the fate of the Canadian portion of hockey manufacturing industry appears to have become more pronounced as of late. This seems of course justified, given the extent to which the implementation offshoring and outsourcing tendencies has been able to dismantle this industrial complex, as it will be discussed more thoroughly in Chapter Three. But there were other times in the past in which the influx of hockey commodities coming from other parts of the world generated anxieties in the representatives and supporters of this industry.

Around the 1970s, for example, Canadian manufacturers started to wrestle with the pressure generated by the influx of hockey sticks produced in Scandinavia, as well as skates from Austria and England. Interestingly enough, Canadian skates were perceived as of inferior quality when compared to the ones coming from Europe. In an editorial do the Globe and Mail, Jack Adams (1973), for instance, states: “In my avocational career as president of the Kitchener- Waterloo Skating Club, I have heard so many criticisms of skate quality that I wonder how many youngsters are turned off hockey and figure skating simply because good quality skates and boots are not easily available to them” (p. 6).

By the mid-1980s, Soviet sticks were introduced in the Canadian market, again spurring fear amongst local manufacturers, who believed that profit margins would be pushed down, just like Soviet-made cars undercut Canadian car prices a few months earlier (“Soviets to test hockey stick market”, 1984, p. M5). Later, Soviet hockey gear would come to be generally associated with poor standards of quality (Motherwell, 1984), a perspective reiterated by some of my informants.

It appears that feelings of national entitlement stretch, moreover, not only over the manufacturing portion of the Canadian hockey industry. The question of the ownership of the companies that produce hockey equipment has also on occasion been the subject of sharp commentary, as evidenced, for instance, in the following passage: “At first blush, the news that athletic footwear giant Reebok has bid for Hockey Co. Holdings Inc. seemed to add insult to injury,

coming the day after the Boston Bruins trounced the Montreal Canadiens in the first game of their Stanley Cup playoffs series” (Marotte, 2004, p. B1). This is however a much more nuanced issue, because it concerns the structures of ownership of giant multinationals. I will further explore this question later.

The production of hockey equipment, in conclusion, configures a branch of Canadian industry that has been particularly susceptible to being engulfed in passionate political debates – debates in which the feelings of national attachment to Canadian icons, on one hand, and the values (or lack thereof) upheld by the advocates of unregulated corporate capitalism, on the other, become nearly irreconcilable.

1.5 Why goalie masks? The scope, relevance, and objectives of the study

From all the kinds of sporting commodities that one might choose to study, why goalie masks? Time and again, I was asked this question throughout the development of this research. And yet, especially when the fieldwork was in its earlier stages, I could scarcely provide a rationale for this decision that the participants would find cogent enough. I did not know much about masks, nor was I particularly knowledgeable about the goaltenders who wore them. Most of the time, I was forced to explain myself by mobilizing deeper issues, arguing that my interest rested not so much on the masks themselves, but on the precaritization of labour in the production of hockey equipment more generally.

This was all very true at the time: My entry into a mask factory, as I will illustrate in greater detail subsequently, was not initially motivated by a conscious desire to investigate goalie masks; it happened because it was one of the few opportunities to study what was left of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada. It was only later that I came to realize what a fortunate (and challenging) decision this ended up being. If I am now able to articulate a justification for this study that is also partially anchored upon the singularity of masks, it is because of what I learned as the fieldwork progressed.

Marxism is a well-established avenue of inquiry in the sociology of sport. Yet, curiously enough, there have been far too few scholars in this field who have directly engaged with the

perspective of the working classes. Among the exceptions to this trend are some influential studies dealing, for example, with sports as a form of labour (Brohm, 1978; Rigauer, 1981; Robidoux, 2001; Theberge, 2000; Beamish, 2009); with the rich history of working class sporting events and endemic games (Kidd, 1996a; 2013); and with the possibility of linking labour and the training of the body through the participation in sports (Riordan, 1977). Still, in most of the Marxist accounts associated to the discipline, sport tends to be framed as an epiphenomenon – a reflection of broader societal values and norms. Even when the role of sports and physical culture in confronting the existing social order has been discussed within the Marxist tradition, it is usually from the standpoint of the ideological content that underpins these practices. By contrast, one of the distinctive characters of the present study is its preoccupation with the perspective of the workers and, more importantly, with the production of the material contents around which the sporting life unfolds.

The vast majority of textbooks and readers concerned with the sociological study of sport and physical culture pay little if any attention to the question of the manufacture of sports equipment. Speaking about my research in different forums, I was asked a couple of times whether the process of production of sporting goods even constitutes a legitimate problem of investigation in this area of research. Whereas I comprehend where these charges were coming from insofar as the historical development of the discipline is concerned, it is relatively easy to perceive in them the very same substance against which this study stands: The artificial separation between the realm of production and the realm of consumption, between the ‘field of production’ and the ‘field of play’. At the most fundamental level, therefore, I wish that this research could serve as a small contribution towards a dialectical conception of the relationship between the production of sports equipment and the participation in the culture of sports, by making a compelling case that one cannot provide an adequate understanding of the process of production without paying attention to trends concerning how the game is played/experienced, just as one cannot fully understand the development of sports and games without reference to their material content.

It is however not my intention to suggest that the realm of production has remained entirely absent from the sociology of sport. There have been in effect numerous inquiries dealing with the industrial output of sporting goods – including with respect to ice hockey (e.g., Harvey & Saint- Germain, 1995). Substantially less attention has been given, nevertheless, to the question of the labour employed within this industry. Some investigations exist, as I indicated previously, 32

denouncing the appalling working conditions sometimes linked to the sports manufacturing industry overseas, such as long working hours, low wages, and child labour (i.e., Sage, 1999; Donnelly, 1997; Donnelly & Petherick, 2004). Given how sensitive and difficult it is to access the matters at stake, these inquiries mostly relied on secondary data.

To the extent that a field of study may be understood as a collective construction, however, it always appeared to me that part of the problem (perhaps the most trivial one, indeed) still needed to be investigated more thoroughly – the daily routine on the factory floor. And to do so a more direct engagement with the workers, as well as with the spaces in which they perform their laboring duties, would be necessary. This is why I adopted in this study a methodological approach that enabled me to experience the factory floor in an anthropological sense (as well). I did so, in other words, in the hopes of developing a more rounded understanding of what it is like to work in the sports manufacturing industry – seeking to articulate the activities that the workers perform on the assembly line; the objective conditions under which they do so; and the meanings that they tend to attach to the commodities that they produce. I do not know of any other study in the sociology of sport that took a similar approach, even though this has been a fairly common methodology in mainstream sociology and labour studies.

Given significant time, financial, and cultural constrains, I opted to undertake this project on Canadian soil. Looking back at how challenging it was to convince a business owner to grant me access to the factory floor, I suspect that, in any case, it would have been nearly impossible for me to conduct this type of research elsewhere – especially in a less ‘friendly’ environment, so to speak. Still, I am sensitive to the fact that the working conditions in the Canadian context are, on average, far from being representative of the working conditions experienced in the hockey manufacturing industry globally.

Yet, these different working contexts are never fully independent from each other. When it comes to things like hockey equipment, commodities produced in different countries will, eventually, compete for what is basically the same market; thus, the depreciation of labour costs/conditions in one place tends to indirectly affect workers situated in other settings (although this problem is far more complicated when one factors in the different regulations concerning tariffs, taxes, and labour laws in each country). In this specific sense, nonetheless, hockey

equipment manufacturers in Canada are perhaps not so removed from hockey equipment manufacturers situated in other parts of the world.

I often wondered how far it would be appropriate to go in terms of narrowing down the focus of this inquiry, without compromising too much my ability to generalize about the findings. My point of departure, to put it simply, was the sports manufacturing industry in general, as an overlooked domain of the sociology of sport. After some careful research, I decided to concentrate on the hockey manufacturing industry, even if, as a Brazilian living and studying in Canada, I sometimes felt like an outsider with respect to the matter. Eventually, I brought myself to believe that it was perhaps not such a daring idea to assume that one could offer original insights into production of hockey gear even without being an expert on the game. Since almost all of the hockey equipment being consumed in Canada was actually being produced by workers abroad, so I pondered, perhaps it was not so unnatural for a concerted critique of this process to come, as well, from someone with a different cultural background.

For the sake of clarity, it should be useful to indicate that the main focus of this document rests not so much upon the global political economy of hockey – although it seems to me that one cannot for a minute lose sight of these wider, global developments in order to engender an adequate interpretation of any individual case. The broader stage of the present inquiry concerns, rather, the manufacturers of hockey equipment that still remain in Canada, after the bulk of this industry was gradually moved overseas (this process is explored at length in Chapter Three). These remaining manufacturers have, for the most part, become increasingly specialized in the production of specific hockey goods (goalie gear for instance).

In the early stages of my research, I was not sure if I would be able to access the factory floor of any company, provided how difficult it tends to be to find a business owner willing to be so generous (in the next chapter, I devote a section to consider this). So for a while I conducted a few interviews with owners of small hockey manufacturing businesses that produce different pieces of equipment, keeping my scope of investigation relatively broad. Until eventually my perseverance in looking for a viable research site paid off: I was granted access to carry out observations at a goalie mask factory, at which point the scope of my research had to be further refined, since I believed it would be appropriate to focus more thoroughly on these specific commodities. I thus initially ran into goalie masks basically by chance.

During the first weeks that I spent on the factory floor, my attention was entirely focused on the manufacturing portion of the goalie mask industry. But as my research progressed, I increasingly felt the need to learn more about hockey and, especially, goaltenders. I read about the history of goalie masks; important players and events; and the techniques used to play the position of goalie. In addition, I studied innovative features and breakthroughs in the domain of hockey equipment, some of which affected the tactics, speed, and even the culture of the game. It gradually became clear to me how fundamental accumulating this type of knowledge was, not only helping me comprehend the different steps in the process of production of the masks, but also in enhancing my ties with the community that I was studying. I perceived that the participants tended to become more engaged in the conversations, as they sensed my growing authority over the matters that we were discussing. Think about the significance of this adjustment, when it comes to the links between the field of production and the playing field: The greater command I developed over the history, symbols, and language of the field of play, the deeper access I gained to the field of production.

Goalie masks, so I have found a few months into my fieldwork, are very peculiar in one respect: They are objects around which vibrant communities of enthusiasts tend to be formed. Many of these individuals are, themselves, amateur mask makers. Provided that I was slowly gaining access to one of these ‘subcultures’ (through some clients that visited the factory on occasion), I made the decision to ‘stretch’ my investigation into mask shows and other gatherings organized by mask enthusiasts, ultimately centering a fair portion of my data collection around the meanings associated with goalie masks beyond the factory floor – thus adding another aspect to the scope of my research.

I am aware of the limitations that this more refined focus entails. But goalie masks, in my opinion, lend themselves very nicely to a case study. Considering the raw productive output alone, they represent only a small portion of the total sum of commodities and cash generated by the hockey manufacturing industry as a whole. However, goalie masks are, for the most part, produced by the same large companies that make the pieces of equipment that sell in greater quantities, such as sticks, helmets, or skates. Hence, the production of masks has by and large been subjected to the same economic trends that have affected the manufacture of these other things, while the numbers are less diffuse and the classification into models easier to compare across different manufacturers. Goalie masks function, in this sense, as a more manageable entry point to the 35

analysis of the broader world of the hockey manufacturing industry – an ‘ideal type’ (Weber, 1949), to employ a classical sociological notion.

Yet goalie masks are interesting commodities to be studied not only in a manufacturing sense. I already indicated that the fate of the local hockey manufacturing industry tends to be an object of concern for most of those who assign a central position to hockey within the cultural landscapes of Canada. But a closer look on the question would reveal that, while true for the industry ‘as a whole’, this is not entirely accurate when it comes to several of the subdivisions of this industry. None of the participants that I interviewed in this study seemed too vocal, for example, about the origins of things like hockey tape, jerseys, or mouth and neck guards. In the symbolic universe of hockey, commodities are thus constantly measured against each other and, at the end of the day, only a few items seem to carry this deep, special connection with national identity. Goalie masks, to be sure, are among such objects.

For several of my informants, moreover, the goalie mask24 constituted the par excellence expression of Canadian hockey (if anything, of the period that mask enthusiasts like to call the ‘golden era’ of hockey) – as opposed to other things like sticks or skates. It is true that most of the participants in this research had some personal attachment to goalie masks, so perhaps they were more inclined to think that way. But I believe it is no exaggeration to suggest that goalie masks have as of late come to occupy a preeminent position within the dominion of hockey motifs. The first attraction once one arrives at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, for example, consists of several windows displaying legendary goalie masks (some of which, I came to learn, are replicas). Liz Pead (2012), in addition, notes: “These days, we might argue that the goalie mask and its busy designs are the face of the team as much as the individual behind the mask” (p. 61). Some authors would go even further, claiming that the masks have almost transcended the sport of hockey, becoming a show on their own: According to Ybarra (2001), “the masks have become a spectacle” (p. B10).

This latter perspective seems reinforced by the reputation that some iconic goalie masks have been granted beyond more traditional hockey spaces. The Museum of Modern Art in New

24 Participants of course were referring here to goalie masks in their general/reified form, rather than any specific mask. 36

York, for example, holds in its collection a piece manufactured by Ernie Higgins, the visionary mask maker from Boston responsible for numerous well-known, early designs. Many storied masks have indeed become valuable pieces of art: I heard numerous rumors about collectors who were willing to pay dozens of thousands of dollars for particular items. On a more abstract level, probably the most well-known media icon when it comes to goalie masks is the character Jason Voorhees25 from the Friday the 13th (1982) movie series (the mask was introduced in the third movie of the franchise). Especially outside Canada, I cannot recall how many times I was asked about the models used in the movie upon telling to someone that I was engaged in the study of goalie masks.

To sum it up: If Nunley and McCarty (1999) are correct when they suggest that traditional indigenous masks can be understood as “faces of culture”, I believe it is fair to suggest that goalie masks have largely become the faces of the culture of hockey26.

This research was structured around two central objectives. On the one hand, my aim was to describe and situate historically, as thoroughly as I could, the processes whereby goalie masks are manufactured – in other words, how they become exchange-values. In order to accomplish this, I set myself to look at the raw materials and parts employed in the production of masks; the steps in the assembly line; and, most importantly, the social dynamics at the factory floor. As I carried out these tasks, I also tried to develop a better understanding about the workers and the conditions

25 Personally, however, my ‘favorite’ masked killer is the one featured on the Canadian comedy Bon cop, bad cop (2006), who displays a much more impressive set of iconic masks than that of Jason’s. Humor aside, it may be interesting to note that one of the mask makers that I met told me that, throughout his career, he received several invitations to produce masks for films. Theater and cinematography, of course, are fields with a much longer history in the art of mask making, in comparison to hockey. 26 This same analogy was the motto for an exhibition organized in Toronto in 1981, in which goalie masks were displayed side-by-side along historic masks produced by First Nations artists, highlighting their similarities. What follows is a fragment of the review of the exhibition that appeared in The Globe and Mail. Despite being filled with stereotypes and what today would be considered inadequate wording, the review pays a nice tribute to what was probably one of the first appearances of goalie masks in an art gallery: “Soultenders and Goaltenders, the first exhibit of National Hockey League masks, is at the McMichael Gallery in Kleinburg until mid-April. Also on display are Indian masks, since there are coincidental similarities between the NHL and the Northwest Coast Indians of last century. The ‘soultender’ dances and chants to please the spirits and protect his people now and in the afterlife. The goaltender performs his ritual for his own well-being and for the continued good fortune of his team” (Cherry, 1981, p. 15). 37

under which they work. In doing so, I hoped to address a meaningful gap in the sociology of sport, by which I mean the lack of studies dealing with the perspective of those who, in many cases, devoted their lives to the production of the commodities needed in the world of sport.

My second major objective, on the other hand, was to attempt to grasp the meanings that are typically invested in the goalie masks. Part of this objective was accomplished by focusing on the perspective of workers and mask makers, thus largely inside the factory. But I also sought to bring into the fold the understandings of some of those who experience the masks as use-values (goaltenders, for example). What I hoped with this was to uncover eventual meanings that had been empirically as well as symbolically attached to the masks, through a careful analysis of their designs, constitutive elements, and artworks that can function as projections of the identity of goaltenders.

The present inquiry also, in a way, pays homage to a disappearing Canadian tradition – the art of custom-made mask making. It has been common in the social sciences and humanities for students of the Global North to venture into the Global South, in order to carry out research. Seldom however has the opposite process taken place; but this is precisely what I attempted to do here.

1.6 An outline of the study

This dissertation is divided into four major parts. In the first of them, I seek to provide some context about the disciplinary setting in which my investigation unfolded. This includes a concise literature review on how the question of objects has been approached within the sociology of sport; an exposition of the major theoretical frameworks guiding the present study; a section on the scope, relevance, and objectives of the inquiry; and a detailed account of the research methods that I employed.

Part II is devoted to an overview of the historical and political landscapes that set the stage for the present research. It begins with an attempt to summarize the development of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada, followed by a discussion about the ways in which this branch of industry has been deeply affected by the implementation of offshoring and outsourcing

strategies. A brief historical take on the emergence of the art of goalie mask making (and how it gradually evolved into a branch of mass production) then ensues.

In literary texts as well as in Hollywood, masks are invested with ambivalent, contrasting meanings. On the one hand, they are believed to conceal the ‘real’ content of something, to cover up for what in actuality lies beneath the surface. The mask is thus interpreted as a disguise, a semblance. The verb ‘(un)masking’, for example, implies this definition. On the other hand, masks are also sometimes invoked to suggest precisely the opposite: Namely, that the ‘real’ content of something is to be found, as it were, in the proxy itself. According to this understanding, masks can reveal more about their bearers than a clean face would.

The third and fourth parts of this study are organized to metaphorically mirror this twofold conception. Part III, which comprises the bulk of this inquiry, is constructed following the Marxist prowess for de-mystification: It seeks to bring into light several dimensions of the process of production of goalie masks that are not readily within the grasp of the general public. Particular effort is invested in describing the progressive stages of the manufacturing process; in unpacking the question of how hockey is experienced by those on the factory floor; and in accounting for the contrasting paces of production that characterize the workplace where I carried out most of my fieldwork – in which both custom-made and mass-produced masks were built.

Finally, the fourth part of this inquiry entangles the viewpoints of workers, mask makers, airbrush artists, goaltenders, and mask collectors, aiming to provide an exploratory analysis of the widely different ways in which goalie masks function as tokens for individuals to express their personality, brands, and crafts. The closing portion of Part IV synthesizes the key arguments developed during the study and explores future avenues of research in the intersections of sport, physical culture, and material culture.

With the exception of Part I, I sought to avoid adopting a rigid, too conventional academic format. Most importantly, the findings of the study were not grouped in any particular section, nor were they analyzed only in isolated clusters. Rather, I tried to spread original findings throughout all of the four major parts, linking the empirical data with broader theoretical perspectives wherever I deemed it appropriate.

Chapter Two: Methodology

In the closing remarks of his analysis about the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, Bruce Kidd (1996b) writes as follows:

Students could be helped to deconstruct artifacts. They could, for example, be challenged to analyze a single item in the display in terms of the cycles of production, distribution, consumption, museum display, and discard, and through identifying the meanings attributed to it by different groups of people (p. 333).

But how to structure such a far-reaching endeavor, especially in methodological terms? What follows is an exposition of how I decided to tackle the matter. Throughout this project, I did not refrain from providing a theoretical rationale for the methods that I employed; yet, I opted to give greater emphasis to describing how I engaged with these methods in a more practical sense. Before elaborating on these methodological decisions, however, I outline some basic epistemological and ontological positions that I adhered to throughout the development of this research.

The study of commodities, from whatever angle, presupposes a particular understanding of the interplay between economic and cultural issues. On the one hand, commodities are brought into being as a response to material needs and desires. On the other, they become ‘emissaries’ of the cultural context from which they emerge. The former perspective has been widely explored in the Marxist tradition. The latter perspective has represented an axiom in the study of material culture. It appears that the bodily form of commodities can thus be more comprehensively explained if one is willing to bridge economic and cultural categories.

Let me be more specific. When goalie masks27 were introduced into the world of hockey in the late 1950s, they had been conceived to serve a very specific function: To protect the faces of goaltenders – who, up until that point, were expected to endure facial injuries on a regular basis. The goalie legend Terry Sawchuck, for example, is said to have received “as many as 600 stiches

27 The goalie mask arguably had some predecessors, with experiments dating as early as the 1930s (such as the leather mask made famous by a goalie named Clint Benedict – who was once celebrated in the artwork of a contemporary mask used by professional goalie Craig Anderson); but the fiberglass mask, largely responsible for the popularization of the item, is a product of the 1950s. The question is discussed in further detail in the following chapter. 40

in his face as well as two broken noses” (Hynes & Smith, 2008, p. 30), before finally adopting a mask protection. The introduction of the goalie mask may be thus understood, amidst other less determinant factors, as a response to what several goalies at the time experienced as a practical need. The simplistic designs of the 1950s and 1960s testify directly to the preponderance of this functional approach. To put it differently, the need/desire to avoid injuries to the face worked, in great measure, as the material basis for the proliferation of goalie masks.

However, I also suggested that commodities are embedded with cultural meanings. It is no different when it comes to goalie masks, which, as discussed in the previous chapter, are intrinsically linked to the culture of hockey in Canada. But these meanings need to be carefully contextualized, if one wishes to avoid misguided interpretations. The fact that goalie masks were introduced in the late 1950s, for example, could lead one to believe that this period was characterized by a growing sensibility towards the well-being of players in the National Hockey League (NHL). But this would be a faulty historical characterization, to say the least. Quite on the contrary, goalie masks appeared, as I illustrate in greater detail later, as the materialization of counter-hegemonic trends.

The meanings attached to sporting objects are, in essence, very fluid, and they can differ from one social setting to another. For the NHL establishment, goalie masks back then represented, by and large, a transgression from traditional values in hockey. For a number of the goalies, they were perceived as progress. The need for facial protection, which today would probably account for plain common sense, is something that the goalies had to struggle for. Interestingly enough, the desire to resolve this clash between different cultural standpoints (i.e., the emphasis on players’ safety versus the emphasis on traditional values) becomes, as well, to some measure integrated into the materiality of masks. Many of the designs prevalent at the time left the eyes of the goalie almost entirely exposed, in part because of the concerns expressed by franchise owners and coaches that the masks could hinder the ability of goalies to see the puck effectively. To some degree, then, the design of these masks may be conceived as a material expression of an emerging compromise between goalies and those running the teams.

Another curious example is the case of the ridges in the forehead of the masks. Nowadays, almost every mask model, regardless of the brand, contains a version of the ridges. Some mask makers would argue that the ridges serve to deflect the puck away from the net. Yet, I talked to an

elite mask maker who would vehemently dismiss this claim, telling me that the ridges were irrelevant in this respect. He even showed me a prototype that he was developing with a clean, rounded forehead. He seemed to believe that such a model had the potential to sit better on the head of the goaltender, given how difficult it can be to make the protective foam adjust to the cavities generated by the ridges in the internal part of the masks.

Despite the fact that this particular mask maker did not see any practical purpose in the ridges, all of the commercial models that he produced had them. The ridges, so he claimed, help to attach an intimidating character to the mask. I met several goalies – both at the professional and amateur levels – who expressed a similar point of view, asking the mask maker, for example, if it was possible to sharpen the angle of the ridges in order to make a custom-made mask look more ‘aggressive’. The ridges are thus connected to the broader culture of symbolic and physical violence that still thrives in ice hockey – beyond any functional properties that they can also be thought to have.

To be sure, kinesiology departments currently experience no shortage of capable lab- oriented colleagues who would be eager to run many experiments, eventually reaching a statistically grounded answer with respect to the effectiveness of the ridges. Yet, such explanations would carry only limited interest insofar as the social world is concerned, for beliefs and cultural meanings are not necessarily aligned with what can be empirically measured. What seems to be far more relevant in this context is that a comprehensive rationale for the emergence of even apparently trivial details like the ridges in a goalie mask cannot be articulated with reference to the functional or the symbolic properties of the ridges alone. Such a rationale is only possible if one is willing to consider how these different determinants interact, in an ongoing process of mutual constitution. As Marx (1973) frames it in the Grundrisse, “The concrete is concrete because it is the concentration of many determinations, hence unity of the diverse” (p. 101).

Thus, a methodological framework is needed that would enable the researcher to unpack the ways in which material and symbolic elements are interwoven in the matters pertaining to the making and meaning of goalie masks. These synthetic, open-ended movements that the researcher seeks to apprehend, however, cannot be characterized in a fashion that reduces them to a smooth convergence of complementary, diametrical parts; rather, what should be highlighted are the tensions and irreconcilable contradictions that tend to underpin them. It is in this light that the

present study aims to follow what conventionally has been called a ‘dialectical approach’. To borrow a characterization from Fredric Jameson (2009), the task at hand here is to deal with “a historically unique phenomenon in which a unity-and-difference of the ideal and the material only becomes visible through a dialectical lens” (p. 137).

Now, to do so in practice tends to be far more complicated than it appears in theory. Goalie masks, based on this line of reasoning, should be understood as the outcome of the interplay between material and ideological determinants. But it is not only the object of study that needs to be conceived in dialectical terms. According to many of the proponents of this approach, the processes of investigation and knowledge construction28, too, are expected to unfold in tandem with a dialectical perspective:

Dialectical rationality is concrete in the sense that it is nothing more than its actual functioning in the world of actual entities. It is a method of knowing, where by knowing, we understand the grasping of intelligible structures in their intelligibility. In these terms we comprehend dialectical rationality as comprehensive: it must not only know objects but must, in the same act, constitute its own criteria for the (dialectical) truth of its assertions about these objects. Dialectical knowledge of objects is inextricable from knowledge of dialectical knowledge and both are necessary movements in a synthetic process which we call ‘the dialectic’. But the dialectic is not only an epistemological principle, a principle of knowing about knowing, but also an ontological principle, a principle about knowing about being. There is a certain sector of reality, a whole group of actual entities, which we know and in which there is a movement which is dialectic. Dialectic then is both a method of knowing and a movement in the object known. This movement is not the inert process studied by natural scientific disciplines but praxis (Cooper, 1965, p. 66).

At every stage of this research, I was confronted with the need to navigate apparently irreconcilable notions: The material and the symbolic, the singular and the general, the craftwork and the mass-produced, to name a few. In the ensuing exposition, I chose to speak about goalie masks in the different ways in which they present themselves, alongside the different ways in which social actors make sense of them. I did so, above everything else, in the hopes of moving

28 In the preface to the second (German) edition of Capital (1974), Marx accounts for this question in the following fashion: “Of course the method of presentation must differ in form from that of inquiry. The latter has to appropriate the material in detail, to analyze its different forms of development, to trace out their inner connection. Only after this work is done, can the actual movement be adequately described” (p. 19).

towards the generation of syntheses that, however incomplete, are able to connect and articulate different dimensions of the objects in question, hinting at their multiplicity. Goalie masks, in this study, are portrayed as the multi-faceted outcomes of an ongoing movement that cannot be fully apprehended through the analysis of any of its component parts in isolation.

In order to pursue the empirical materials needed for such endeavor, I engaged with a number of different methods. For the historical portion of this research, I relied heavily on documental sources, such as historic newspapers; databases with information and reports about publicly listed companies and the evolution of stock prices (namely Mergent and Factiva); old sales catalogues; and governmental/corporate reports. I supplemented these findings with bits and pieces of oral history, since many of the participants in this study had been involved in the hockey manufacturing industry for quite some time. The bulk of my findings, however, were obtained through participant observations and (object-based) interviews. In the sections that follow, I will discuss these methods and how I chose to deploy them. But not before articulating, with greater clarity, my positionality as a researcher.

2.1 Doing research in Canada as an outsider

It is today a standard practice in the social sciences and humanities to encourage researchers to become more self-reflexive about their positionality in relation to the matters that they have chosen to investigate. This is particularly important for those scholars who opted to engage with groups or populations that have been historically marginalized. Social relations, as the argument goes, are permeated by intersecting power relations – gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, social class, level of education, etc. The greater the ‘identity gap’ between researchers and participants, the more carefully the former are expected to navigate such differences. Of course, in its extreme formulations, this argument engenders a paralyzing effect: The authority of the researcher to articulate claims on behalf of other individuals and groups is undermined to the extent that the endeavor becomes, as some scholars have put it, almost “apologetic” (Caughey, 2006). My dialectical take on this matter was, in essence, to be as mindful as possible about the social and

cultural gaps I could identify, yet remaining hopeful about the possibility of moving emphatically closer to others29, regardless of hierarchical distances.

Of course, I could have approached the manufacture of hockey equipment – and, in particular, of goalie masks – from several different angles. Yet my methodological decision was to explore it through a more ‘grounded’ standpoint. This was motivated, chiefly, by my desire to grasp the minutiae of things, to penetrate into what I perceived to be ‘the belly of the beast’. I wanted my exploration of the hockey manufacturing industry to be as visceral as most players seem to experience the engagement in the game. But this also meant that I would have to endure all the awkwardness and discomfort associated with stumbling into an entirely new social setting for the first time (Hume & Mulcock, 2004).

My inherent detachment from the group of people that I was willing to study became pronounced especially in two ways: First, I was not from Canada and, second, I did not come from the ranks of the working classes. Whereas I could argue that I did have at least some familiarity with the opaque life of being a white-collar wage-laborer, truth is I knew very little about the industrial proletariat. I had never personally experienced how it feels like to work on an assembly line nor spoken with workers at length about their hopes and frustrations. Up until my entry into the factory floor, not unlike several other Marxists in academia, I was usually disproportionally concerned about the things that the working class could have accomplished, rather than with the lives that the workers were actually living. I learned a fair amount through my clashes with what Paul Willis (1981) renders as “working class ethos” – not only in coming to terms with my illiteracy with respect to the everyday life in the factory floor, but also in terms of getting to know more about the personal beliefs and political themes that the workers held dear; the activities that they liked to engage in during their free time; how they made sense of the development of their careers; the cultural references that they evoked; and the games/sports that they liked to play.

29 As Hollan and Throop (2011) contend, “through empathy, we gain a first-person perspective on another’s thoughts and feelings, as if we were experiencing and understanding the world from his or her vantage point. And yet the exact means through which this simulation of the other’s perspective is achieved, and the extent to which it can be achieved, remains controversial” (p. 3). 45

One of the most marked cultural tensions between the workers and myself concerned, moreover, our implicit views on the question of manual labour. Throughout the period that I carried out observations on the factory floor, they always showed great respect for higher education, even if none of them – with exception of the owner of the shop – had the opportunity to go to college. And yet they struggled endlessly with the idea that, as a researcher, I could be genuinely interested in what they were doing. Although they would listen carefully to my reasoning, the workers seemed unable to wash away the feeling that I was simply wasting my time, that none of that stuff could serve as the basis for rigorous academic work. In sum: They constantly dismissed the everyday life in the factory floor as uninteresting. After a couple of months, as they grew fond of me and became more preoccupied with the development of my work, things began to change: The workers started, for example, to call me every time that they were doing something unusual so I could take a look on it, or to sleep on some of my questions if they believed that they did not respond to them thoroughly enough, providing me with a more elaborate answer the next day. They still did not consider their daily routine a topic worth exploring, but at least they were willing to trust my judgment and collaborate more actively.

As I indicated above, however, my different class background was not the only way in which I was an ‘outsider’ to the workers, as well as to the other participants that I have interviewed (such as small businesses owners and mask collectors): I was also a citizen from a country where hockey is scarcely known. At first, I felt really uncomfortable to be working under such circumstances, most notably because I was talking to people for whom the links between hockey and Canadian national identity were often very dear. Fundamentally, I was afraid that my initial lack of knowledge about the subject-matter would undermine my credibility as a researcher. Later, however, I realized that most participants were actually quite thrilled to encounter someone from Brazil so interested in goalie masks. Perhaps because I have never tried to conceal my relative ignorance about hockey-related matters, they would make a significant effort to explain to me every minor detail about the topics that we were discussing, as well as about the objects that we were handling.

Still, I am aware that I missed a fair amount of what was going on for not having grown up in the culture of hockey. Whenever one has not been thoroughly socialized into a particular sporting culture, it becomes very difficult to follow the references to historic figures and events,

not to mention my struggles in acquiring the appropriate ‘lingo’ of the sport30. Most of the times, I tried to look into names that recurrently popped up in conversations; but sometimes I did not have the opportunity to meet the participants again so I could ask follow up questions or clarify issues.

Yet, one important thing that I came to learn, as my research unfolded, is that even some die-hard hockey fans were fairly unaware about the names of, for example, storied mask makers. Indeed, equipment visionaries are, in many senses, unsung heroes of hockey – not a single one of them has been formally honored in the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto specifically for their contributions to the development of the game. There are of course several members the Hall who also happen to be widely celebrated for having made important contributions to the advancement of hockey equipment – such as Jacques Plante or Ken Dryden, for example. But none of these members are featured in the hall for their achievements as inventors or manufacturers, but rather for what they did as players. Even the likes of Jack Cooper and George Tackaberry (the founders of the hockey companies Cooper and CCM) are absent in the list of honored members. Provided that the hall also includes owners and administrators (a category titled, to further enhance the irony, “builders”), I would frame this omission as yet another glaring example of the ideological split between the field of production and the playing field in ice hockey.

The permanent exhibition of the Hall, in addition, only features the biography of a few mask makers. I say so only to highlight that the cultural formation that I chose to study, which largely revolved around the manufacture of goalie masks, was also generally unknown to most Canadians. The recognition of the specificity of this subject matter helped me cope much better with my previous lack of knowledge about it. At the end of the day, I think that my national background hindered my ability to connect with participants at some levels, but it also opened up some possibilities that might not have been available otherwise.

30 Andrei Markovits and Lars Rensmann (2010), for example, note that: “‘Pitch’ means nothing to an American in terms of referring to a ‘field’ but quite a lot as an integral part of baseball. Any insider perceives any erring in the proper usage of the language as a tell-tale sign of an outsider’s ignorance or worse” (p. 23). The same authors later add: “Just as mastery of a language leads to its enjoyment and experience as an aesthetic pleasure, the very same pertains to the one who has mastered a sports language and follows it to its highest level” (p. 46). 47

The world of goalie masks, at least as I experienced it, is largely a masculine preserve. All mask makers that I have knowledge of, including in historical terms, are males. The same holds true for all the workers in the factory where I did my observations and for all the mask collectors that I spoke to. As an exception to this trend, there are a few women who work as airbrush artists. During my research, I had the opportunity to interview a couple of female goalies, as well as to occasionally exchange some ideas with the spouses of mask collectors and mask makers. For the greatest part, however, my research unfolded around men. Similarly, most participants in this study were white, English-speaking Canadian individuals. In these respects, being a white male turned out to be, in my perception, quite enabling, especially given the culture of working class masculinity that pervaded many of these social settings.

2.2 Challenges in entering the factory floor

Commodities, as I discussed at greater length in the previous chapter, are everywhere to be seen. In this day and age, they have become an integral part of the everyday life of most people. Yet, those who routinely consume these products rarely know much about the circumstances under which they were manufactured (Debord, 1983). What may perhaps be best described a collective familiarity/proximity with commodities does not entail, necessarily, a familiarity/proximity with the contexts from where they come from. In short: The production of commodities tends to be, in a significant measure, enveloped in obscurity and secrecy.

But why this is so? There are, in effect, quite a number of reasons, other than the basic fact that there seem to be simply too many of them for anyone to keep constant track. To begin with, industrial activity is frequently associated with the degradation of the environment. Not surprisingly, therefore, industrial areas have, over the course of the twentieth century, first been pushed to the margins of major urban centers and, later, overseas. Industrial zones are, to put it simply, geographically detached from the lives of most individuals. Second, in line with what was indicated earlier, factories are seldom the healthiest environments – even where strict labour regulations are fully implemented. And there is also a third, quite important issue, which concerns the attempt to protect innovative designs and production techniques from competing business.

The latter is the one that impacted my entry into the factory floor more decisively. From the very outset of my research, I knew that gaining access to the everyday life in the factory was not going to be easy. In effect, my desire to study the production of hockey equipment was generally received, upon the initial contact with potential participants, with some suspicion. Several of the individuals that I reached out to never returned my calls and messages. Even the ones who agreed to take part in this research did so, at first, hesitantly – if not skeptical about my intents.

I am aware that almost every ethnographical enterprise is plagued by similar difficulties. What seems peculiar about entering a workplace, however, is how surprisingly intimate these spaces can be. Of course, anyone can visit a mask factory as an outsider, as someone who is just stopping by to pick up a mask or replace a bent cage. But the very same place, as I came to learn, would appear entirely different if seen from the ‘inside’. Small businesses such as the one that set the stage for my research can be very personal. Individuals often invested a lot of work, money, and dedication in putting these businesses together. The livelihood of both owners and workers is at stake in these settings. As I observed in some of my interviews, owners tend confuse their own personal trajectory with that of their businesses. In the factory where I conducted my fieldwork, moreover, the owner would constantly refer to the other workers as ‘family’. Why, then, would any established entrepreneur allow a complete stranger to venture into such a personal space, particularly without deriving any concrete benefits? I do not possess an answer to this query, but after some months of conversations and meetings I was able to find someone gracious enough to agree to do so. I am profoundly grateful for the trust, hospitality, and generosity with which I have been treated by everyone in the factory ever since.

Similarly, one should take into account the fact that a factory environment is usually a dangerous setting. Large machines and tools are constantly operating at full capacity. All of the workers with whom I shared my days in the factory floor had experienced, at some point during their careers, some kind of accident in which they almost got seriously injured or even lost a part of their bodies (usually the fingers). Dealing with toxic materials, like fiberglass or liquid hardener, is also an endeavor to be undertaken carefully. Here, again, I must thank the patience, advice, and care that I earned from my informants while learning how to navigate the factory space and the tools/machines therein.

Somewhat predictably, during my first couple of days in the factory floor, I was treated with a lot of reservation – if not with some coldness. But the issue that caught my attention the most was how many times in this short time-span I was told stories about individuals who managed to infiltrate mask factories in order to steal some secret concerning how they are built. Several of these stories were quite funny, having to do with poorly disguised mask enthusiasts that did not pose any real danger to the business; but a few of these accounts were pretty intense, relating to issues like the rightful ownership of patents and so forth. I was expressly told, in addition, not to take any pictures or videos of the process of production. At these early stages of the fieldwork, I also noticed that my interlocutors would often cut their sentences short or intentionally contradict some of their previous claims when speaking about things like the quality and quantity of certain materials, for example.

As for my part, I tried my best to play along, listening to the stories carefully, as if they had nothing to do with my presence there. For a little while, I was genuinely unsure about why they kept telling me those very similar stories, since I believed my academic credentials would grant me a free pass on these more, so to speak, business-related suspicions. Until one day they gathered to tell me a story about an impostor who actually pretended to be carrying out some kind of research. Weird times, those first days in the factory floor, but I guess it could not have been otherwise. Ultimately, I think, it was my Brazilian background that helped them wash away these concerns relatively quickly. I suspect they realized that I was so much behind in my knowledge of goalie masks that I simply could not represent a real threat.

2.3 Participant observation

The method of participant observation is well established, especially in the anthropological and sociological traditions. It has, too, a rich history within the sociology of sport, although this method seems to have lost some of its appeal in recent years, particularly in face of the growth of media studies and questionnaire/interview-based inquiries. A great deal of the argumentation concerning the methodological approaches favored in the burgeoning field of Physical Cultural Studies has been formulated precisely as an attempt to reassert the relevance of ‘embodied’ modes

of inquiry in the study of sport and physical culture (e.g., Giardina & Newman, 2011). The present research is, to a substantial extent, aligned with these calls.

Yet, my decision to pursue a more ‘grounded’ account of the hockey manufacturing industry entailed important consequences. First and foremost, it meant that most of my findings were obtained from a single location. The ‘microscopic’ nature of the enterprise – to use an expression employed by Clifford Geertz (1973) – called for an excess of caution when it comes to drawing inferences about the industry as a whole. Thus, even when only goalie masks were at stake, I needed to keep in mind that what I witnessed at first hand was only a small portion of a much broader totality, scattered across a number of different provinces and even countries.

It is true that several of the scholars from whom I borrowed to structure my inquiry along similar methodological lines have been less shy in terms of generalizing and comparing their findings across different labouring contexts (e.g., Burawoy, 1985; Aronowitz, 2014). But these generalizations and comparisons have usually been anchored upon the work of a lifetime, often supported by a collection of case studies. To be frank, I always tended to praise their effort to do so – after all, this seems to hint at the very substance of what C. Wright Mills (2000) famously called the ‘sociological imagination’ – in this specific case, the ability to connect the personal troubles arising from the immediate milieu of the everyday experience of the labour process with public issues that pervade the broader structural order. In my own research, I tried to be very cautious when attempting such connections, not because I deemed them unimportant, but because of the perils that they involved. The findings that I derived from the participant observation are therefore heavily descriptive and context-sensitive; unless otherwise stated, they intend not to be representative of the goalie mask industry in general. Following Geertz (1973), I sought to work under the assumption that “Ethnographic findings are not privileged, just particular: another country heard from” (p. 23).

To put it in very broad terms, the method of participant observation consists in merging oneself into a particular setting, seeking to draw inferences, along the process, about the cultural, social, and political landscapes in which one is immersed. These inferences may spring, among other things, “from what people say, from the way they act, and from the artifacts they use” (Spradley, 2016, p. 10). In methodological readers, scholars have sought to classify participant observations into different types, usually taking into account the degree to which the researcher is

able to mingle with participants and how thoroughly he or she becomes integrated into the activities being performed by the group of people under study. Since, in my opinion, these definitions – albeit useful in conceptual terms – tend to do little justice to the fluidity of the fieldwork, I will seek to describe my involvement in the factory floor in a less fixed, clearly delimited manner.

For a period of slightly over six months (from mid-September/2015 to mid-March/2016), I joined the working routine of a factory in which goalie masks were produced, on average three times a week (adding up to 68 visits, according to my notebooks), in order to carry out participant observations. On occasions, I also met some of the workers for informal gatherings, leisure trips, and in order to attend mask-related events.

Most of the times, I would arrive at the factory late in the morning, and stay there until the end of the working day. Only few times, towards the end of my fieldwork, was I able to spend a whole working day at the factory floor. When I was negotiating the conditions of my entry as a researcher in the mask factory – which I will henceforth refer to by the pseudonym Masks Co. – I agreed with the owner of the business that I would not be there for the entire working day, since he feared my presence could disrupt the flow of the production line. This was indeed one aspect of my fieldwork with respect to which I had to exercise a great deal of sensibility. Far too often, the workers would stop what they were doing and get carried away telling me some sort of story or answering one of my queries, no matter how hard I tried to cut them short, particularly if I had noticed that they were being observed. After some time, I realized that if I was also engaged in some kind of productive task while chatting, they were less likely to put their own stuff on hold – a technique that I much preferred, since it allowed me to collect information while also keeping them away from trouble, and which I sought to perfect during my stay in the factory floor.

Three days a week may not seem too overwhelming when compared to a full regular working week, but to me this was a quite intense and demanding period of time. In total, I spent roughly 400 hours in the factory floor, not to mention the few hours of daily commuting (which at least granted me some insight about the geographical region where Masks Co. was located). Sometimes, I felt as if I had been split in three, managing at the same time my obligations at the university, my expectations and insecurities with the development of the ethnographical enterprise, and my investment in learning manual duties that were, up until that point, almost entirely

unfamiliar to me. During my first two months in the factory, I remained a more passive observer, although I would occasionally be invited to feel the touch of a particular material or to help with some minor procedure, such as measuring the exact spot where the eyeholes of a given custom- made mask had to be cut or hand-sanding a particular rough spot. From the end of the second month onwards, however, I started to help with the assemblage of the masks on a regular basis – adding the cages, protective foam, stickers, etc.

Having been physically active during most of my life, I rarely found myself in situations where I felt I was not skilled or fit enough to perform a straightforward physical task. On the contrary, I always loved to experiment with new sports and physical activities. But to engage with manual labour was in many senses frustrating, because it demanded a lot of strength from certain parts of my body that were simply untrained (like the tip of the fingers), in conjunction with some tacit knowledge about the properties of the materials and the functioning of the tools, which I also lacked. My lack of familiarity with the instruments commonly used in an industrial setting was indeed one of the dominant themes during my first few weeks in the factory floor – almost every day one of the workers would take some time to explain to me how they employed a particular appliance. For a significant period of time, at the end of almost every day I had to ask my working fellows to check the goalie masks that I had finished, only to learn with some dismay that something could have been done more thoroughly (to be frank, on a few occasions I felt that they were over-emphasizing certain irrelevant things just to reassert some authority over the task at hand, which they were hesitant to see an outsider performing just as well).

In addition to the owner of the shop, Bernie, who would split his time between administrative tasks and the factory floor, Masks Co. employed four individuals – Martin, Glenn, Gerry, and Carey31. Each of them, as I discuss more thoroughly in Part III, was responsible for one specific stage in the process of mass production. There was another member of the team, Pelle, who would come to the factory only a few times a week, for he was sometimes commissioned to build custom-made masks, a task that Bernie would also often undertake on his own. On occasions,

31 Insofar as research participants are concerned, all the names that appear throughout this study are pseudonyms. 53

I will refer to these two as mask makers (so as to highlight the specificities of tasks that they performed, as opposed to the remainder of the workers).

During my observations, I tried to focus, more thoroughly, on the ways in which these workers and mask makers handled, interacted, and made sense of the commodities that they were producing. Most of the times, I did so from a certain distance, careful not to disturb the flow of the line of production (with exception of Carey, whom I observed more closely, since we shared a room). But at least once a day I would seek an opportunity to approach each of them individually32, especially if the workers were catching a lunch or cigarette break, in order to ask them more directly about things like a particular technique that I saw them employing; the materials that they were using; or what models of masks would come out of the shells that they were building.

Of course, our conversations often veered in more traditional directions, like their political views or the different jobs that they had throughout their lives, if not simply chatting about generalities. I also asked them frequently about hockey and their opinions about the performance of goaltenders, in particular – but, as I will explain later, this was not a topic in which they were significantly interested. At various opportunities, we discussed the details of iconic, well-known mask designs (especially in conversations with the mask makers, Bernie and Pelle); but we would also sometimes examined the characteristics of the models being manufactured at Masks Co.

These conversations were instrumental in allowing me to develop a better understanding of how the workers perceived their roles within the assembly line – or, perhaps more accurately, how they would like their roles to be perceived. Some of them would claim, for example, responsibility for having helped to solve a particular technical issue (like determining the more stable spot to place the hole for a screw); thus representing their contribution to the making of the goalie masks in manners that often transcended the unreflective engagement with labour that,

32 It is interesting to note, in retrospect, how this particular process unfolded. Every time I went to the factory, I tried to approach each of the workers individually, at least for a quick conversation. In the beginning, I could tell that they were feeling a little uncomfortable, as well as anyone would probably do while being observed at work. As soon as the habit was established, however, they would joke about being upset if, for a reason or another, I had to skip pausing at one of their individual working stations in a given day. 54

according to scholars such as Harry Braverman (1998), is typically associated with the maintenance of the steady flow of the assembly line.

Following Hoskins (1998), I sought to explore the view that, through the stories that they tell, informants tend to “reveal part of themselves attached to the biography of an object, elaborating its history and its characteristics in order to better understand their own needs and desires” (p. 21). Every now and then, moreover, the workers would approach me to amend some of the responses that they had previously given to me, or to clarify their positions on certain matters. In some respects, I think that my presence in the factory was a source of distraction and amusement to them. Three of the employees had worked at Masks Co. for over a decade and this was the first time that they had a foreign visitor hanging around. They would often, as well, ask me things about Brazil, especially with regards to the weather, geography, and clichés about women.

During my period at Masks Co., I filled several notebooks with my impressions of what was taking place there. However, I refrained from using audio or video devices to record the conversations that I held with the employees of the factory. This was an express request from Bernie, who seemed really preoccupied that the workers could misrepresent some information about the business on tape, especially with respect to financial matters. As far as I could tell, this appeared not to be a matter of censorship – he emphasized to me on several occasions that I could talk to whomever I deemed appropriate and about whatever topics I saw fit; yet, if the conversation was being recorded through electronic devices, he wanted to be the sole spokesperson for the business.

I struggled quite a bit with how to handle this situation as a researcher – on the one hand, it was paramount for me to preserve Bernie´s trust; on the other hand, I wanted all stakeholders to be able to voice their perspectives. Ultimately, I decided that I would not risk my access to the factory floor, trying instead to obtain as much data as I could from more organic, daily exchanges. Of course, I was careful to follow the appropriate research ethics guidelines at all times, securing oral and written consent from the parties involved.

By using the term ‘organic’, I intend to suggest that these conversations were not undertaken entirely at random. Sometimes, I would ‘schedule’ these talks in advance, asking a

particular worker, for example, whether I could spend some time learning his part of the productive process next time I was around. These exchanges were not, in addition, unstructured: I had a subset of questions that I wanted to go through with every single person working there, which I kept updating as time progressed. This also turned out to be a very good strategy in terms of enabling follow-up questions, which I would often ask only after a couple of days. I referred to these as ‘organic’ conversations in the sense that they did not follow a more rigid interview format with respect to the location in which they were undertaken, the varying duration of the exchanges, and how I registered them.

As a result of this approach, I ended up with lengthy scribbles in which I sought to reproduce relevant sections of these conversations. However, for obvious reasons, I was unable to preserve, at all times, the exact wording employed by the workers at Masks Co. I tried my best to be entirely faithful to the content of what, in my interpretation, they were trying to express. But most of the quotes that I used on Part II are paraphrases or syntheses of what the workers said, rather than transcriptions of their words verbatim.

I am conscious of the fact that I in this study I am roaming in the terrain of interpretative sociology, where even the most ordinary tasks, such as picking and choosing from the raw data, imply a fair deal of partiality on behalf of the researcher. Nonetheless, I believe it is important to indicate to the reader that I was compelled to play a greater role than researchers usually do in serving as a mediator between, on the one hand, what was being voiced by the participants and, on the other, what is ultimately presented as a significant portion of the empirical data in the ensuing exposition.

Similarly, part of my original agreement with Bernie demanded that I would not take any pictures or video footages from the inner part of the factory – as I suggested earlier, there tends to be a serious concern with secrecy in industrial settings. At first, I was somewhat disappointed with this limitation, considering how interested I was at the time in exploring the possibility of engaging with alternative, embodied methodologies (particularly film and re-enactions). Indeed, “if we only have methods that allow for verbal articulations of things”, as Woodward (2016) notes, “things which cannot be verbalised will be ‘absented’” (p. 363).

With the progress of my fieldwork, however, I realized that the use of visual methods in the study of goalie masks would have been, in any case, far trickier than I could have initially anticipated. This seems particularly true if one is dealing, as I was, with the field of production. For the specialist, minor, almost imperceptible details in a goalie mask – such as the shape in which the air holes are cut or the thickness of the lower part of the chin – can reveal the company in which the item was manufactured. Throughout this research, I was fully committed to the task of concealing as carefully as I could the identity of the participants that I engaged with. In this sense, the resort to visual methods would have posed considerable difficulties, especially if objects were to be featured in the pictures. In any case, the one thing I regret not having been able to accomplish is the use of film to account for the different paces of production that co-existed inside the factory that I studied, where the workers were usually invested in more rapid and mechanical tasks, while the mask makers could devote far more time to the custom-made products – a marked contrast that I struggled to fully translate into words.

Yet, I do not want to sound apologetic. I am talking about this because methods, as scholars carrying out fieldwork tend to know very well, imply decisions, which ultimately result in tackling the phenomena from a particular angle, in detriment of others. Such absences are, in essence, necessary, but the inquiry process seems to be greatly enhanced when the researcher seeks to navigate these limitations with as much awareness as possible.

Whatever the methods employed, representing the ‘totality’ of what goes on inside a mask factory is a significant challenge. During the period that I stayed in the factory floor, I borrowed heavily from a small, relatively unknown piece by Walter Benjamin, written for a radio presentation. In this piece, he seeks to carry the audience through the functioning of a brass manufacturing plant. According to his take, the most fundamental difficulties in accounting for the dynamics of the factory floor are not related to what is readily visible, but for what lies beneath the surface. Even the observer, who stands directly in front of a line of production, so Benjamin (2014) argues, is able to grasp very little about its inner workings:

One can really describe only the smallest part of all that meets the eye there. The writer or poet has yet to be born who is capable of describing a three-high rolling mill or a rolling shear or an extrusion press or a high performance cold rolling mill so that others can imagine them. An engineer could hardly do that. […] But what of the observer? I mean, for instance, what if one of you went to the Hirsch- Kupfer Brass Works near Eberswalde, and walked from one of those machines

with the almost unpronounceable names to the next? What would you see? Very simple: just about as much as I can describe here with words. That is: next to nothing. And what would be the point of describing such a machine purely by its appearance? It is not made to be looked at, unless perhaps by someone who has first grasped its structure, its functional performance, its purpose. […] One can only correctly comprehend something from the outside if one knows it from the inside; this is true for machines just as it is for living things (p. 70).

A few paragraphs later, Benjamin (2014) makes a similar point, stressing even more sharply the challenges of penetrating the realm of appearances in the factory context:

Let´s assume you are standing in one of the giant halls: it would be fascinating to see how the mixture that is melted to brass is poured into the ovens, how the brass plate comes out of the ovens, how the fat, short metal plates go into the rolling mill and come out the other end all thin and long, how the short, round cylindrical rods get pushed automatically into the pressing mill and appear again as long, delicate, narrow tubes. You would see all that. But you would not see how it was done, and what with the deafening racket of the machines at work, the rolling cranes, the dropping of loads, no one could explain that to you either (p. 70-71).

Throughout my days in the factory floor, I experienced, frequently with renewed intensity, the same bewilderment and awe that Benjamin attributes to the casual observer who is entering such a setting for the first time. The line of production, as I came to learn, constantly presents itself in a new light. Of course, the more time I spent with the workers, the clearer I was able to account for its general movement. Contrary to what is commonly believed, however, the line of production rarely flows undisturbed. Almost on a daily basis, something unexpected would take place: One day, the cages were not shiny enough, so Carey would have to stop his regular tasks to polish a number of them. Sometimes, the paint would not sit well on some spots, or some minor crack would appear on the surface of a mask, forcing Glenn to re-sand and Gerry to repaint them. In summary, the general direction of the line of production often backtracks, adding unexpected ramifications to it.

At Masks Co., the assembly line was therefore comprised by steps that necessarily needed to be undertaken and steps that were only occasionally performed, if some product or part did not seem to be meeting the expected standards of quality. Adding to the complexity of the task of apprehending the general dynamics of the factory floor, there were numerous apparently autonomous areas that needed to be conceptually integrated, so that a general overview of the factory’s functioning could emerge. These included, for example, the acquisition of the materials and tools necessary; the concatenation of the steps and techniques of production; the relationships

between the workers and management; the establishment of appropriate margins of profits; the calculation of wages; the transportation of finished products; the negotiation and contractual obligations with the established channels of distribution; and the consumer service, to name a number of them.

In essence, these thoroughly different processes and attributions – amongst others – come together in the context of a factory. They may be understood as a totality, which becomes in some sense materialized in the finished commodity. But how to make sense of this totality, if not by the analysis of its individual components and the ways in which they seem to be connected? Benjamin (2014) frames the endeavor as follows:

Thus one can say that the closer one wants to get to what is going on in such an immense plant – should one witness such an operation some day – and the more one longs to understand a little bit of it, the further one has to distance oneself from it. And we should think of our few minutes here on the radio as if they were the gondola of a tethered balloon from which we can see into the whole operation down there in the Hirsch-Kupfer Brass Works, and can single out the points that must first be grasped in order to master the whole. Even then it will be difficult enough for us. For are there not many such crucial points? (p. 71).

There were, in effect, far too many of such crucial points – even taking into consideration only the manufacturing side, in a much smaller factory like Masks Co. Throughout my participant observation, I sought to unpack the different stages of the production of goalie masks, visiting every station of the manufacturing process, researching about the different materials, talking to every single person involved in their manufacture and shipment. The synthesis that I offer in Chapter Five intends in no way to be exhaustive; rather, it consists simply of a careful attempt to capture the entangled dynamics that tend to be at stake in the mass production of a goalie mask – how, in my understanding, an ongoing movement towards totalization emerges from the combination of single, individual moments. Unlike Benjamin’s metaphor, I obviously did not do it from a hot air balloon. But towards the end of most afternoons that I worked in and observed Masks Co., I climbed the long stairwell that leads to the mezzanine of the factory, where I sat for a moment in order to write down my observation notes while they were still fresh. From there, I

could oversee the entire main hall, thus enabling me to ‘map’ the division of labour and the general flow of the productive process in that particular setting33.

If, after having spent six months directly engaged in the everyday life of Masks Co., I were asked to provide a piece of advice for someone just entering the field, I would probably stick to a passage of Benjamin’s piece that I reproduced by hand on the back of the cover page of every single one of the notebooks that I filled throughout this research. This is a passage that I used to read quietly to myself, time and again, at every corner that fieldwork appeared too demanding or intimidating – I enjoyed to do so especially before jumping on the train for another day in the factory floor. It goes like this:

If you ever have the opportunity to see this Brass Works or a similar gigantic enterprise, then you must first have a good night’s sleep, keep your eyes open and, especially, have no fear. That is necessary because otherwise you would stumble over the tracks and workpieces that cover the floor of the hall; you would have no eye for the work and instead would constantly look up in case one of the ton blocks, which are being swung through the air by cranes, was about to fall on your head; you would see only an impenetrable linkage, a network that seems to flicker, and not the clear, sharp division of the hall, where every worker has his specific place and every machine has, in a way, it’s own small office (Benjamin, 2014, p. 75).

2.4 Semi-structured and object-based interviews

In addition to the data gathered from my engagement with the six fellows with whom I shared my days at Masks Co., I conducted semi-structured interviews with eleven other individuals. In total, therefore, there were seventeen participants in this research. Fifteen of them were men and only two were women. The world of goalie masks, as I indicated above, in largely

33 This same stairwell is also the source of one of the fondest memories that I have from my experience at Masks Co. In response to a note that I sent Bernie expressing my gratitude for his willingness to allow me to carry out my research in his factory, he wrote me as follows: “We miss you here too man, it just doesn't feel the same without you sitting on the stairs in the back with your notepad and pen”. If there is an important, more practical methodological lesson that I learned throughout this research, it is that the success of fieldwork depends largely on being able to connect with people – sometimes members of communities that one would probably never come into extensive contact with, if not by deliberately pushing oneself out of the ‘comfort zone’. I am honored to have developed several friendship ties that have outlived the research process itself. 60

a white male preserve, both in Canada and in the United States. This was, to a significant extent, reflected in the demographics of the study. I engendered deliberate efforts to include the perspective of at least a few women. I was not able to succeed in doing the same, when it comes to including some diversity in terms of racial and ethnical backgrounds: There were no participants from visible minorities. All participants were adults, ranging from 21 to 56 years of age, and were drafted through convenience sampling strategies, as well as based on an initial, tentative mapping of the manufacturers of hockey equipment located in Ontario.

When it comes to class background, slightly over half of the participants in this study (including the employees from Masks Co.) came from the ranks of the industrial proletariat. Some of the (low-profile) mask collectors and amateur mask makers that I spoke to also made a living through permanent positions in industrial workplaces. As for the remainder of the participants, they had widely different professions: Business owners (all of these, it should be noted, claimed to have working-class parents); amateur (including students) and professional goaltenders; and also some individuals who worked full-time in white-collar jobs and in the services sector.

I arranged the participants with whom I carried semi-structured interviews in the following categories: Four amateur or professional mask makers; three current or former small business owners, whose companies pertained to the hockey manufacturing industry; four current or former goalies who played at an elite level at some point of their careers; three mask collectors; and two airbrush artists. The numbers compiled here surpass the total amount of participants indicated two paragraphs earlier because some of the individuals that I interviewed fit in more than one category. For example, I talked to mask makers who also had some experience as airbrush artists, and with business owners who were also former elite goalies. I grouped participants in such a fashion simply to clarify the number of different perspectives supporting my claims with respect to each of these themes.

The process of interviewing research participants represents, without question, one of most traditional methods of data collection in the social sciences. The semi-structured interview is amongst the more established formats that this process can take. I chose to conceive, organize, and conduct my interviews according to this general format, chiefly, because of how it is arguably “sufficiently structured to address specific topics related to the phenomenon of study, while leaving space for participants to offer new meanings to the study focus” (p. 24). Later, I decided

to incorporate an extra feature to this approach (to bring to the interviews the goalie masks themselves), as I will explain subsequently.

The findings that I derived from the interview process were particularly important to substantiate Part II and Part IV of this study. Part II deals, among other things, with the rise and decline of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada, as well as with the introduction of goalie masks into the world of hockey. In this sense, participants who had been long involved in this industry – and thus who lived through many of these transformations – provided interesting insights, although their political interpretation of such matters frequently differed quite fundamentally.

The interviews that I carried out with the mask makers, as well as with the business owners, were more objective, largely centered upon historical figures and models, transformations in the industrial landscape, technical advancements and innovations in the realm of hockey equipment, and the current state of affairs in the hockey manufacturing industry (Appendix D). In Part IV, by contrast, I sought to shed some light on how goalie masks tend to be signified after they leave the field of production. While speaking with different stakeholders (goaltenders, mask collectors, airbrush artists), I opted, in these cases, to conduct interviews that were more open-ended, ultimately trying to get at how these items were experienced in more subjective terms.

Particularly useful in enacting the latter approach was an interview method that, following Sophie Woodward (2016), I will refer to as “object-based interviews”. In short, the idea is that the co-presence of the physical object with respect to which the interviewer and the interviewee are talking about – in this case, the goalie mask – helps the participant in question to better articulate how he or she tends to experience and be affected by the object, sometimes also allowing certain dormant memories to resurface. When discussing the perspectives voiced by one of the participants in her study about the materiality of jeans, Woodward (2016) seeks to contrast the findings obtained through the method of “life story interviews” with those arising from “object-based interviews”:

Within the initial life history interview she seems to struggle to think about concrete pairs of jeans; jeans form a backdrop to her life rather than a ‘special’ type of clothing. In the object interview, looking at and touching the jeans allows the material and particular memories to emerge. She talks in ways that evoke the materiality of the jeans; the material changes she talks through are ones I can also

see: they have faded, softened, frayed and marked. Had she tried the jeans on this would have allowed her to engage with the physicality of her memory through what it felt like to wear them [the participants of my study often did put on the masks]. Although as her body shape has changed, the physical relationship to the worn garment would be different. Doing object interviews allows an understanding of how things materially evoke the sensory experiences of wearing (p. 366).

I learned considerably from the engagement with this method, be it, for example, from the goalies whom I asked to bring their own masks to the interviews; from the collectors who could often link every minor chip or ink mark in their beloved masks with something that took place on the playing field34; or from the mask makers who carefully sculpted or hand-sanded the shells of custom-made masks as we spoke (the latter, of course, were not recorded, as I explained in the previous section).

Furthermore, the use of object-based interviews also made it possible for me to identify and discuss minor differences that those with little familiarity with goalie masks would typically take for granted, like the asymmetries in the designs or the different materials used in their creation35.

34 This was frequently the case even for the masks that these collectors did not own. Some of the most passionate mask enthusiasts that I met would retrieve high definition pictures of a given iconic mask, and then watch the full replay of an important game in which the mask was worn, seeking to find correspondences between the marks in the mask and the way in which the game unfolded. Despite being prone to some inconsistencies, this method has occasionally been used, in combination with other techniques, for assessing the authenticity of goalie masks, while it also plays a role in terms of ascribing authority to certain mask specialists. I remember one day at a mask show, when one collector pulled me aside and whispered to my ear something along these lines: “Do you see that red ink mark next to the nose? Most people think it was caused by a puck to the face, since at the time that mask makers would often dye the mask in red paint before coating it in white. In reality, however, this mark was caused by a hit on the post”. 35 There is, for example, a design pioneered by the famed mask maker Bill Burchmore in the early 1960s, which has been popularized as the ‘pretzel’ mask, because of its peculiar shape. In this type of mask design, the fiberglass is not arranged in layers, but forms the structure of the mask through some sort of spider-web pattern. Considering how the ‘pretzel mask’ provides goalies a broader field of vision, it may even be considered, in some respects, a precursor to the cage-mask combination (as if the cage was made with fiberglass, rather than metal). However, to allow the fiberglass to solidify in such a web pattern is an art on itself. Indeed, this appears to be such a complicated endeavor that many of the replicas made of these masks use thin ropes to provide some basic structural guidance, around which the fiberglass is placed. You can only see these ropes clearly by placing the mask against a source of light, when the amber colour of the fiberglass allows one to see through. I could never have accessed this type of information if not manipulating the masks directly. 63

Most of the eleven interviews that I conducted were carried out in public social spaces, like coffee shops and restaurants. Only on a couple of occasions I assented to the request of businesses owners and visited their offices for the interviews. All these conversations were audio recorded and later transcribed by myself. Appropriate measures were undertaken in order to ensure the anonymity of the participants, as well as to safely store confidential information while in my possession. This research was granted approval by the research ethics board of the University of Toronto on May 26, 2015 (Appendix B). The approval was further amended on September 25, 2015 (Appendix C), so as to reflect the inclusion of participant observations as a method of data collection.

PART II: THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Chapter Three: The world of the small hockey equipment entrepreneur

In every well-established form of organized sports, there appears to be a dialectical relationship between the ‘playing field’ and the ‘field of production’. Improvements in the realm of production – and, in particular, in the manufacturing process – can affect the ways in which a given game is played; while, in turn, changes in how a game is played may call forth new or upgraded pieces of equipment to be produced. The introduction of curved sticks in hockey, for example, is said to have made much easier for the players to lift the puck from the ice (later, this became even more pronounced through the advent of sticks that bent more easily and the emergence of the ‘slap shot’). Goaltenders, on the other hand, responded by flexing their legs and positioning a larger portion of their bodies closer to the ice (having to defend the upper part of the net more consistently), thus enabling the emergence of greatly improved chest and arm protectors, as well as the goalie mask.

Perhaps a methodological clarification would be opportune: The conciseness of the examples just given – uttered from the vantage point of dealing with past occurrences from the present – is not intended to downplay the complexity of gradual historical transformations. Generalizations of the kind seem appropriate insofar as they seek to apprehend key elements in the historical processes under analysis; but similar statements, it must be cautioned, are often articulated in a fashion that, as in the examples above, relies too heavily on a nexus of causality. I have previously invoked the expression ‘dialectical relationship’ precisely as an attempt to underscore my commitment to an approach that aims to transcend, to the greatest extent possible, the shortcomings of one-directional, straightforward explanations. In line with this perspective, every historical transformation concerning the entanglements between the playing field and the realm of production in a sport such as ice hockey appears to be characterized, instead, by an ongoing movement – a back-and-forth movement full of trials, accomplishments, and failures, pervaded by a constellation of determinants and contingencies, some of which may be very elusive. This is how I tried to make sense of these processes, even if it is not always easy to do justice to their intricacy in writing.

Despite the absence of a more systematized body of scholarly work on the subject, I believe it is fair to suggest that, in the early days of the ice hockey manufacturing industry (the same seems to apply to many other sport-related branches as well), the relationship between the producers and

the consumers of hockey equipment was rather narrow. It was not uncommon that those manufacturing the equipment would be the players themselves (understood here in the widest sense of the term) – or at least individuals in some capacity associated with the game. This enabled a much more proximate connection between the realm of production and the playing field. If players felt that the mechanics of a particular piece of equipment could be improved, or that the introduction of some new gear would help them to participate in the game with greater safety, such feedback could be conveyed to the producers almost immediately.

Accordingly, at this early historical juncture – which, for the purposes of this study, spans from the dawn of hockey as an organized sport in the mid-late nineteenth century until the consolidation of the first large-scale companies entirely dedicated to the making of hockey equipment (especially in the interwar period) – the means of production employed by the hockey manufacturing industry were still fairly incipient. Bruce Dowbiggin (2001), for example, states that hand-crafted Mi’kmaq sticks, carved individually, as single pieces, from tree roots in Nova Scotia, “were unsurpassed until the 1920s, when two- and three-piece sticks were first produced by factories in Halifax and Ontario” (p. 14). All too frequently, moreover, the production of hockey equipment was undertaken alongside the production of other, unrelated goods. The Starr Manufacturing Company, based in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, for example, became known for producing hockey sticks and skates around the late nineteenth-century, as well as “nails, screws, nuts, and bolts” (Dowbiggin, p. 16). Even the fabled Hespeler Wood Specialty Company (later renamed as Heritage Wood Specialties), from Cambridge, Ontario, which to this day manufactures the very last wooden hockey sticks in Canada (O’Connor, 2012), has historically done so in parallel with the production of other implements, such as brooms, farm implements, and, as of late, a robust furniture line. By 1922, the Hespeler plant, then one of the powerhouses of the production of hockey sticks in Canada, employed no more than 25 workers (Dowbiggin, p. 28).

The limited range of the hockey manufacturing industry at that time can also be evidenced when it comes to the raw materials it employed. Overwhelmingly, these materials were extracted from the geographical regions where the game was (increasingly) being played. I already mentioned the maple hockey sticks that were prevalent in the early days of hockey. Other popular woods used in the manufacture of hockey sticks were hornbeam, yellow birch, elm, and white ash. As Bruce Dowbiggin (2001) suggests in a somewhat exaggerated claim, “new hockey sticks were as close as the nearest tree” (p. 19). 67

Things began to change by the turn of the century, with the emergence of larger companies, some of which would later come to claim a significant share of the hockey-related market. CCM (an acronym for Canada Cycle and Motor Co.) was founded in 1899 in Weston, Ontario, initially focusing on the production of bicycles, but later turning primarily to the manufacture of hockey goods. Cooper was established in Toronto, Ontario, in 1905, while Bauer, from Kitchener, Ontario, dates back to 1927. Northland, the major American player, was established in 1917 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, although it did not enter the hockey business until the 1930s. Similarly, Easton came into being in 1922, yet the company only started producing hockey equipment several decades later. Sherwood was another enterprise that played a prominent role in the consolidation of the hockey manufacturing industry in North America. It remains to this day one of the most storied hockey stick producers originally from Quebec. The company rose to the scene relatively late: It was created in 1949.

Stephen Hardy (1990) has aptly demonstrated how, roughly around this same historical time frame, North American entrepreneurs like the Spalding brothers started to campaign for the standardization of sports equipment:

The Spaldings certainly sought market share for their own brand name, but in doing so they also promoted the larger industry of providers and experts. Advertisements sent a clear message that homemade games and handcrafted equipment would no longer do in an industrial age (p. 61).

So successful such standardizing efforts proved to be – especially through the publication of illustrated guidebooks featuring particular brands of equipment, as well as through the advent of what today is typically called the ‘official’ provider of equipment for professional and amateur leagues – that the official rules of various major sports, like baseball, appear to have been partially reengineered around commodities marketed by certain brands of equipment (Hardy, 1990)36.

36 History often repeats itself: Most university and junior leagues in Canada currently require goalies to use, for example, masks that have been certified by the Canadian Standards Association (CSA). But I spoke with a number of small manufacturers who seem unhappy with the criteria set by the CSA to determine the safeness of the masks, claiming that some of the resistance tests were based on unrealistic expectations of what a mask may have to endure during a hockey game. As far as I could grasp, the standards set by the CSA are tailored by a committee, which includes representatives of the industry. Since these are voluntary positions, however, it becomes harder for small manufacturers to appoint representatives who can afford taking the time to attend the meetings on a regular basis, thus arguably yielding major companies greater influence over these decisions. 68

Was this also the case with respect to ice hockey? Especially throughout the first half of the twentieth century, the standardization of hockey equipment was a goal evidently shared by emerging industries and leagues, even if for different reasons. Industrialists wanted to enable the mass-production of hockey goods; while league administrators, in tandem with the ethos of meritocracy that was back then rapidly expanding its dominion over the world of sports (Rigauer, 1981), wanted to ensure fair grounds for competition to unfold. Yet it is hard to determine to which degree – if any – this convergence of interests allowed manufacturers to offer some input in the early codification of the rules of hockey, since there is little research available on the specific individuals and companies who could have lobbied for these transformations. Whereas I intend not to explore this dynamic in greater depth, two points are worth noting in this respect:

First, similarly to what Hardy (1990) identified with respect to baseball, manufacturing companies every so often partnered with major hockey leagues in the publication of illustrated guidebooks – a practice that is employed to this day. As late as 2007, for example, the NHL endorsed the publication of a booklet on the history of hockey equipment, whose copyrights belongs to Reebok.

Second, a clear trend towards enhanced complexity is evidenced in the rules that deal with equipment standards and requirements in ice hockey. While the original rules of hockey did not delve deep into the question of equipment, much has changed ever since; current rulebooks – including the ones from the NHL and the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) – dedicate entire chapters to regulate the matter, determining acceptable sizes and other objective parameters.

Perhaps then there is good reason to believe that the collaboration between industries and leagues in setting and updating equipment standards has played an important part in the making of ice hockey as it exists today. Only further studies could illuminate the matter. But what is certainly more significant insofar as the present investigation is concerned is that, in parallel to these efforts towards standardization, another crucial process started to unfold: Some hockey leagues began to establish themselves as the ultimate authorities in determining what kinds, shapes, and components ought to be allowed on ice. Whatever input manufacturing companies might have had on the subject (or still have), this had to be articulated in a vested form.

The leagues, by contrast, increasingly exercised their powers ostensibly, not only putting forward precise standards and regulations, but also policing players and teams and punishing the ones that did not comply. The more these leagues were able to consolidate their grip over the ‘official’ rules of hockey, the greater latitude they could exercise in formulating and refining such rules according to the criteria that they saw fit (Kidd & Macfarlane, 1972; Wong, 2005). As their reputation solidified, leagues could also more effectively fend off any pressure from outside interests, thus legitimizing their space as independent, autonomous entities – at least on the realm of appearances.

This tendency was not exclusive to ice hockey. Much has been said in the field of sport studies about how major sports organizations – the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) are the cases most commonly explored (e.g., Chapellet & Mabbott, 2008; Sugden & Tomlinson, 2017) – have succeeded in becoming supranational governing bodies, setting up rigid hierarchies amongst its local and international members, while also monopolizing the codification of the rules of various sports along the process37. Yet there is a facet of this dynamic that, in my estimation, has remained thoroughly overlooked, despite its far-reaching consequences. It concerns the implementation of rules that prescribe narrow equipment requirements and standards.

It is nowadays generally taken for granted that organizations like hockey leagues have the right to legislate over the things that can and the things that cannot be used during a hockey game – rulebooks even contain sections that are devoted to ‘illegal equipment’. But it was not always that way. By considering the question from a historical standpoint, it becomes apparent that the introduction of rules stipulating acceptable equipment requirements and standards entails a crucial break: It inaugurates an era in modern hockey in which what was once a rather ‘organic’

37 This colonization is not only a de facto one; it contains also a huge symbolic dimension. Rule changes crafted in corporate headquarters in Switzerland would most likely not only be enforced within the competitions subordinated to the organization in question; they would also, if feasible, be enacted by occasional players everywhere in a matter of weeks. I remember as a kid when FIFA changed the rule that allowed goalkeepers to hold the ball with their hands if it was passed on to them by a teammate. The new rule – which forbids it – was adopted in almost every pickup soccer game that I took part on as soon as it became clear how it worked. Research on such matters is unfortunately still incipient, as well as challenging, given how elusive these matters tend to be. 70

connection between the ‘field of production’ and the ‘playing field’ gets partially severed. From this point onwards, needs or opportunities that may arise and solutions or improvements that are devised in the realm of hockey equipment become matters that concern not only players and manufacturers, but also league administrators.

Over time, leagues cemented their roles as third parties imbued with the competency of setting the tone as to which products industries ought to manufacture and as to which gear players ought to use. Leagues, too, became responsible for adjudicating what equipment changes would be deemed acceptable and which ones would not – including with regards to the introduction of new commodities. Virtually every rulebook today is filled with statements of the sort: “Modifications at the manufacturer are not allowed unless approved in advance by the League” (National Hockey League, 2018, p. 12).

Of course, these leagues did not invent the notion that games unfold in accordance to certain rules; nor did they stay in the way of most of the back-and-forth flow of communication between producers and players – otherwise innovation would have completely stalled. But by claiming ownership over most final decisions concerning equipment matters, leagues to a considerable degree alienated both players and producers from the ability to drive the evolution of hockey gear in their own terms – in other words, such initiatives could prosper only if sanctioned, under the tutelage of the established leagues.

Not only that: as I noticed several times over the course of my fieldwork, the preoccupation with how modifications in pieces of equipment will be received by league officials was an ongoing concern on the factory floor. To imagine what would be considered acceptable and what would not be tolerated – like materials, new designs, etc. – were questions that often steered experimentation and innovation on the part of small businesses owners. Thus, even if inadvertently, major leagues have also, at least to some measure, narrowed the horizon of innovation in the making of hockey equipment, gearing it towards what manufacturers subjectively perceive as changes that could more easily be brought into the fold of the ‘official’ standards and requirements.

But let me return to the topic at hand: The flourishing days of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada were, in line with the developments mentioned above, largely driven by a

concerted push towards the standardization of the equipment needed to play the game. Coupled with the growing popularity of the sport, standardization helped to establish a steady demand for mass-produced hockey gear – which, for self-evident reasons, bolstered the development of larger, more specialized companies.

Specialization was in effect another stamp of this expansion phase. However, it would be incorrect to assume that this tendency overtook the whole industry at once. Quite on the contrary, it appears to have unfolded as a fairly gradual, uneven process. This can be evidenced, for example, through another fascinating, yet under-studied phenomenon: The practice of inter-sport equipment exchange. As late as the 1960s and the 1970s, one of my informants told me, “Goalies borrowed football pants, first base mitts, catcher chest protectors, lacrosse arm guards, and some versions of catchers masks; forwards would trade catchers leg guards back and forth, each able to use each other’s equipment”.

As a general rule, the greater the social and economic significance acquired by a given sport, the more specialized (and, to some degree, autonomous from the sports industry in general) the branch of industry that provides the equipment for its practice becomes. It goes without saying that, at the present day, the hockey manufacturing industry has achieved a remarkable degree of standardization and specialization. Things such as ‘hockey tape’ testify to how specific hockey commodities have become. Notwithstanding, a few exceptions remain: Products like mouth guards, for example, are manufactured to uniformly fit players who engage in different sports (including ice hockey), while items such as goalie masks, as I will discuss in greater detail in the sixth chapter of this document, are sometimes still custom-made.

It is beyond the scope of this investigation to provide a detailed account of the development of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada throughout the twentieth century. For the purposes of the argument being articulated here, it suffices to say that, especially from the 1960s onwards, this branch of production experienced several decades of sustained growth, consolidating its position as “the driving force in the domestic [sporting goods] industry” (“Sporting goods industry expects streak to continue”, 1987, B7). The reasons for this continuous – if eventful – expansion were diversified. To a significant extent, it could be explained by the popularization of hockey in the United States. This is a perspective articulated, for example, by Dorrell (1973), who claims that

The growing popularity of professional hockey in the United States has meant a boom for the manufacturers of hockey equipment – most of which are Canadian companies. […] Some companies will speak only of percentage growth, others talk in terms of dollars only and the remainder disclose figures in terms of units produced. But for all companies times are good. So good that hockey products manufactured by Canadian-based companies still have a larger share of the U.S. market than do sport companies in that country. […] For Canada’s largest manufacturer of all types of hockey products, CCM, the great increase has been in skate sales. Skate production in 1972 was up 240 per cent from 1967, stick sales are up 30 per cent and sales of other hockey equipment have risen 65 per cent. Skate blades are manufactured at its Toronto plant, other hockey products are produced in Montreal (p. 12).

The expanding market for hockey gear also meant good business for American companies. In the late 1960s, another report indicates, the hockey stick industry “started to boom, growing about 30 percent a year” in the United States (“Hockey stick maker struggles in newly competitive market”, 1982, p. 36). The increase in the demographics of hockey participants was another determinant factor in the climb of equipment sales, particularly with respect to women and adults/seniors (Motherwell, 1984).

But while the hockey manufacturing industry, taken together, went through a period of sustained growth, the second half of the twentieth century also witnessed several shifts in the companies that were able to establish a lead with respect to market shares, with many of them being later relegated to less prominent roles or being absorbed by major conglomerates. By the mid-1980s, for example, Sherwood produced the best-selling hockey sticks38 in Canada (Motherwell, 1984), followed by companies like Victoriaville and Karthu-Titan (from Finland). In 1986, the latter acquired the ‘Koho’ and ‘Canadien’ hockey stick trademarks – estimates at the time suggested that the move made the company responsible for “about half of the hockey sticks in the world and 30 per cent of hockey equipment” (“Sporting goods industry expects streak to

38 Dowbiggin (2011) refers to these as the “Stradivarius of wooden hockey sticks”. Around this same period, Sherwood became one of the first hockey companies to start commissioning players of the NHL to use certain pieces of equipment. A few years later, not only individual players were being sponsored: The league itself started to nurture the idea of “granting exclusivity to an equipment supplier – for a substantial price” (Strachan, 1989, A21). “In typical NHL fashion”, Strachan (1989) states, “there has been no discussion between the league and the players about the matter” (A21) – which arguably prompted the latter to consider boycotting the initiative. Eventually, the idea of an official sponsor was implemented, but in a rather flexible manner – that is, with standardized uniforms and things like pucks, but allowing players to remain using some pieces of equipment of their own choosing. 73

continue”, 1987, B7). None of these brands remain major players today, although some of them were engulfed by the two conglomerates that now thoroughly polarize the market.

The hockey goalie industry, in particular, remained significantly underdeveloped until the late 1970s and the 1980s, when a generation of skilled entrepreneurs – most of whom were former professional or amateur goalies themselves – started to campaign for a substantial enhancement in the standards of quality, comfort, and safety of goalie equipment. As one of my informants remarked,

I played and when I played – so this is in the 1960s and the 1970s – the equipment was very poor. Whenever you got hit, you would get a big bruise. My arms were always bruised, my hips were bruised, my knees were bruised, my ankles were bruised, and my hands were always bruised.

Up until the period that he was alluding to, goalie pads, for example, were typically manufactured with leather and deer hair (Fedunkiw, 1989); arm protectors were largely made with felt and stripes of leather; and goalie masks were generally ragged and roughly built, closely adjusted to the face, transferring most of the impact to the head of the players.

The first companies to devote themselves exclusively to the manufacture of goalie gear in Canada appeared in the 1970s (only a few of them are still on the market today). Amongst the industry leaders, Cooper was likely the company that showed the earliest interest in the development of goalie equipment, most notably through the joint efforts of two of its collaborators, former goaltenders.

While the majority of these emerging companies would also accept custom-made orders, especially if coming from elite goalies, they became over time mostly interested in fostering the large-scale production of these goods. As such, the early development of this branch of the hockey manufacturing industry fed heavily on technical advances, aimed at modernizing the process of production. These were entrepreneurs that, generally speaking, tended to value research and experimentation, as they took on the challenge of carving a niche market. According to one owner I interviewed, some of these advancements were shared: “There was a cluster of companies that

were in the same industry and they fed from each other”39. These enhanced conditions of production soon resulted in the availability of a wider and improved supply of goalie equipment, offering players far better options to navigate already by the mid-late 1980s – as if quantity and quality were, at least on the surface, temporarily walking hand in hand.

However, the consolidation of the hockey goalie industry needed to overcome, as well, an ideological barrier. Especially at the NHL level, this era was characterized by contrasting views on how to handle the introduction of newer, safer gear for goaltenders. This is how a participant spoke about the older generation of goalies that played during this transitional period:

When I started building equipment for NHL goalies, there was still a number of goalies that had played without a mask. So there were guys like Ed Giacomin, Gerry Cheevers, Les Binkley... there was a number of guys that when I started had played not wearing a mask. So those guys were really different. They were kind of a better bunch of guys, because they were all black and blue all the time, but they loved to play and they wanted to play and it was their living.

Another one of the equipment makers that I talked to recalls a sales visit to a professional goalie, by the late 1970s, in the following manner:

As I was approaching the dressing room I could see him, and his biceps were black and blue. So I thought to myself: ‘Oh, this is gonna be really easy’. In about thirty seconds, he told me to get lost and that was it. I never really did get to know him very well, but he did not have any problems, I think, getting hurt. This was the part of the equation from that era of goalie that I did not understand.

On the other hand, this interviewee subsequently added: “But it was interesting that his backup at the time, you know, he wanted it all”.

Thus, despite incipient advances in the productive realm, the goalie industry was slow to take off. For numerous elite goaltenders, acting careless about protection remained an integral part of the hockey goalie ethos around until very deep into the 1970s40. This perspective seems to be

39 The pioneers of the goalie industry, some of which I had the opportunity to talk to, tended to speak about each other very fondly. Even if they represented competing businesses at the time, interviewees conveyed a sense of camaraderie for ‘old timers’, claiming that they ‘all knew each other back then’, and also highlighting how instrumental these relationships were in terms of pursuing innovation.

40 To be sure, controversial understandings about the significance of playing through injuries are still prevalent among hockey players today; yet, it is safe to assert that much more effort is invested in seeking to avoid such injuries. 75

reinforced by yet another business owner that I talked to, who suggests that, at the time, several goalies still

resisted getting better equipment. I remember one goalie telling me “I really like you and I think your gear is really good, but there is one thing you don´t understand”. He said: “I am a pro and a big thing about being a pro is being hurt, and playing hurt”. So that was his sort of twisted logic to it, kind of a carry forward from the old days.

However resilient such old-fashioned views proved to be, nonetheless, they eventually began to be shoved aside by a gradual transformation in the ‘goalie culture’, which was to a significant extent re-centered around the question of injury protection41, most notably through the rise of the goalie mask as the most preeminent symbol of the goaltending fraternity42. This cultural shift facilitated the consolidation of the goalie industry as an individual branch of production throughout the 1980s and 1990s – especially in terms of materials and designs. Some of my research participants stressed how this transition from the custom-made to the mass-produced approach in the manufacture of goalie gear helped in the ‘democratization’ of the position of goalie43 (probably to this day one of the most expensive sporting positions one may elect to play, given the mandatory equipment requirements). Not surprisingly, therefore, this was also the era in

41 Perhaps this cultural shift is best epitomized in a quote attributed to Jacques Plante, who is said to have ironically stated: “If you jump out of a plane without a parachute, does that make you brave? No” (Woolsey, 2004). Rationalization, without question, played a central role in turning the position of goalie more ‘civilized’.

One may feel inclined to marvel at what appears to be a striking lack of common sense underlying the old views on how the position of goalie was meant to be played. Yet it is probably worth noting that, over fifty years later, very similar matters have once again emerged in the public debate around sports. I have in mind here the polarizing perspectives around the issue of concussions. Just like back then, there currently is no shortage of individuals, from the most distinguished ranks, arguing that sports like hockey or football are destined to become ‘too soft’ – if they have not already. In essence: Still today, the health of the players is not always articulated as an axiomatic view in the world of sports.

42 “Brotherhood” and “breed” are other terms frequently used to denote the tacit, informal networks amongst hockey goalies (e.g., Hynes & Smith, 2008; Oliver & Kamchen, 2014). 43 Ironically enough, cutting production costs through offshoring strategies engendered even more pronounced effects in this ‘democratization’, another interviewee once told me. Here, the relationship between the playing field and the field of production takes on a sharp contradictory character. On one side of the globe, the process is experienced as an expansion in opportunities; but this is only because companies succeed in extracting greater surplus-value elsewhere. 76

which major companies started to grow more interested in manufacturing things like chest protectors, pads or masks. Still, the manufacture of goalie equipment was amongst the last branches of production to be (re)claimed by major companies willing to bring together, under the same brand, almost everything one needs to play hockey – from skates to sticks to masks. Insofar as goalie masks are concerned, the acquisition of Mission-Itech by Bauer in 2008 was likely the most impactful move in this direction (“Itech joins Bauer team”, 2008, p. B11).

Towards the end of the last century, the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada had reached its apogee. Cooper, in its heyday, had three different manufacturing plants (the main factory was located in Toronto), including one created by the mid-1970s in Barbados, which probably constituted the first offshoring endeavor in the world of hockey equipment (Dewey, 1980). In 1991, Canstar Sports Inc., which at the time had already become the parent company of Bauer and Cooper (amongst others), employed, alone, a little less than 3,000 workers, most of whom were based in factories around Ontario and Quebec. Nike would acquire this corporation a few years later, initiating an era of heavy influx of American capital into the hockey equipment industry44. In the year 2000, The Hockey Co., which produced hockey gear under the brands CCM, Jofa, and Koho, as well as other well-known hockey trademarks, employed almost 2,000 workers. Reebok – now owned by Adidas – acquired the Hockey Co. in 2004. The manufacturing portion of this industry, however, was soon destined to endure an abrupt decline.

44 In 2008, these traditional hockey brands partially returned to Canadian ownership, when Nike sold them to a group of investors, called Performance Sports Group. In 2016, the latter also purchased the Easton baseball/softball division, thus intriguingly meaning that, for a certain period of time, Bauer and Easton were rival brands in ice hockey, but partners in baseball/softball. The ownership of sports multinationals appears to be a case study on its own, provided the complex relationships between parent companies and subsidiaries, the constant changes in the countries of domicile, the wide portfolio of brands, etc. The stocks of the company Performance Sports Group were first listed in the Toronto Stock Exchange (not being cross listed in the New York Stock Exchange until a couple of years later), in what appeared to be an interesting pitch to appeal to the sentimentalism of Canadian investors. Of course, I intend not to suggest that this strategy had a major impact in the value of the stock; it was a rather nuanced, supplementary tactic in attracting new investments. The stock performed well for a number of years, until it plunged in 2017. The company filed for bankruptcy in this same year, being subsequently acquired by two groups of investors – Sagard Holdings and Fairfax Financial. 77

3.1 The decline of the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada

What is a national sport? If a national sport is, as Roland Barthes (1997) states, a “sport arising out of the elements of a nation; its soil and its climate” (p. 81), I believe one has good grounds to question whether hockey remains Canada’s game. Part of the reason why this appears to be so is that today – as opposed to what was the case for most of the twentieth century – almost the totality of the hockey sticks, pucks, helmets, or ice skates available in the Canadian market were manufactured elsewhere; while the raw materials commonly employed in the production of these items tend to be, likewise, extracted out of the ‘soil and climate’ of foreign nations.

This is however not the first time that Canadian hockey has arguably been taken away from Canadians. Yet, when Bruce Kidd and John Macfarlane (1972) were wrestling with this same problem over forty years ago, they had quite different concerns in view. Above everything else, they were troubled with what they perceived as a significant growth in the commercialization (at the time, they called it “Americanization”) of hockey, which they beheld giving rise to powerful sports cartels, at the same time progressively alienating the game from whom they believed were its rightful owners – the Canadian people. It goes without saying that this process is now a fait accompli, and it unfolded in a fashion that has far surpassed Kidd and Macfarlane’s most pessimistic predictions. Today, insofar as national stereotypes are concerned, there is perhaps nothing more typically Canadian than ‘Americanized’ hockey.

Underlying the present research is therefore the understanding that around the mid-1990s a second upsurge of ‘de-nationalization’ of Canadian hockey came under way – this time concerning its ‘infrastructure’. In driving attention to this process I intend not to suggest that Canadians are nowadays less invested in hockey than they have previously been. On the contrary, the links between hockey and Canadian national identity seem as strong as ever, greatly galvanized in recent decades by the extensive fashion in which this association has been explored with commercial and political purposes (Gruneau & Whitson, 1993). What I am rather trying to stress here is that around twenty years ago a process started to unfold, which fractured the interplay between the ‘field of production’ and the ‘field of play’ in Canadian ice hockey even further. This time what it caused was a geographical disconnect, which has now reached a stage of near- completion.

This may not be the best place to revisit in detail the origins of this process, which was largely set in motion by the fall of the Berlin wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, ultimately leading to a new arrangement of the global economy that some analysts have termed the ‘New International Division of Labour’ (e.g., Charnock & Starosta, 2016). Suffice to say that at the heart of this ‘new division’ is a split between physical and intellectual labour in which, increasingly so, the workers from the Global South carry out the production of a disproportionate share of the commodities consumed worldwide (from agriculture and the extraction of raw materials, in less industrialized countries, to the manufacturing of goods, in industrializing ones).

One of the marked consequences of this ‘new division of labour’ is that it projects certain antagonisms that up until recently were primarily experienced inside the national state into the global arena (Marden, 1997). In other words, the tension between the industrial elites and the working classes, which was so characteristic of most highly-industrialized societies for a great deal of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, has to a certain degree been transmuted into a tension between ‘post-industrial societies’ and the industrializing world.

In drawing attention to these remarks I am not implying that the previous arrangement of global economy was less asymmetrical in geographical terms. On the contrary, “the accumulation of capital”, the “leitmotiv of capitalism”, has always been “an uneven process both spatially and temporally”, and such spatial imbalances have fundamentally been expressed by the fact that “different kinds of economic activities have been located in different geographical loci, such that at any given time there exist concentrations of more highly capitalized, higher-wage, higher-profit activities in some places (core) and less capitalized, lower-wage, lower-profit activities in others (periphery)” (Wallerstein, 1983, p. 17). Never before, however, has the tension between the ‘periphery’ and the ‘core’ been so widely translated into a division between physical and intellectual labour.

It should be noted, however, that the gradual process of de-industrialization of several countries of the Global North, coupled with the process of industrialization of some countries of the Global South, has as a rule produced consequences in both camps. In the Northern countries, it has destabilized labour movements and imperilled many of the legal achievements previously

made by the working classes45. In the South, it has given rise to masses of workers that, in the most extreme cases, subsist under circumstances that violate basic human rights. In many senses, these impoverished communities seem to have been left behind in the broader cannon of social development: A careful reading of some of the classical studies on the emergence of the working classes reveals how the labouring conditions enforced in sweatshops disturbingly parallel many of the issues faced by English workers over a century and a half ago (Hunt, 2009). Indeed,

In proper dialectical fashion, assembly lines do not disappear, and they are not replaced. They are subsumed. There are plenty of assembly lines turning out so- called smartphones, those small hand-held computers that connect with broadcast electronic streams from cell phone towers or satellites that suffuse the Earth’s atmosphere. Workers on the most typical such assembly line in China or the maquiladoras surrounding the United States resemble the most notorious sweatshops of the early part of the preceding century. Think Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Production, however, is dispersed globally, with clots of concentration turning out the materials goods that used to be centered in just a few areas of the capitalist center (Skoll, 2016, p. 83).

The different degrees of physical investment demanded from workers, defined thoroughly along national lines but also with respect immigrant status, are without question one of the marked characteristics of global capitalism at the dawn of the twenty-first century:

Different bodily qualities and modes of valuation (including the degree of respect for the bodily integrity and dignity of the laborer) achieved in different places are brought into a spatially competitive environment through the circulation of capital. Uneven geographical development of the bodily practices and sensibilities of those who sell their labor power becomes one of the defining features of class struggle as waged by both capital and labor (Harvey, 2000, p. 109).

The coupled processes of de-industrialization of some countries and industrialization of others have been heavily bolstered by two economical mechanisms employed by major multinational companies: Offshoring and outsourcing. With regards specifically to physical labour and the production of goods, the first denotes the practice of moving manufacturing jobs out of a given country (strictly speaking, not necessarily from the Global North to the Global South,

45 In the United States, for example, “Today, well over 90 percent of union contracts have a no-strike clause, and under penalty of law, the union is require to enforce it. When, on rare occasions, the union violates this provision, the company can – and usually does – procure a court order to end the strike and fine the union or otherwise discipline its officers with penalties, including imprisonment” (Aronowitz, 2014, p. 73) 80

although this has been overwhelmingly the case); while the latter refers to the practice of sub- hiring a company based in another country to undertake part of the productive process necessary for the assemblage of a particular good. At the early stages of these practices, one could de facto track the intensive transfer of manufacturing jobs from the northern to the southern hemisphere, as well as the massive layoffs in the Global North. Yet, today, this has become much a more elusive process, since it may often be the case that the jobs which were to have been ‘off-shored’ had never been effectively created in North America or Europe (Blinder, 2009) – the positions are, in other words, created directly in the South, despite being generated by a growing demand on the North.

Inherent to both the offshoring and outsourcing tendencies is the ambition to reduce the costs associated with the production of a particular good. This may be accomplished through a variety of strategies – for example the relocation of parts of the company to places where taxes are lower and governmental/fiscal incentives are higher. Yet, with respect to the labour force, this reduction of costs has been mainly achieved through the transfer of the production line to territories where labour costs are cheaper and the laws safeguarding the workers are much less stringent.

It follows from such definition that, despite the best efforts of various human rights advocates campaigning on behalf of the workers of the Global South the sharp ‘post-colonial’ underpinnings of ‘post-industrial’ societies will not fade until such global division of labour is called into question. This is because the exploitation of cheap labour can only survive insofar as working conditions remain depreciated enough as to ensure greater economic advantages for the multinational corporations seeking greater profits. To put it bluntly, the entire rationale behind ‘offshoring’ and ‘outsourcing’ rests upon doing to workers elsewhere (and to the environment) what companies are often not allowed to do in their original countries. Not surprisingly, therefore, these economic strategies have been best executed in places where authoritarian regimes have ensured that workers enjoy little political freedom.

One would be amused by the number of publications that uncritically endorse these economic strategies, portraying them as irreversible facts about which little can be done. Yet, it is as well in this domain that one may find what is, in my opinion, some of the most exciting sociological work being carried out in academia today. Shehzad Nadeem (2011), for example, conducted a remarkable study focusing on the impacts of offshoring practices in India – which includes some engaging passages concerning those individuals that we never see but with whom

we often speak: the employees of the Indian companies that have been sub-contracted to provide ‘costumer services’ to major Western corporations.

Another interesting research dealing with the impacts of outsourcing policies, more focused on the realm of manufacturing, is that of Pun Ngai et. al. (2014). This group of scholars has engendered significant efforts to support activist groups who have been fighting the rough working conditions at Foxconn, the giant Chinese manufacturer then responsible for the production of over 50% of the world’s electronic products, in whose premises 18 workers have attempted suicide within the time-span of a year. As John Urry (2014) sharply states in a book that advances what is certainly one of the most comprehensive critiques of the offshoring process from a sociological standpoint, this new arrangement of the global economy has arguably led the world into a form of class warfare – yet, in sharp contrast to the classical definition of this struggle, it is the ‘rich class’ that has benefited from it so far.

The sports manufacturing industry, without question, has historically been at the forefront of these offshoring and outsourcing tendencies (Harvey, Rail & Thibault, 1996). Constituting a branch of industry that is not so heavily dependent on cutting-edge technology, the production of sports equipment helped to pave the way for other corporations that were still somewhat hesitant about whether their intellectual property would be safe if they moved their production plants to foreign countries. One may still recall how some time ago the investigative reports denouncing poor labouring conditions46 that now often befall upon high-tech companies used to concern, more frequently, major sports equipment manufacturers – such as Nike, Adidas and Reebok (Den Hond, Bakker & De Haan, 2010).

With major companies – most of which were originally based in North America and Europe – adhering to offshoring and outsourcing strategies en masse, the landscapes of production in the sports manufacturing industry were reshaped in a rather dramatic fashion. When it comes to the hockey manufacturing industry, in particular, estimates suggest that roughly 90-95% of the hockey

46 Ironically, physical activity has on occasions been used as a form of punishment in factories overseas. For example: “Recently, it was stung by a U.S. labour group’s report that Vietnamese workers were forced to run laps for failing to wear regulation shoes. Twelve women fainted and were taken to the hospital. Nike suspended the manager and she was charged by Vietnamese authorities” (Heinzl, 1997a, p. B1). 82

equipment currently consumed in Canada was produced in foreign lands (Austen, 2013). Consistent with these numbers, in its annual report to investors, the conglomerate Performance Sports Group (2015) – which back then owned Bauer, Mission and a number of other less-known hockey-related brands – claimed that “greater than 90% of our manufactured products were sourced from international suppliers47” (p. 18).

This comprehensive (and yet largely unregulated) adoption of offshoring and outsourcing practices was fundamentally driven by profit-making aspirations in the private sector; however, the frosting on the cake was arguably articulated in the political sphere. In 2013, the Canadian Government decided to do away with tariffs on imported hockey equipment:

Just about the only thing Canadian about buying hockey equipment in Canada has for years been the tariff on imported goods. Now, even that quirk of Canadian hockey history is going away. On Thursday, the finance minister, Jim Flaherty, announced that the Conservative government would end import tariffs on all sports equipment, except bicycles, on April 1. The tariffs were as high as 18 percent (Austen, 2013, p. B1).

While these cuts supposedly aimed at offering some financial relief to consumers of products that were – anyway – for the most part no longer being made in Canada, they also helped to cement the grip of major multinational companies over the hockey-related market, making it nearly impossible for small manufacturers to carve some space to compete.

As a side note, it is worth noting that the mass production of hockey equipment constitutes, in my understanding, a particularly acute case in the domain of offshoring. I believe this is so because it lays bare some of the most profound inequalities that thrive in the world today: How contradictory is it that the equipment necessary to play hockey, a sport so closely linked to (and almost exclusively played in) the icy landscapes of the Northern hemisphere, is for the greatest part manufactured in countries of the Global South? And how ironical is it that this material production, which feeds from the intensive physical labour of women, men, and perhaps even children of different ethnicities alike, stands in such a flagrant opposition to the everyday

47 The company also further explains that “over 90% of our overseas production is located in China, Thailand and Vietnam” (Performance Sports Group, 2015, p. 18). As I came to learn, such annual reports periodically yield valuable information about the consolidation of offshoring and outsourcing tendencies, which is largely catered as part of the efforts to appeal to investors. 83

experience of hockey in Canada, where it is still often deemed a symbol of manliness, nationalism, as well as one of the last bastions of gender and ethnical oppressions?

In many respects, the production of hockey equipment by workers of the Global South configures one of the utmost expressions of “estranged labour” (yet certainly not the sole example), providing dark contours to the already gloomy Marxist aphorism which asserts that, under the aegis of capitalism, the worker is related to the product of his/her own labour as to “an alien object” (Marx, 1964, p. 108). In the case of the production of hockey equipment, such alienation is pushed even further because the workers are not only confronted by products that become “powers on their own” (that they cannot possess); but the very outcomes of their labour are, in addition, arguably useless and meaningless to them. From the standpoint of these workers, the hockey commodities that they make come to embody, in a sense, the flagrant disconnect between the economic and cultural forces around which their lives unfold.

A mask maker once told me a story that seems to illustrate this point quite convincingly. By the early 2000s, a major food multinational wanted to replicate some of his classic (goalie) mask designs as small souvenirs, in order to attach them on the top of refreshment cups. After some back and forth negotiations, he agreed with the terms of the deal, putting together a number of prototypes that the corporation sent to its suppliers in Asia. Yet, the manufacturers were repeatedly struggling to get the proportions of the miniatures right. The multinational eventually decided to send the mask maker to China, so he could explain in person to those in charge how the issues could be fixed. Entering the toy factory, he described to me, was already to some degree uncomfortable, given the young girls that he glimpsed, working at the assembly line. But the most amusing part of his visit to the factory, so he explained, was when one of the managers asked him about the tiny, colourful goalie masks. “The manager believed they were making helmets for cats!”, the mask maker wrapped up laughingly.

But let me shift the focus back to the hockey manufacturing industry in Canada. Various newspaper reports suggest that the implementation of offshoring and outsourcing strategies was also heavily felt in this side of the equation, particularly within working class districts. One after another, companies began to reduce the size of their workforce, sometimes shutting down entire manufacturing plants. In 1997, for example, Bauer, which was acquired by Nike two years earlier, announced its plan close a skate factory in Cambridge, Ontario:

This spring, Bauer stunned the plant’s 400 unionized employees with news that the doors will be shut down by the end of next year. […] A unionized plant in Canada does not necessarily fit into Nike’s money-making strategy. Nike is primarily a marketing company, and it almost always leaves the manufacturing to someone else – someone far away where wages are low and unions rare (Heinzl, 1997a, p. B1).

In 2001, The Hockey Company (then the parent company of the CCM brand), in turn, communicated its intention to “cut 300 jobs, 260 of them in its facility in Mount Forest, northwest of Toronto” (Spears, 2001, p. B5). Generally speaking, Ontario was hit by such layoffs first, given the lower labour costs in Quebec, to where some of these jobs were at first allegedly transferred (Heinzl, 1997a). Yet this trend was short-lived. Later that same year,

Another nail was hammered into Bauer-Nike Hockey Inc.’s coffin in St. Jerome with the disclosure Friday that the plant is laying off between 40 and 65 people, company officials confirmed. […] The St, Jerome plant north of Montreal that employed 1,200 people a few years ago will soon be reduced to about 120 staffers (“Stake-maker cuts jobs”, 2001, p. B7).

This same company, a few years later, made an announcement indicating that it would be

Shutting down most of its Canadian hockey equipment production, making subsidiary Bauer Nike Hockey Inc. chiefly a research, design and marketing operation. The decision, announced yesterday afternoon, will cost the jobs of 137 people at a hockey stick factory in Cambridge, Ont., 30 at a goalie equipment operation in Mississauga and 154 at a skate and helmet plant in St. Jerome, Que. (Saunders, 2003, p. B3).

Another hit to the hockey goalie industry, more specifically, was the acquisition of Itech by Bauer in 2008 – a move that included a discontinuation of a manufacturing facility in Kirkland, Quebec, in “a multi-stage process that will affect 140 employees (“Itech joins Bauer team”, 2008, p. B11). In the year of 2011, Sherwood was reported to have been the last major manufacturer to offshore the production of its entire line of hockey sticks (Marotte, 2011, p. B1). To put it briefly, in roughly two decades, the bulk of the hockey manufacturing industry once established in Canada had been transferred overseas – not at once, but steadily.

Not uncommonly, corporate executives would frame these changes in the manufacturing portion of the hockey industry as a matter of ‘necessity’. Heinzl (1997b), for example, reports that “A spokeswoman for Bauer defended the decision to outsource, saying it was necessary because of the increasingly competitive nature of the skate manufacturing industry” (p. B2). Similar sentiments transpired, as well, in some of the interviews that I conducted. While there is probably 85

some truth to these claims insofar as they concern the ability of major companies to compete against each other at the top of the market, offshoring and outsourcing can be hardly regarded as defensive strategies, tailored to keep companies afloat. Quite on the contrary, these were key engines in what would be rather characterized as a period of aggressive capitalization, sustained by lower production costs, increased profit margins, and enhanced earnings prospects48.

While difficult to determine with precision, it appears that the global hockey market expanded slightly from the 2000s onwards, and this was probably one of the reasons why investors came to expect greater revenue shares. Estimates suggest that, in 2001, the hockey equipment market worldwide was worth around $500 million (Spears, 2001). According to Milstead (2011), this number reached the vicinity of $550 million in 2011, based on the evaluation of financial market specialists. Other estimates were much higher: Bertrand Marotte (2004), for example, speculated about a $700 million figure in 2004, based on what was reported to him by an analyst of Wells Fargo Securities.

However, at the same time that the hockey market was growing in size, it was becoming even more concentrated on the hands of a few multinational companies. Russell David, then vice- president of finance at The Hockey Company, suggested in 2001 that smaller manufacturers collectively controlled “about one-third of the market” (Spears, 2001). A very different scenario was painted in a report made available in 2015 by the Performance Sports Group (2015) conglomerate:

Management estimates that 90% of the ice hockey equipment market is attributable to three major competitors: Bauer Hockey, Reebok International Ltd. (‘‘Reebok’’), a subsidiary of adidas AG, which owns both the REEBOK and CCM brands, and Easton Hockey (which is owned by private investment firm Chartwell Investments and utilizes the EASTON brand under a trademark license from the Company), each of whom offers consumers a full range of products (skates, sticks and full protective equipment). The remaining equipment market is highly fragmented among many smaller equipment manufacturers that offer specific products, catering to niche segments within the broader market (p. 7).

48 Over these years, the general increment in stock prices for publicly traded companies seems to yield further evidence in this respect. 86

Small companies were thus also indirectly affected by the implementation of offshoring and outsourcing strategies, which made the competition for market shares much more difficult for them. One of the owners that I interviewed told me that, in its apogee, his company employed 45 people. This number then started to decrease consistently, until in 2015 he was left with eight workers.

According to my informants, one of the marked changes that took place in the hockey industry from the late 1990s onwards concerned a shift in the profile of high executives, as large conglomerates extended their dominance over market shares. Bernie constantly complained about having to deal with some of these executives, bothered by their on average young age and what he perceived as a generalized lack of knowledge and genuine interest for the game – something that he would often mock, as well. An interviewee, moreover, stated as follows:

I think one of the big things that happened in the hockey business was: the hockey companies were always family owned. So you had Jack Cooper on Cooper, I think the Bauer guys were still involved in Bauer, then you had a bunch of small guys like me, that were all just family guys and I don’t know when that started to change... maybe in the nineties... the public corporations started to buy in. So there was a real change from kind of this family value system and how you conducted business to – how should we say it – a public company just trying to make their quarterly results look better.

As another participant sums it up: “For me, it was my livelihood, you know, it was an investment; for a lot of them it was just a job”. Needless to say, this shift in the general profile of executives also further enhanced the disconnect between the field of production and the playing field of in ice hockey, setting the interests of the players and the interests of the companies increasingly apart.

The general trends described here amount in broad terms to the scenario encountered by the small manufacturers of hockey equipment at the dawn of the twentieth-first century. Squeezed in between hungry industry giants and confronted with dynamics of production and merchandise that they struggled to find the resources to match, small manufacturers scrambled to remain significant, mostly resorting to history and tradition.

Yet the ‘made in Canada’ appeal did not prove very effective in the long run, as I will discuss in greater detail later. Numerous small manufacturers succumbed in these newfangled landscapes of production: “I am the last man standing. All those who started with me went out of

business”, Bernie, would often repeat as a mantra. An analogous sentiment was voiced by a small- business owner that I spoke to: “Certainly, from when I started they are bankrupt, they are all gone, they do not exist anymore”. The most acute period in this insolvency trend occurred following the 2009 financial crisis that hit the United States much harder than Canada, pushing exports to dive due to the strong valuation of the Canadian dollar. Bernie seemed truly uncomfortable – almost livid – to talk about how fragile the finances of his company became at that juncture.

However, not everything got lost: A few small companies, especially the ones fortunate enough to be involved in the production of niche pieces, such as goalie equipment, forged strategies to survive these transformations in the hockey market. A handful of new companies also emerged during this period, for the most part exploring these very same niches. These strategies included, in particular, what I will refer to as a reinvigorated interest in the connection between players and manufacturers in Canadian ice hockey, expressed most notably through the emphasis on custom made items. As a participant stated,

If you can develop a brand and products that will allow you to get a profitable price for them, I think there is always room for someone doing better. It seems it’s getting more specialized. Like recently we have started offering a lot more custom options on kind of our standard products... and guys really liked that, you know.

The bulk of the present research was undertaken on the factory floor of one of these small companies – pockets of hockey traditionalism, in a stage dominated by much larger stakeholders.

Chapter Four: The birth of the goalie mask

In seeking to make better sense of the realm of sports through the lenses of materiality, the researcher often encounters very difficult, seminal questions, which cannot be addressed conclusively. One of such queries is this: What is the process whereby a newly-conceived piece of equipment is first introduced and then becomes an integral part of any given sport? Instinctively, one would be likely to presume that every original item enters the sport somewhat ‘organically’ – that is, first being adopted by amateurs and recreational players, until it eventually reaches the domain of professionalism (if proven useful). Historically, this certainly appears to be overwhelmingly the case, if anything because professional sports leagues have, in general, evolved out of amateur organizations.

Notwithstanding, the codification of rules fixating basic equipment standards/dimensions and the subsequent rise of sports-related marketing strategies have – especially over the course of the second half of the twentieth century – steadily produced a reversal in this process, increasingly assigning to the professional sphere the function of serving as the entry point for innovative pieces of equipment (for instance through the experimentation with original materials and newly crafted protective assets, etc.). From the elite levels of the sport, then, the embracement of a new piece of gear has come to trickle down to everybody else.

At an age in which major equipment corporations extensively advertise through professional players and leagues49, such a practice certainly makes commercial sense. Perhaps even more significantly, the development of new or improved commodities ‘from the top to the bottom’ may be said to impact not only the actual engagement in sports (that is, the ways and tactics in which games are typically played), but even the cultural landscapes that surround them – consider things like sneakers and how these products helped to thoroughly re-signify basketball in America, for instance (Wilson & Sparks, 2001).

49 The amateur standards that university leagues tend to impose upon players need not be given too much consideration for the purposes of the argument being developed here, since there is little question about the growing professionalization of the administration of these leagues, not to mention the increasingly commercial nature of the endeavours themselves. 89

Maybe one can go as far as to suggest that this reversal becomes, as it were, inscribed in the products themselves: I have in mind here questions such as the evolution of the size and placement of a given brand’s name on hockey skates, for example. In the early models, this information was usually barely visible; in the current models, logos and nametags are featured far more extensively, strategically positioned. Today, sporting commodities are conceived, among other things, to function as ideal bearers of trademarks. Generally speaking, historical transformations of this kind represent another largely under-explored avenue of research, whereby scholars can demonstrate how, over time, the tightening grip of commercialization over the world of sports gets materialized in certain physical properties of sporting goods.

How did things unfold with respect to goalie masks? Here the singularity of the matter at hand once again presents itself in full: In North America, goalie masks started to appear consistently in the world of hockey through the professional sphere, although this was not a move orchestrated by major equipment companies – but by the players themselves.

Jacques Plante, who played for the Montreal Canadiens at the time, is credited as the first goalie to wear a fiberglass mask in an official NHL game. Some testimonials suggest that, since the mid-1950s, he and a few other goalies had already acquired the habit of using masks during training sessions (Hynes & Smith, 2008), especially if they were in the process of recovering from facial injuries. Still, the storied debut did not take place until a few years later – precisely on the evening of November 1st, 1959, at the Madison Square Garden, in New York City.

The New York Rangers were hosting the Montreal Canadiens and, three minutes into the game, so the reports go, Plante was knocked unconscious by a backhand shot from Rangers’ right wing Andy Bathgate. The impact of the puck brought about a cut on the left side of Plante’s face and, having gradually recovered consciousness, he was taken out of the game, bleeding abundantly. After being given seven stitches, Plante refused to return to the ice unless he was allowed to wear his training mask. In the absence of an experienced replacement goalie, coach Toe Blake – not without some unease – eventually agreed to his goalie’s request (Plante, 2005). Jacques Plante went on to put together a solid winning performance that day, helping to initiate what would become a rather contentious journey for those seeking to legitimize the use of the goalie mask in the NHL.

The backlash from the hockey establishment was articulated from different levels – and for the most peculiar reasons. With respect to the general reaction of the fan base and the sports media, Woosley (2004), for example, reports how “Jake the Snake [Plante’s nickname] was called everything in the book, from a coward to a nut to a would-be players’ union organizer and disturber” (p. E6).

Goaltenders who opted to wear a mask around that time were also on occasions taunted by their own peers. When confronted with questions about the matter, Rangers’ goaltender Gump Worsley, for instance, is said to have often repeated a tirade that he crafted: ‘My face is my mask’ (MacGregor, 2017). Even members of various coaching staffs would oppose the adoption of masks, although these would typically lean towards more technical explanations. According to Raymond Plante (2005),

Some coaches, including Toe Blake, thought that if a goaltender wore a mask all the time, he would feel overconfident and this might diminish his concentration. It would be easier to outplay a goalie who had lost that extra alertness brought on by fear, which kept him on his guard at all times (p. 83).

Reservations against the use of the goalie mask also came from higher administrative ranks. Muzz Patrick, general manager of the New York Rangers, was reported to have stated the following:

Our game has the greater percentage of female fans than any team sport I know. I’m talking about real fans – ones who can give you the scoring averages and the all-start lineups. Those women fans want to see the blonds, the red-heads – and the bald spots. That’s why I am against helmets and masks. They rob the players of their individuality. We start out with goalies wearing masks. Every club has a defenseman or two who goes down to smother shots. Soon, they will want masks. The teams will become faceless, headless robots, all of whom look alike to the spectator. We can’t afford to take that fan appeal away from hockey (Woosley, 2004, p. E7)

Little could he know that the precise opposite process was actually just about to begin: Masks would gradually become thoroughly associated with the individuality of players, as I discuss more thoroughly on Chapter Seven. The introduction of goalie masks in the elite levels of ice hockey was, in short, initially subjected to fierce cultural resistance, emanating from stakeholders far differently positioned.

These manifold perspectives were however connected in one sense: They all embedded an attempt to preserve the aura of hyper-masculinity that thoroughly enveloped the culture of ice hockey at the time – as it does, to a lesser extent, today (e.g., Allain, 2008). This tendency has historically been particularly pronounced when it comes to the position of goalie. According to Hynes and Smith (2008), “Scars and broken facial bones were worn like a grim badge of honor by the members of the goaltending brotherhood” (p. 31).

Slowly, however, opposition to the use of the mask began to dissipate. Some would claim that much of it had to do with Plante’s performance: “Jacques continued to wear the mask amidst slurs and ridicule; in any case, he was playing so well that no one could justifiably reproach him for it” (Plante, 2005, p. 87). Other star goalies – like Terry Sawchuk in 1962 – soon joined Jacques Plante in adopting the mask, further strengthening the pivotal role played by professional players in the popularization of the item. Throughout the 1960s, virtually every elite goalie ended up following the trend, thus initiating a cultural shift in how the item was broadly perceived by the general public.

It may be argued that this cultural shift relied heavily on voluntarism – goalies soon came to the realization that the use of the mask simply made a great deal of sense, particularly, as research participants stressed on many occasions to me, considering the technical improvements made in other areas of the game (like shooting), which made possible for the pucks to travel much faster and higher. Perhaps the most compelling evidence in this respect is the fact that “while the NHL has required all players wear helmets beginning with the draft class of 1979, there's still no rule forcing goalies to wear masks” (Fletcher, 2009, p. 25). In 1974, the very last maskless goalie was seen on NHL ice (MacGregor, 2017).

The introduction of new commodities, as I stressed earlier, can transform the established, hegemonic fashion in which a given sport is played. Taken together, little could be challenged about the cogency of this statement. Yet a closer look at the matter would soon reveal that commodities might do so in a variety of different ways – as well as to different degrees. Most new or upgraded items, it should be noted, produce only a limited, perhaps even almost imperceptible impact on the development of games. But there are some pieces which are destined to revamp conventional practices. The adoption of the goalie mask in ice hockey certainly belongs to the latter class. Roughly sixty years ago, its debut in the NHL was first received with suspicion and

skepticism; today, it has become one of the most preeminent symbols of hockey – and certainly the ultimate trademark of the goaltending position, as it is represented, for example, in the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.

One is thus compelled to ask: How such a pronounced change in reputation came about? A good starting point would be to indicate, first and foremost, the gradual nature of this process, for it is safe to assert that it did not happen overnight. Nor did it feed exclusively from exploits in the ‘field of play’. In reality, the elevation of the prestige of the goalie mask is also inextricably connected with a rich history of boldness and innovation in the realm of production – including, to begin with, the raw materials employed.

Whereas it is not necessarily true for every newly crafted piece of hockey equipment, the fiberglass (the core material used in mask models such as the one debuted by Plante) was back then a relatively novel invention. It was first mass-produced in the early 1930s. Kevlar, a component occasionally featured besides the fiberglass in more recent mask models, dates back to 1971. Alongside with some thicker variants of plastic and carbon fiber, these are essentially the four materials used to this date in the basic structure of goalie masks – fiberglass being the most common of them.

The first goalie masks to appear on ice were fairly rudimentary. These early models, all of which were handcrafted, tended to present asymmetries, as well as an irregular surface, poorly sanded. In the majority of them, the fiberglass was assembled in layers, as it is still the case today. But this was also an era of intense experimentation with different building techniques: Some players, including Plante, tried the so-called pretzel mask and, in Europe, helmet-cage combinations, like the one used by Vladislav Tretiak during the 1972 Canada-Soviet Union Summit Series, were prevalent. The latter cannot be regarded as masks per se, since they lacked a back plate. This back piece is, as I came to learn, the most distinctive characteristic of masks as opposed to helmets, enabling goalies to move their heads with greater agility and lateral amplitude, so mask makers would claim. The back plate also remains one of the noticeable links between early and contemporary mask models.

4.1 Three major phases in the history of mask making

In North America, the history of the production of goalie masks can be divided, in essence, into three major phases. The first of these phases, which spans from the late 1950s to the early 1970s, was set in motion by pioneer mask makers with fairly diverse backgrounds: Some of them had direct links with hockey, while others only came to the business as enthusiasts. Lefty Wilson, for example, was a former goalie and trainer. He was responsible for many of the masks worn in the sixties, most notably the Sawchuk model. Ernie Higgins was another pioneer mask maker. A former plumber, he later specialized in using fiberglass to build masks and orthopedic devices. Bill Burchmore, the maker behind the first models used by Jacques Plante, was also at first employed at the fiberglass industry. Plante himself ventured into the hockey manufacturing industry in the early 1970s, creating the company Fibrosport, which also took orders for custom-made masks, but was most importantly responsible for the first mass-produced goalie masks in Canada – circa 8,000 items were assembled per year (Hynes & Smith, 2008).

Most of the very early, handcrafted mask models were curved around the nose and the cheeks, because they were carved to fit very closely to the face. Later, designs began to be conceived around a sharp vertical line at the center, which provided the players some air cushion between the mouth and the front portion of the mask (since it typically ran straight from the most protuberant part of the nose to the bottom of the chin). This marked middle line is one of the distinctive features of Fibrosport masks50, although still incipiently (compared to some of the models that came later).

The protagonist part played by Plante in flipping the initial reputation of the goalie mask on its head was outstanding, particularly when one considers how he managed to advance the cause from two different fronts – having stakes both as a player and as a manufacturer. In the first place, just like any other goalie, he had a self-evident interest in advocating for the mask – that is,

50 I heard from several mask makers that Plante’s face provided a quasi-ideal alignment between the nose and the chin (in terms of design). These mask makers would also on occasion complain about how replicas of Plante’s masks, when molded on others, would not look as cool and sharp-edged. One must consider in this connection that handcrafted masks are built directly upon the mold of a player’s face. If the mold is aptly produced, as I will describe in detail later, angles and asymmetries on the face should be transferred to the fiberglass. 94

safeguarding his own face from injuries. He was, in addition, one of the few players who had enough leverage to defy the hockey establishment at the time. But Plante was also often described as a creative, business-oriented mind51. Among the issues that prompted him to wear a mask on that pivotal day at the Madison Square Garden, a biographer suggests, was that “he could not suppress the business instinct that lurked inside him” (Plante, 2005, p. 86).

This first wave of North American mask makers was essentially preoccupied with the functional properties of the masks. They took in consideration, as I was best able to systematize based on the evidence I gathered, five elements. First and foremost, they were engaged in the pursuit of an adequate balance between the thickness and the weight of the masks. They would like the masks to be as safe as possible, but without turning them into too heavy a load to be dressed with. Second, they wanted to expand the field of vision as thoroughly as possible. Third, they were looking for ways to improve comfort, particularly by fixating the masks more efficiently, minimizing the movements caused by misfits (the introduction of an internal foam lining, for example, was a response to this concern). Fourth, they were seeking alternatives to enhance the ventilation of the masks. And, lastly, they were trying to preserve some of the ability of goaltenders to communicate with teammates while wearing the mask.

Broadly speaking, the investment in developing such basic, functional properties never left the horizon of professional mask makers – despite how alien some early prototypes were made to look, especially in retrospect. Many of the technical improvements achieved in the decades that followed were directly related to these fundamental concerns, which underpin the entire history of mask making. Sometimes, ideas were implemented that tackled more than one of these issues at once. For example, by cutting ventilation holes in the parts of the mask that sat above the mouth and ears of goalies, mask makers were able to reduce some weight, improve ventilation, and allow

51 In one of the last contracts that he signed with the Toronto Maple Leafs, for example, Plante implemented the following strategy: “Guess what? Jacques Plante doesn’t get paid for sharing the Maple Leafs’ goaltending shores with Bernie Parent. Not a cent. Honest. And he has yet to receive so much as a nickel from St. Louis Blues, whose net he guarded with historic distinction during the 1968-1969 and 1969-1970 National Hockey League seasons. No, Jake the Sneak hasn’t taken a leave of his senses. He has simply devised a devilishly clever way of lightening an oppressive tax burden. Here’s what it is: He has arranged to have his hockey salary paid to him later on, after his career is over and he has dropped into a lower income bracket where the government seizes a smaller bite” (Proudfoot, 1971, p. 17).

goaltenders to communicate with teammates more effectively. Similarly, the introduction of cages expanded considerably the field of vision, while also making the masks lighter.

By the mid-late 1970s, however, a second wave of mask makers started to enter the scene, gradually introducing new concepts that triggered what I will refer to as a second major phase in the history of goalie mask making. This second generation added, most importantly, another layer of complexity to the craft: They sought to bring together functional and aesthetic elements in the production of goalie masks.

In the years that followed, this tendency unfolded simultaneously in two distinct – yet complementary – directions. On one hand, mask makers began to work more carefully on the design of the masks, paying greater attention to issues such as symmetry; the angles in which the lines met; the placement and position of the ventilation holes; and the sharpness of the ridges. Around this same period, the size of the masks increased considerably, most notably to cover more thoroughly the ears of the goalies, as well as parts of the neck and the throat. In addition, the notion that masks could help goalies deflect the puck away from the net started to gain track, being fully incorporated into novel designs, especially through the elongation of the ridges and the inclination assigned to the peripheral areas of the mask. Most models also displayed pointed lines and edges that were meant to make them look aggressive and intimidating – thus wholly integrating them into the broader culture of hyper-masculinity generally attached to hockey goalies, as I alluded earlier. Every accomplished mask maker developed a fairly characteristic, recognizable style; although the same mask maker would sometimes come up with strikingly diverse models to fit different goalies.

In parallel to this search for improved, more aesthetically-impactful designs, mask makers also began to adorn the masks with vibrant paintings. This tradition was initiated almost by chance, so the story has been told, when a trainer dyed the mask of goaltender Doug Favell in orange paint, in what was initially intended as a Halloween prank. “Done up in solid orange for a game on Halloween night in 1971, the jack-o’-lantern vision heralded an era of mask art that cemented the goaltender mystique” (Cameron & Cameron, 2014, p. 55). The goalie Gary Cheevers has also been frequently mentioned as a precursor in this respect: In the 1967-1968 NHL season, he allowed stitches to be drawn on his mask every time it was hit by a puck, becoming, according to Hunter

(1998), “the first goaltender to exploit the expressive possibilities of the inexpressive mask” (p. 147).

Such incipient beginnings soon gave birth to what mask collectors and enthusiasts regard as the most prolific and diverse period in the history of goalie masks (roughly from the late 1970s to the mid-1980s). In effect, the art of mask making never again witnessed such a wide variation in the combination of designs and paintings. The artworks of this period were not as detailed as the ones prevalent today; but they were already, as I will discuss at greater length later, invested with huge symbolism – and sometimes quite ambiguous meanings. Most of the times, the manufacture and the artwork were undertaken by the same mask maker (or company), who was thus responsible for all stages in the production of these items. On the Canadian side of the goalie mask industry, two names became particularly influential in the search for innovative features, not only in terms of the increasingly refined and creative paintings, but also focusing on technical matters: “While elaborate mask artwork captured the imagination of hockey fans and the sports media, physical design improvements to the fiberglass mask continued to be made by Greg Harrison and mask makers such as Montrealer Michel Lefebvre” (Hynes & Smith, 2008, p. 100).

This of phase was also characterized by another interesting dynamic. Elite goalies, as well as affluent amateurs, would commission mask makers to produce painted, custom-made masks. Most of the technical advances later transmitted to the rest of the industry were first tried in such custom-made models – the most iconic of which came to best epitomize the period that mask enthusiasts, later, started to call the ‘golden era’ of hockey. Yet these masks were very costly. The bulk of the demand for goalie masks was therefore supplied by mass-producers, thus meaning, as it still does today, that they rarely featured any artwork.

Things were about to change once more as a third distinctive phase in the evolution of goalie masks started to take shape, whose greatest catalyst was the introduction of the mask-cage combination. Ken Dryden and Greg Harrison – who at the time worked at the company Cooper – are widely credited for this invention (Hynes & Smith, 2008). The ‘combo’, as the model came to be nicknamed, debuted on ice in the early 1980s. For a few years, mask-cage designs coexisted with more traditional facemasks (form-fitting) but eventually the former proved far more effective, gradually taking over the goalie mask market entirely. In essence, the use of the cage thoroughly expanded the goaltender’s field of vision, while at the same time providing much greater protection

to the eyes (which, in the facemask models, were significantly exposed). In addition, the ‘combo’ was able to better safeguard the neck and chin areas, in comparison to the European models that used cages as well (helmet-cage combinations). Ken Dryden (2016) once claimed that "The Plante mask was a blessing; the hybrid mask was a miracle" (p. 289).

There existed, at first, some fairly distinct varieties of the ‘combo’ mask, mostly because the prototypes behind each model were conceived by different mask makers, and the hockey market was not yet so heavily concentrated in a few companies. Indeed, as some participants explained to me, even the premier models currently mass-produced by large companies like Bauer or CCM contain signature traits that can be traced back to the mask makers that once helped to design them – Michel Lefebvre in the case of latter and Jerry Wright, from the defunct company Itech, when it comes to the former.

But after Bauer and CCM positioned themselves to successfully claim the lions’ share of the goalie mask market in the 2000s (interestingly enough, Easton was never a major player in this context, despite its tradition in making regular helmets for hockey and other sports), diversification stalled even further. Not only did the models made available by each of these corporations (ranging from entry-level to pro masks) start to look strikingly similar; across different companies (including the smaller ones), designs would also come to display very little variation, especially if compared to the array of compositions from the previous era – almost as if, so to speak, a few definitive, ideal mask standards had been established by the industry. Plagiarism, so I was told, might have contributed, in a minor way, to this drive towards uniformity. Of course, outliers exist to this day. A good example is the ‘mage’ model popularized by former Boston Bruins’ goaltender Tim Thomas, in which the fiberglass structure does not extend around the chin area (protection is provided, instead, by a plastic piece and a larger cage). Overall, however, the ability of mask makers to infuse the basic structure of the masks with aesthetic content diminished remarkably over this period – therefore bringing the ‘golden era’ of mask making to a sudden end. Already at the time in which he was working on the mask-cage combination, celebrated mask maker Greg Harrison could anticipate how it would eventually mean the demise of creative, unique structural designs:

It’s the newest in face masks for goalies, providing the flash of the molded mask with the safety of the cage, but provides little room for artistry […] “They were looking for ways to enhance their looks on the ice, to get an individual appeal”, 98

says Harrison. He is now devising a cage and plastic combination model with maximum appeal and safety that can be mass-produced. “You could recognize a goalie from his mask, but you could never see his face. The cage and helmets are more non-descript. All about you can do is put on a logo” (Pottins, 1983, p. 27).

To be sure, this reduced artistic flexibility was in great measure linked to the imperatives of the process of mass-production, which, by its very nature, calls for a high degree of standardization. Yet, as I indicated above, mass-producers were already responsible for supplying the bulk of the demand for goalie masks in the preceding phase – even if some of the companies that reigned over the goalie mask market back then were destined to lose relevance, as major conglomerates entered the scene. The most important change, insofar as the third phase in the evolution of mask making is concerned, thus occurred at the higher levels of the sport: Elite goaltenders progressively began to adopt mass-produced masks, spelling the downfall of the traditional figure of the mask maker52. At the current day and age, only a handful of NHL goalies, for example, wear mask models that were not manufactured offshore – let alone custom-made. Perhaps because these mask makers represented, historically speaking, the driving forces in pushing for structural innovation in mask designs, little was accomplished in this respect ever since, although, it should be noted, major companies are constantly working on new ways to enhance the outer, superficial look of the masks, a topic that will be discussed more carefully in the next chapter.

I questioned participants frequently about the reasons that led to this conceptual transformation in the upper tiers of the ‘goalie fraternity’. But the answers they provided were very speculative. Some thought that it could have had something to do with the lobby of large corporations and the influence that they have arguably been able to exercise as the official equipment suppliers of various major leagues. Others tended to believe that goaltenders, particularly from the younger generations, have simply grown accustomed to ‘one-size-fits-all’ models, as Bernie liked to call them, having never had the chance to try a custom-made mask. The higher cost associated with custom-made masks was another issue raised on occasion by participants; but at the elite levels of the sport, the matter does not seem to play a very determining

52 “Whatever does not grow must disappear; and no business can grow without adopting the values, techniques and methods of today’s industry, spectacle and state” (Debord, 1998, p. 69). 99

role. A few interviewees would, in addition, claim that the quality of the masks produced offshore has increased in recent years, rendering differences less meaningful.

The tradition of building custom-made goalie masks, however, did not evaporate entirely. In a number of places, such as the factory in which I conducted the largest part of my research, it was kept alive – emulating, in many senses, a window into the burgeoning days of the Canadian hockey manufacturing industry. Most of the times, goaltenders would come after these models for the reasons one would expect: They simply wanted masks that would fit more comfortably. This is arguably the greatest asset of custom-made masks, provided that they are built upon a mold of the goalie’s face. But there were also some unusual requests, such as from goalies whose heads were too large to fit the commercial models (most of these orders, Bernie told me, came from Asian countries, thus providing some very preliminary indication that white hegemony, so characteristic of the sport in a historical sense, may be built into the very structure of things like goalie masks). Finally, there were also several contracts for custom-made replicas of iconic designs from the ‘golden era’ of mask making.

To conclude, I should like to point out that, in this third phase of the history of goalie masks, another important split took place: The manufacture and the ornamentation of the masks came to be performed, except in some rare cases, by different enterprises. The turn of the twenty- first century thus marked the emergence of airbrushing as a separate stage in the production of (painted) goalie masks. Collectively, airbrush artists – even studios in several instances – represent one of the few segments of the hockey manufacturing industry that has actually firmly expanded its North American presence since the inception of offshoring and outsourcing practices (a few of these artists are also based in Europe; the masks they paint, by contrast, are mostly produced in Asia) – as Mick Hayley (2008) frames it, “over the past two decades, a small army of artists has emerged to fill this niche market” (p. L1).

Not even this segment of the goalie equipment market has, however, flown under the radar of large corporations. Of course, a primal coating is provided by any mask manufacturer, in various solid colours. At least at Masks Co., in addition, the superposition of two or three basic colours was generally allowed in customized orders. But companies like Bauer and CCM have lately begun to offer a decent variety of mask models in which stickers containing quite detailed drawings are applied:

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Hockey equipment company Bauer hired Gunnarsson [the Swedish airbrush artist who currently paints over a half of the masks used in the NHL] as its official goalie-mask painter, and commissioned him to create designs for its retail masks to make those hot paint trends available to kids. Bauer launched a line of youth Star Wars masks, and his glow-in-the-dark series is coming soon (Brady, 2016, p. E6).

It remains to be seen whether airbrush artists will manage to avoid undergoing the same fate that has befallen upon traditional mask makers, if improvements in this technology ever come to offer more vibrant reproductions and thoroughly personalized options.

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PART III: FACTORY LIFE

Official patriotism is a mask for the exploiting interests. Class conscious workers throw this mask conspicuously aside.

Leon Trotsky (1940) 102

Chapter Five: Mas(k)s production

I still vividly remember approaching, for the first time, the industrial landscapes of the small town in Southern Ontario where I conducted most of my fieldwork. This geographical region remains to this day the manufacturing powerhouse of Canada, although it no longer displays the opulence of its heyday. De-industrialization has arrived. Even if the effects of this process have not been as devastating as across the border – particularly in the State of Michigan, once the epicenter of the industrialized world – significant impact has been caused by the gradual loss of jobs and manufacturing plants on the Canadian side of the Great Lakes. Entire cities were forced to reshape their economic foundations – not always very successfully. There remains an ongoing concern with the long lasting effects of pollution and the contamination of the soil. Everyone I met in the area had strong opinions about how things could have unfolded differently. Trade unions, in particular, were no easy subject. In sum: Not far from the burgeoning metropolis of Toronto, one may encounter numerous communities whose traditional ways of life have been deeply challenged by a recent squeeze in manual labour opportunities in Ontario.

The very same stretch of road where I started my journey into the manufacture of goalie masks once looked fairly different, one of my informants told me. When he was a young man, so he recalls, one could walk its entire length and virtually every single one of the many factories along the road would display a large sign advertising vacancies, hanging over its façade. It was not uncommon, at the time, for workers to change jobs regularly, provided the affluence of opportunities available. Occasionally, during lunch breaks at Masks Co., two of the employees would share stories about having worked at various different industries across the neighborhood, entertaining how unworried they were back then about quitting a position and seeking another one later, if they wanted to take, for example, a few weeks off.

While I was there, the ample grey, concrete buildings that at one time hosted these booming factories were still largely in place (paling, I should say, in comparison to the industrial brick architecture of the nineteenth century Canada) – mostly two-storey pavilions, some of which had been partitioned into smaller commercial stores. Only a few of them, however, seemed particularly busy. Out on the streets, there was barely anyone in sight – except for drivers passing by every once in a while. All the workers that I met throughout my research used cars to go to their jobs, with a single exception. Yet the parking lots around the factories, too, looked rather empty. Every

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single time I went to Masks Co., I progressed through the sidewalks almost entirely on my own, covering maybe a half-dozen blocks, until I could eventually reach the workshop. Once there, the quietness of the streets was overtaken by a much more vibrant atmosphere53.

5.1 An inside look

Entering Masks Co. for the first time was an utterly distinctive experience. The ceilings were quite high, providing enough space for a mezzanine that stretched from the front to the back of the building (on the upper left side). Under the mezzanine, there were five rooms, side by side: an office space (devoted to managerial stuff, such as dealing with clients, meetings, etc.) and four working stations. Each of these working stations was tailored for a particular stage of the mass- production process – specifically: moulding, cutting/sanding, painting, and assembling the masks. Curiously enough, despite the considerable size of the pavilion, most of the labour was performed inside these rather small rooms, which effectively comprised less than a quarter of the total space available.

Towards the wall on the opposite side of the mezzanine, there were several large machines (most notably hydraulic and mechanic presses). Several of these appliances were not functional; one would be amused by the amount of unnecessary machinery, furniture, and residues of production scattered all over the place, inside and outside the workshop (there was also a little backyard). I deemed this apparent messiness – an “organized chaos” as Bernie liked to say – relevant in one particular sense: It helped to bring about a working environment that, to some degree, escaped the thorough rationalization of time and space that, according to the academic literature (e.g., Bitterman, 1996), typically characterizes the assembly line.

Most of the inner walls of Masks Co. were covered with high metal shelves – including in the upper level. Some of these shelves had functional purposes: They were used when unfinished masks were transitioning from one room to another – for example, when they had been painted

53 Most of the noise inside the factory, as I later learned, comes from an air compressor that operates almost uninterruptedly, serving different functions along the manufacturing process. Most days, in addition, music could be heard in the background. 104

and were left to dry. In one of the smaller rooms, there was also a wall-rack to store the masks that were ready to be shipped. For the most part, however, the shelves in the main hall of the factory were filled with things that were not frequently used: Countless plaster and clay moulds, old masks, replicas, used cages, and boxes with parts and materials. Lying down on the floor, towards the back of the pavilion, several mask shells and back plates were left to solidify. There were several large ventilators in the main hall, which also helped in the process of drying the fibreglass. Every morning, these shells were usually collected, and then replaced by a new batch. Above the entrance of each of the working stations, there were, in addition, some replicas of ‘classic’ goalie masks adorning the walls. I am trying to describe this myriad of mask-like elements to illustrate a relevant point: In a glimpse, I went from someone who had never touched a goalie mask to someone who was seeing/engaging with them by the hundreds – discarded, fragmented, under construction, finished54.

The visitor tends to entertain the most peculiar feelings when entering a similar setting for the first time. Surrounded by all these ‘head-shaped’ figures, it appeared as if one was being constantly observed. At Masks Co., for reasons that I was unable to fully account for (allowing myself to enter the terrain of speculation, I would probably suggest psychological or aesthetical), the ‘front’ part of the vast majority of the masks was ‘facing’ the inner portion of the main hall55, thus increasing the sense that one was being watched from all sides.

After having spent a few months in the workshop, I gathered enough intimacy to ask the workers why they always arranged the masks in that fashion (the query sounded, I felt, a little awkward to be posed from the get go). None of them was able to provide an answer that I considered entirely satisfactory. They all said that they did so because it allowed them to manipulate the masks more efficiently. Whereas this appears to be true towards the later stages of the manufacturing process, when handling the masks by holding them by the cage allows one to

54 These mask-like elements on display inside the shop were not very colourful. Only a few of the old, used masks featured artworks. The new ones were typically painted in solid white or black; the shells, on their turn, had a translucent, dark green colour, characteristic of the fibreglass. 55 An analogous arrangement of the masks (front-facing) was also to be found in each of the smaller rooms, as well as in all hockey equipment stores that I visited (but usually covering only one or two walls, and not the full perimeter). 105

avoid causing any damage to the fresh paint, the position of the mask seems to matter very little in the early stages, let alone when it comes to moulds, shells, etc.

Observing the behaviour of goaltenders, mask makers, and mask collectors, I noticed a similar pattern: They tended to engage with a mask that they had never seen before by holding it from the bottom, as if both ‘parties’ were about to start a ‘conversation’ – more or less in the manner of Prince Hamlet. The few times I visited the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, goalie masks were also typically displayed in this frontal position, even if it sometimes prevented the visitor from seeing the drawings at the top portion of the mask (arguably the most attractive feature for those unfamiliar with hockey), especially in the cases of the (mask-cage combination) models that hang high on the wall. This is perhaps an important issue to consider when dealing with goalie masks as artifacts: They belong to a class of objects that features a focal point to which the gaze of most people tend to gravitate towards. Speaking from my personal experience, and insofar as the colourful models currently worn by professional goalies are concerned, I would take this claim a step further: As one develops greater familiarity with goalie masks, this focal point tends to move from the center of the canvas (usually on the more ‘spacious’ upper part) to the proper ‘face’ of the mask56.

A delicate layer of white dust covered almost every surface inside the shop. This thin powder was one of the residues of cutting and sanding the fibreglass, after it had solidified. Although both procedures were generally performed behind closed doors, the dust still managed to spread all over the place. There were certain days, especially when the factory was operating at full capacity, in which the amount of fibreglass powder in the air made the whole atmosphere look rather foggy. Most of the times, however, one could barely see it – I mean, as it flew through the air, provided that the dust actually sat everywhere, bearing some similarity to a frosty landscape. Yet, it was impossible not to feel it and smell it at all times. The fibreglass powder felt particularly annoying for the eyes, even if, as some of the workers there told me, one eventually gets used to it. I never did, most likely due to my contact lenses, I suspect. For the six months that I stayed in

56 Of course, this was not an issue back in the old days, when the ‘face’ of the mask and the center of the drawings frequently overlapped. 106

the factory floor, I left the building every single time with the feeling that I could expel a gravel of fibreglass from the corner of my eyes.

It was also very difficult to keep the fibreglass powder away from one´s attire – especially when it came to dark-coloured clothes. This was one of the issues that bugged the workers the most. Most of them would leave some old clothes at the shop57, so they could change in the morning, before getting the day started. These were not proper uniforms; yet, the same outfits were used consistently. I wondered frequently whether this recurrence, coupled with the repetitions in the cycles of production, did not help to enhance the feeling of ‘timelessness’ on the factory floor. As for my part, I was initially not bothered by getting my clothes dirty. On the contrary, I actually enjoyed it; for it helped me nurture a sense of belonging, of having to deal with a harmless annoyance that was so evidently an integral part of everyday life in the factory floor. The dust felt, as it were, as a constant reminder of the materiality of the fieldwork. To be sure, this was somewhat perplexing to the workers, who were hesitant to believe that I did not mind if my clothes were full of white spots. I think they assumed I was simply being polite. At first, they were always careful not to shake my hand or get too close when they found themselves covered in fibreglass powder, always acting very formally.

57 After a couple of weeks in the factory floor, I too started to avoid to using well-preserved clothes (that would otherwise be part of my daily routine) inside the workshop. These clothes, in the first place, made workers around me uncomfortable – concerned, as they tended to be, that the outfits would get ruined. But adequate clothing was important also for the activities I was willing to engage in. Once I was allowed to start helping in the assemblage of the goalie masks, for example, I was told that even casual pieces like jeans were not supposed to be worn during that stage of the manufacturing process – cargo pants were recommended. Jeans usually have metal clips, which could potentially bruise the fresh paint, provided that one needs to hold the mask against the lap to add final touches to it. My point here is rather intuitive: The everyday life in the factory floor importantly constrains one’s ability to use the types of clothing that, broadly speaking, denote higher social statuses. The owner of the business, Bernie, would often express some frustration with the fact that, as opposed to other professions, he could not wear his best outfits during working hours (to his affliction, he was very fashion-inclined). I experienced some of this embarrassment, as well, when navigating the public transit on my way in and especially out of the factory. As Bourdieu (2010) so eloquently articulates, “Goods are converted into distinctive signs, which may be signs of distinction but also of vulgarity, as soon as they are perceived relationally […] the individual or collective classification struggles aimed at transforming the categories of perception and appreciation of the social world and, through this, the social world itself, are indeed a forgotten dimension of class struggle” (p. 485-486).

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Even more to the point is an episode that took place during my first week in the factory floor. As I explained earlier, I adopted the habit of spending some time sitting on the stairs that led to the upper level, from where I could have a panoramic view of the whole setting, in order to take some notes late in the afternoon. These stairs, like most of the floor, were coated with fibreglass dust. So I sat there and did what I had set myself to do, immersed in my thoughts, largely oblivious to the fact that I was getting my hands and pants all dirty. This was so intense that I can probably still shake out some fibreglass dust from the notebooks I used in the workshop. For a few days, the workers warned me repeatedly about the fibreglass powder that covered the stairs, and even mocked me a couple of times as I stood up with stains in my pants. Despite having told them on several occasions that it was not a big deal, one day I arrived at the factory and the stairwell had been cleaned (only up to the exact step in which I sat). The workers simply could not accept that the dust did not bother me. Carey made sure to brush these steps regularly for the rest of my stay at Masks Co., in spite of my protests. Working class hospitality, I guess.

As time unfolded, however, I predictably became much less enthusiastic about the fibreglass dust. Indeed, I began to understand more thoroughly why the workers had such a hard time grappling with it. As a rule, the temperature was fairly high inside the shop, especially when it was raining and the air could not circulate as usual. For those performing demanding manual tasks, and thus sweating persistently, the fibreglass not only lands on the skin – it sticks. The workers responsible for moulding, cutting, sanding, and painting the shells were required to wear protective suits, glasses and masks to avoid inhaling it directly. This powder was not only annoying; over time, if aspirated constantly, it could lead to respiratory conditions. Some workers did not seem bothered about wearing the protective masks (especially the simpler versions, suited for less complex tasks, which gently covered the nose and the mouth); but others would complain about these masks eagerly (in particular about the larger ones that had exchangeable filters for chemical substances). Whatever the case, I found a little joy in learning that these workers and hockey goalies were, in an elusive sense, bounded by the need to use masks to perform their duties.

The protective suits, on the other hand, were generally white. They would not leave a single part of the body exposed, with exception of the shoes, hands and parts of the wrist, and the neck/head. Although the suits did not fit not particularly loosely, I cannot recall how many times I heard the joke that those wearing them felt like astronauts.

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Humour was, indeed, another quite distinctive trait of the general atmosphere in the factory floor. The workers would constantly mock each other with all sorts of puns. As far as I could tell, these were not intended as derogatory comments in any respect – they were, generally speaking, pretty fond of self-deprecating jokes as well. Most of the times, it appeared that humour was being employed simply as coping mechanism, comments uttered in passing as one moved around the workshop, a candid distraction from what was otherwise a highly routinized workplace. In other words, most of the jokes seemed to be aimed at subverting the stillness of the daily routine in the factory floor.

What I have in mind here is not any form of deliberate, organized objection against established norms; rather, my point concerns comments and attitudes that tease and temporarily destabilize the rigid, standardized development of the labour process. One of the mask makers, for example, would frequently draw a winged-emblem in his white suit, as if he was part of a flying crew. Carey, with whom I shared a working space for several months, would sometimes sculpt funny faces when he was cutting pieces of foam, using the empty holes that were left behind in the sheet of spume. When he had blue gloves on, in order to assemble the masks, Pelle would often drop by and ask him whether he was getting ready to perform surgery. Sometimes, I was targeted as well: While I was taking notes, Martin approached me on a few occasions, questioning if I was studying enough – “because there will be tests in the end of your period with us”. In consonance with what Korczynski (2011) observed,

The most common forms of humour embedded in the labour process (and on the whole shopfloor) were coded as ‘routine humour’ in which humour came from the way workers played with the routine labour process, and as ‘routine absurdity’ in which humour came from the way in which workers extended the logic of routine into absurdity. Both of these types of humour can be seen to be dialectical in the sense that they expressed a sense of resistance to the routine labour process, at the same time as helping to enact the labour process (p. 1436).

Yet, there were also a few occasions in which some sexist jokes were told, revealing what appears to be one of the ugly facets of the culture of hyper masculinity that thrived in the factory floor.

Banters aside, the workers were always very respectful of my work. They really struggled to believe that the activities that they performed could be of any interest in a scholarly sense. They also did not see what they did as, so to speak, a dimension of Canadian hockey that was not

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properly acknowledged or praised; nor were they able to perceive themselves as contributors to the cultural significance of the game. They seemed so detached from the goalie masks that they produced that, in the early stages of fieldwork, they even struggled to comprehend why I would ask things like that. It was interesting that, after a while, they started to get a better sense of where I was coming from: One of them actually became really hooked on the idea that I “would end up upsetting very important people” in the world of hockey for giving props to manufacturers, since, according to his line of thought, these important figures “did not like sharing the credit” – a perspective that I found quite entertaining.

In a somewhat stereotypical fashion, the workers loved endless supplies of coffee and, early in the morning, donuts. There were dozens of empty coffee cups sitting all over the factory floor. Provided that, as I came to learn, nothing could be easily wasted as per the prototypical manufacturer’s mentality, many of these cups were re-used as containers for different mixtures, and so were the coffee trays, which served to accommodate, more firmly, the boxes of goalie masks inside larges boxes – which would then be shipped to retail stores.

5.2 The manufacturing process

Imagine for a moment that everything was functioning in an ideal fashion at Masks Co. (which, truth be told, was seldom the case): There was no shortage of materials, machines and tools were working steadily, and no one was absent. What does regular day on the assembly line look like? To be sure, there was far more going on there than I would be able to apprehend and systematize coherently. But I would nonetheless like to offer a sense of the basic flow of the line of production – in other words, how goalie masks were brought into existence; who are those responsible for making them; and the different tasks that they had to perform.

Of course, in a working context like this, no one had the time to stop what they were doing to give me a detailed tour of the assembly line, nor even to explain in minor pedagogical steps how each task was performed (except for Carey, who had to patiently teach me how to assemble the masks). Thus, what is presented here concerns a general picture of the line of production as I was able to carefully piece it together by observing and talking to participants, as well as by trying to comprehend how their actions were concatenated. 110

The process of production began with Martin, who spent most of his working days back and forth between the main hall of the factory and his individual room – whose walls were (poorly) decorated with quite stereotypical working class masculinity themes: Pictures of motorbikes and half-naked women. Martin was a reserved person, around his mid-fifties. He had been working in manufacturing plants since his youth. What initially brought him into the goalie mask industry was his ability to handle the fiberglass58. Martin knew every nuance of the material, having dealt with it in some of his previous jobs as well – even though these other jobs did not require him to employ fine motor skills to the extent that his position at Masks Co. did. He had previously worked in the boat construction industry. Later, he was involved in the manufacture of armored vehicles, helping to assemble trucks. In both these branches of industry, fiberglass is also used prominently.

More than once, I asked him whether he felt any differently about producing yachts, armored vehicles, or goalie masks. His answer was always something along these lines: “I don’t really think about it”. “So what goes on your mind while you’re making the masks?”, I questioned him more pointedly on one occasion. “You know, it’s repetitive… I try to keep my mind busy thinking about other things, like going on a motorcycle ride”. That same day, after a little while, Martin approached me to add the following words: “Deep inside [he was pointing repeatedly to his own head], you know that you did all these things. But I don’t care at all about who’s using them”.

The other workers would also complain about their tasks on occasion. But Martin was far more vocal about the monotony he confronted: “Every day is the same, these molds all look the same: small, medium, large. Not different from last week, not different from next week”. In many senses, he embodied the classical working class archetype, prone to experience his days in the factory floor as a negation of life itself:

Insofar as industrialization meant the deskilling of labour, the wage earner increasingly experienced work as the marketing of minutes. What workers sold was the sacrifice of time; as employers seized control over the work process and the hours of labour became a managerial prerogative, wage earners began to conceive of worktime as not their own. (…) As management expelled “life” from work, the duration of labour became central: For the employers, it indeed became

58 Some of the great mask makers of the past also followed a similar path. Bill Burchmore, for example, used to work at Fiberglass Canada, when he started making masks. 111

money; for the labourer, it meant not only income but also a debit from life (Cross, 1988, p. 3-4).

The fiberglass arrived from the supplier in large rolls59 – these rolls were about a meter and a half of width. In the main hall, there was a massive table with an articulated arm attached to it, on which such rolls were fixed like paper towels, allowing Martin to pull one of the ends every time he needed more material. Using a large scissor, he cut the sheets of fiberglass into smaller pieces, which were roughly squared (circa 80cm on each size).

Looking more closely at the fiberglass, one can see how it is comprised of very thin stripes (approximately a half centimeter wide), arranged side by side but also perpendicularly, similar to interlaced ribbons and creating a flat chess-pattern. When Martin needed a reference line to make straight cuts on the sheets, he pulled out a single one of these fibers, causing this linear section of the material to appear somewhat more translucent. Under the table where the fiberglass rolls were attached, the floor, filled with such discarded strips60, shined brightly if hit by a beam of sunlight.

After Martin had finished cutting the square pieces of fiberglass, he carried everything he needed into his smaller room, in order to start producing the shells. On the large shelves of the main hall, there were several negative molds available for each mask model and size, so Martin also took with him the ones necessary to fill a given order. All over these large shelves one could find, in addition, dozens of negative molds that were no longer in use (or used scarcely). It was impressive to see how Martin navigated these molds, quickly selecting the ones that he would require, given how similar they looked like to the untrained eye.

In his room, there was also a large table, positioned against the wall. This was where he placed the negative mold of each mask, before starting to lay the sheets of fiberglass along its inner part. Up until this point, the fiberglass appeared literally just like a piece of paperboard – dry and

59 Several other materials, such as carbon fibre, also came in tall rolls. Kevlar was in fashion for a certain period of time in the industry, but Bernie never seemed too excited about it. His view was that Kevlar becomes too hard after solidifying, whereas he believed that the masks needed some flexibility. 60 However, very little material was wasted on the factory floor, as I mentioned earlier. Carey was particularly obsessed with the matter: He would cut the sheets of foam until there were literally only scraps left, making me quite anxious about how closely he needed to hold the material with his hands, in relation to the edge of the chopping area in the hydraulic press. 112

flat. But after getting in contact with a liquid mixture that included resin and hardener, the fiberglass sheets became quite malleable, adjusting to the cavities of the mold. Every mask contained numerous layers of fiberglass – I chose to refrain from revealing the exact numbers used at Masks Co. because this tends to be one of the well-kept secrets of every mask maker (it may also vary according to the model)61. Yet I can safely say that there were far more layers than I initially assumed, making this part of the process of production very repetitive indeed.

The layers of fiberglass were applied one over the other. Between them, Martin administered the liquid resin with a brush. One would be amused by how rapidly he performed such intercalated tasks. Since he did so with a brush in his right hand, it was hard not to associate his figure with that of a hurried painter. Martin’s movements while brushing were typically very elongated; yet at times he would also poke the fiberglass in some spots in order to ensure that it sank properly into the pronounced cavities of the mold. A first coat of black or white paint was also added at this stage. After all the layers of fiberglass were in place, he attached a weight that fit very closely in the inner part of the mold (from the back), ensuring that pressure was exercised upon the fiberglass as it solidified.

The hardener acted fairly quickly, making the fiberglass more difficult to manipulate after a little while. This was part of the reason why Martin had to move in such a speedy fashion. But the full process of solidifying usually took an entire day. Every morning, Martin received a batch of new orders. At the end of the day, when the work was finished, he paired the paper describing each individual order with the shell of the mask model in question. The shelves were left to dry overnight, on the floor of the main hall of the factory. By the end of most afternoons, dozens of them were laying there62.

Glenn, who was also in his mid-fifties, performed the second major stage of the manufacturing process, by far the one that I found the most excruciating. The smaller room that he used was not decorated at all, containing only tools and a working table. This was where most of the fiberglass powder came from. In essence, Glenn was responsible for cutting the outline of

61 This is a key decision that directly influences the weight and the safeness of the final product. 62 A similar process was undertaken in order to produce the back plates of the masks – of course, with much smaller sheets of fiberglass and molds. In the past, the back plates were usually made with plastic. 113

the mask (the shells produced by Martin had quite irregular edges, where an excess of resin tended to accumulate); the main hole over which the cage was fixed; the ventilation holes; the two thin holes where the ribbons that held the back plate were laced; and six to eight holes for screws. Similarly, he had to cut four thin holes on the back plate, where later the fabric stripes would be attached, as well as two holes for screws. In order to undertake these tasks, he used a special type of jigsaw, which projected a fairly high pitched, loud sound. This was also, as it would be expected, the most dangerous portion of the process of production.

After the cutting was done, Glenn proceeded to sand the inner and the outer parts of the masks, as well as the edges. Formerly, the entire process of sanding was undertaken mostly by hand. Nearly all of the mask makers that I spoke to – both amateurs and professionals – expressed little sympathy for this stage of the manufacturing process, given how difficult it was to make the fiberglass look and feel smooth, especially around the cavities for the nose (in the replicas) and along the inner part of the ridges. Nowadays, however, most of the sanding tends to be performed with an electric tool. The more expensive the mask model, the more carefully it was subjected to the sanding process, and the smoother the touch of the fiberglass was as it hit the skin. Moreover, at Masks Co., the sanding of some of the top models was still finished by hand, most notably in the pro and custom-made models.

Few things were as elusive to capture in a goalie mask factory as the minutia in the process of sanding. Fundamentally, what Glenn was seeking to do was to remove the excess of (hardened) resin that lies upon the surface on the mask, as well as to even up the top layers of fiberglass, leveling their chessboard pattern. But this excess of resin was almost invisible to the naked eye. Feeling it with the fingers was a little easier, although still challenging; yet every worker at Masks Co. could do so in a heartbeat. This was, indeed, one of the things that impressed me the most: The people that I met at the factory could not only exercise much more strength than I could in their fingertips; they were also much more sensitive than I was with their fingers. I remember one day in which I was helping with the hand sanding of a mask, and Bernie kept pointing to a spot where he wanted me to apply more pressure. I could not see any resin there, nor feel anything; but after rubbing the place repeatedly with the sandpaper, the resin began to wear out (like when an eraser is applied on a paper), as if coming from nowhere.

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Glenn was also able to detect whether, in the process of laying the sheets of fiberglass, any major air bubbles had formed. Sometimes he could catch bubbles simply by checking for subtle bumps on the surface of the shells. But if he remained unsure, he would gently hit the specific location he was suspicious about with a tool, then determining if the spot contained any air bubbles through the sound it echoed. If the bubble appeared to be fairly small, he would break it open, and fix it with some sculpting resin. In case the bubble was too large, to the extent that it could compromise the safety of the mask, Glenn would have to throw the entire shell on the garbage. The level of proficiency acquired by the workers at Masks Co. (Bernie liked to use the term “quality control”) made such instances very rare. I never personally witnessed a shell being discarded. But Bernie told me that, when the business was in its infancy, this would happen on occasion.

After this, Glenn would warm the masks up with a heating gun, in order to check for any remaining bubbles and, most importantly, cracks. He also used a red paste, which revealed the cracks more clearly, also filling minor irregularities. “A scratch becomes three times bigger after you paint it”, he often said.

As soon as the cutting and sanding portion was finished, Gerry entered the scene. He was the older employee in the workshop, as well as the most social. His small room was located towards the back end of the factory, closer to the door leading to the backyard. This was, to be precise, a painting booth. Next to it, on the outer part, there was a cabinet with many cans of paint, in different colours. Most of the orders received by Masks Co. concerned white masks. Black masks were not uncommon as well. But a few times there were also requests for other solid colours – as far as I can recall, I had the opportunity to see red, blue, green, and dark gray (my favorite) masks. Gerry would usually call me if such an unusual order arrived, to show me the colour that he was planning to apply and, later on the same day, the final result. He had three functional painting guns ready at all times – one for the white, one for the black, and one for the other colours that were eventually needed.

He took the preparation of the paint very seriously. The pigment, in most cases, needed to be diluted in a very specific proportion, which included another fluid, intended to add some extra shininess to the mixture – a glittery aspect. Gerry would make a large quantity of the white and black paints every few weeks. He preferred to craft the mixture without haste, so he would usually

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do it on Saturdays, when the line of production was not running. The less usual colours, by contrast, he would produce only on demand.

Gerry used to repair cars in his youth – that was how he originally learned to apply the spray paint. Inside the booth, there were a few (manually) rotating pedestals, in which the pre- coated shells were initially placed. With a spray gun, Gerry then released the colour, spinning the base of the pedestal slowly. He was very meticulous about keeping the right distance between the gun and the shell, as well as with respect to the velocity of the rotation. If these were not perfectly synchronized, he explained to me, the paint could feel thicker on certain spots, or even accumulate in the form of little drops. As he shot the paint, he did not stand still; he actually maneuvered his body and especially his right arm around the pedestal, moving sideways and even back and forth, adjusting the distance constantly. To add a few final touches around the edges, if needed, he would hold the pedestal with his left hand, so the paint could hit the mask from below.

Since most of the masks were coated in white, the painting booth usually looked white as well. But when, for example, a blue, green or red mask was produced, a significant portion of the room would take on that same colour – especially the wall against which the masks were being painted. Every once in a while, then, Gerry’s room would be illuminated with bright colours – causing it to stand out against that otherwise pale section of the factory, for a few hours. Until the colour in question gradually began to disappear, again fading behind new layers of white paint.

5.3 Assembling the masks

After I had spent roughly eight weeks carrying out observations on the factory floor, Bernie agreed to designate me to a role in the assembly line: To help Carey putting the masks together. Most fellows who have worked as seasonals at Masks Co. were allocated to this section, which also functions as an entry point to the other, more complex assignments. Carey, for example, was in the process of learning how to cut and sand the shells, a task to which he would devote himself every so often, especially if Glenn was absent. Carey no longer needed much tutoring, but more opportunities to practice, as the machinery was limited. He did not seem particularly excited about these other tasks, which he deemed more demanding physically; yet he would often stress the importance of possessing enough training to fill in every position, should the necessity arise. 116

I did not participate directly in the process of gathering the necessary parts to piece the masks together. Carey, who was always very protective of me, would take care of that. He would basically prepare three things in advance: Pieces of foam; artificial fiber fillets; and fabric ribbons. He would produce these parts based on the sizes and models specified in the orders he received every morning, in the exact numbers that we would need.

Preparing the foam was the most complex of these tasks. First, Carey would superimpose large sheets of foam with sheets of adhesive paper, sticking them together. Then, using a hydraulic press, he would cut the necessary pieces, employing metal moulds.

Cutting the artificial fiber fillets was easier. For this he used a small machine that he really enjoyed manipulating, which heated up a sharp, thin piece of metal to the point that it became glowing red, thus allowing Carey to clip the fillets without leaving shredded ends. He employed this same machine to cut the fabric ribbons. Finishing these ribbons, by contrast, was something that he disliked. Not because it was particularly challenging; but because he had to stitch the ends of the ribbons using a sewing machine, a task that was perceived as ‘feminine’ on the factory floor.

Contrary to the other workers who had to stand all the time, when we had everything we needed to assemble the masks, Carey and I could sit. The room where we put the masks together was somewhat narrow, but deep. Shelves, in an “L” shape, covered two of the walls. In the longer portion, the shells that came from Gerry, which were ready to be assembled, were placed – usually sorted by sizes (the larger ones on top), not models. The masks that were ready to be shipped were arranged on the smaller section of the shelves, next to the exit door. Two wide office-like desks were positioned against the remaining walls – the two working stations we used. Above these desks, there were several plastic containers fixed to the wall, filled with bolts, flat nuts, buckles, and other metallic parts. The tools and the foam were stored in the drawers of the working stations. Even when he was ahead of schedule on the days that I was absent, Carey would “save” a couple of masks for me to assemble the next day, which was pretty cool on his part.

The first step in the assemblage of the masks was to add the steel cages. In the high-end models, Carey would give the cages some extra polishing, especially around the middle bar, which was usually flat, and could thus shine more visibly. To do so he would employ a disk sander, against which he pressed the cages, as sparks flew by.

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The cages were fixed with four screws, the first two of which were relatively easy to attach, using an electric screwdriver. However, to affix the remaining two screws was far from straightforward. Neither the cages nor the masks were always perfectly identical; depending on how each pair fit, one had to employ more or less strength to align the holes in the shell with the holes on the cage. While it may be hard to notice at first glance, the cage of every goalie mask available on the market is highly tensed; if one of the corners becomes loose, the cage pops out of alignment immediately.

After the cage was secured, we screwed to the shell two special metal pieces (one on each side). As we did so, we also plugged, on the inner part of the mask, a synthetic fiber belt, to which a plastic chin cup was attached (stretching from one side of the mask to the other). This belt was not movable, although its length could be adjusted, if needed. On the outer part, by contrast, these metal pieces functioned as buttons, intended to connect the lower part of the back plate to the shell, through a fabric ribbon. On both sides of the mask, the lower end of these ribbons had a plastic buckle, which could be detached, so goaltenders were able to lift the front part of the mask, if they wanted to take a sip of water or talk to other players. Most of the mask models that I helped to put together had, in addition, an extra pair of these special metal pieces, which worked as buttons for a security strip.

Carey and I would then proceed to add a lining of foam to the inner part of the shell. This was the most complicated step in the assemblage of the goalie masks, I thought, since the foam was supposed to fit very flat – avoiding the formation of air bubbles, which, over time, could cause the protective layer to loosen. On my very first tries, connecting the pieces of foam appeared almost like a jigsaw puzzle, given that I had to figure out not only the correct position of each piece in relation to the others, but also whether they were meant to be glued on the right or left side (I asked Carey, who would observe with a smile, not to intervene, so I could better memorize the sequence). There were nine pieces of foam in total – three on each side, two on the center, and one on the back plate. Another tricky part was to make them adjust nicely around the ventilation and ear holes, also preserving a good general symmetry. It was necessary to hit the correct position right away. If pieces had to be removed after being fully glued, they would become useless. I did ruin some as I learned the task, forcing Carey to cut extra ones.

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Sometimes goaltenders would ship their used masks back to the manufacturer, asking for the foam lining to be exchanged. This was a truly gross service. Since the foam is for the most part in direct contact with the skin, it absorbs a great deal of sweat. It was actually possible to see darker spots on the lining, where the sweat accumulated more thoroughly – these spots looked so dense that one feels almost as if the content could be squeezed out. Carey and I used to put thick yellow gloves and cotton masks when we had to remove used foam linings, yet the strong smell was still pronounced.

A few final touches were still necessary to complete the assemblage of the masks. We added a sweatband, which was placed around the forehead area. We then proceeded to the part I appreciated the most – pasting, on a few different locations, half a dozen stickers featuring logos, instructions for use, disclaimers, and certifications (depending on the model). The stickers – when carefully aligned – really lighten the commodity-dimension of the masks, which up until that point remained, in my opinion, largely implicit. The next step was to attach the back plate, using the fabric ribbons. These ribbons had to pass through different thin holes on the mask and the back plate (eight in total), another task that demanded some thinking, before the right sequence was fully memorized. The very final move was to give the goalie mask an overall polishing, with a regular flannel, to remove any dust or fingerprints.

The progression and content of the building steps unfolded very similarly regardless of the mask model in question, thus highlighting, as I stressed earlier, the general convergence towards a few basic structural mask designs, with limited variations. Carey was also the employee responsible for arranging shipment of the masks, allocating them, individually, in plastic bags and then boxes. These boxes were, subsequently, placed inside bigger cardboard boxes; along with packages of mask parts sold separately, which hockey stores would often include in the purchases. “If the masks don’t go out, the money doesn’t come in”, Glenn used to say in relief, when the packages were ready to be shipped. But before that could be done, the masks waited for a few days in Carey’s room, until the orders were filled in their entirety.

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5.4 Goalie masks dissected: The ‘Made in Canada’ claim

So there I found myself, standing in front of several shelves stacked with goalie masks, some of which I had made a small contribution to their creation. From that room, the masks would travel to the most varied and distant places in the world of hockey. Individually, each of these masks was, quite simply, an amalgamation of the processes, raw materials, and parts I just sought to describe. But what else was there to be seen, beyond the things that were – so to speak – immediately available to the naked eye? I should like to explore this query from two different angles. First, I want to examine in brief the origins of raw materials and parts. This is followed by an analysis of whether the research participants valued goalie masks differently (as well as other pieces of hockey equipment more generally) if they were ‘Made in Canada’63. Second, I will share some of the nuances that I learned about the design of mass-produced masks, paying particular attention to how certain physical attributes, which may at first appear largely incidental, can in reality be infused with great symbolic significance – “hidden traces of a mask”, to borrow an expression from Lévi-Strauss (1999).

63 I am not interested in discussing the matter here from a legal standpoint. But, for illustrative purposes, below are the rather objective guidelines established by the Competition Bureau of Canada (2009, p. 16- 17): “Product of Canada claims”: The Bureau generally will not challenge a representation that states that a good is a "Product of Canada" under the false or misleading representations provisions of the Acts if these two conditions are met:

(a) the last substantial transformation of the good occurred in Canada; and (b) all or virtually all (at least 98%) of the total direct costs of producing or manufacturing the good have been incurred in Canada.

“Made in Canada Claims”: The Bureau will generally not challenge a representation that a good is "Made in Canada" under the false or misleading representations provisions of the Acts if these three conditions are met: (a) the last substantial transformation of the good occurred in Canada; (b) at least 51% of the total direct costs of producing or manufacturing the good have been incurred in Canada; and (c) the "Made in Canada" representation is accompanied by an appropriate qualifying statement, such as "Made in Canada with imported parts" or "Made in Canada with domestic and imported parts". This could also include more specific information such as "Made in Canada with 60% Canadian content and 40% imported content". 120

The goalie masks manufactured at Masks Co. were fully assembled on Canadian soil; yet, several of the raw materials and parts employed in their production came from other parts of the world. The plastic chin cups used in the higher-end models, for instance, were produced in China, and so were the rolls of foam. The carbon fiber came from the United States. In the main hall, there were several sealed boxes containing basic materials (like the fabric ribbons), which had been shipped from places like Taiwan, Thailand, and China. Some of the tools, too, had foreign origins – thus adding another layer of complexity to the question of what it means for something to be ‘Made in Canada’ (since these tools were not directly featured in the final product). One morning, for example, I arrived at the shop and Carey was anxiously waiting to show me something that he had just figured out: The sandpaper, utilized when the shells needed to be polished by hand, was imported from Brazil.

The employment of globalized resources in the assembly line is, in itself, nothing new: Roughly a century ago, in the famed Ford Rouge River plant, “raw materials like iron and coal for making steel came from regional suppliers around the upper Great Lakes region, while rubber for tires and other parts came from more remote parts of the world” (Skoll, 2016, p. 82). The hockey manufacturing industry, too, was subjected to similar trends. By the early 1990s, for example, Reich (1991) claims that “Precision hockey equipment is designed is Sweden, financed in Canada, and assembled in Cleveland and Denmark for distribution in North America and Europe, respectively, out of alloys whose molecular structure was researched and patented in Delaware and fabricated in Japan” (p. 240). Yet this trend certainly intensified towards the end of the twentieth century (stretching over to small manufacturers that had previously been more inclined to source locally), especially as the extraction of basic resources became significantly less costly in the countries of the Global South (Risse, 2012).

Not every raw material or part was, however, obtained overseas. In the case of Masks Co., specifically, several of the components used in the assembly line were not only produced in Canada, but also in Southern Ontario. The most unique of them were perhaps the steel cages, of which Bernie seemed very fond. Few work-related circumstances would annoy him more than customers calling or writing emails to complain about cages that bent during games. As he told me numerous times, he strongly believed that the cages had to be built to crook upon impact, instead of shattering. “You can always buy a new cage, but there is nothing you can do about your eyes”, he used to say. The fiberglass, too, was a product of Canada. 121

In our conversations, Bernie often stated, somewhat vaguely, that he wished he could employ only Canadian-made materials and parts in the manufacture of the masks; yet the prices of foreign supplies were simply much more competitive – that is, when it was even possible to find a Canadian alternative. If the figures were not too disparate, he would always opt for the local source, so he argued. At first, I was not entirely sold on this claim. But as I got to know him better, I could see how the matter would bother him constantly. He did not seem particularly concerned about the raw materials; however, he was very meticulous about the origins of the parts – as well as about their quality. He even detailed to me, on a few occasions, his plan to apply for funding from the provincial government in order to subsidize the production of a particular mask part that he had to purchase from abroad, given the lack of Canadian-made options; yet, to my knowledge, he did not have any luck in such enterprises.

I was never able to fully comprehend why Bernie seemed so resolute about favouring Canadian manufacturers. We spent a great deal of time together and, contrary to most of the other mask enthusiasts that I interviewed, Bernie rarely spoke about hockey as a dimension of Canadian national identity. Above everything else, I think he was bounded by a sense of commitment – as a small manufacturer himself, he appeared to feel that it was his duty to promote, to the best extent possible, companies from the region. Several of his suppliers, indeed, were located not too far from the mask factory, with commercial ties dating back to the infancy of the business. Sometimes, it was not even necessary for raw materials or parts to be shipped to Masks Co. – the deliveries were picked up in person. I am unsure to which degree this may be representative of other branches of industry as well. Yet, speaking specifically about my experience in the manufacture of goalie equipment, if the idea of ‘working-class solidarity’ still remains relevant in the Canada today, it is precisely in this sense: It no longer has anything to do with struggles for a protagonist role in the political realm, but with tactics tailored to ensure mutual survival.

Another caveat that can be added to this question concerns how, even on Canadian soil, immigrant workers may at times be responsible for manufacturing parts, as well as some pieces of hockey equipment. This was not the case at Masks Co., where all the workers had Canadian roots. But I heard about a community of workers with Vietnamese background, who were arguably involved in the making of some of the parts. Moreover, I know for a fact that a few branches of the hockey manufacturing industry, most notably the ones that employ sewing skills more

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consistently, like the production of goalie pads, depend to some degree on immigrant workers from Asia (often women).

To be sure, Bernie valued the Canadian roots of his products, which he saw as a potential opening to differentiate Masks Co. from big corporate competitors, eventually perhaps even in the sphere of advertisement. This has been, in effect, a common marketing tool amongst small manufacturers of hockey equipment. A business owner framed the matter to me in the following fashion: “Our brand in being made in Canada means something. You know what I mean? It means that our brand stands for quality, good service, all good things – I would like to think”. Interestingly enough (especially from a dialectical frame of analysis), the ‘Made in Canada’ claim carried, for some time, significant weight in both material and symbolic senses.

In a ‘material sense’ I mean, on the one hand, how the equipment was experienced on ice. In the years that followed the inception of offshoring and outsourcing strategies, it became widely believed, as several participants told me, that Canadian-made hockey gear was superior in terms of quality and performance, when compared to imports. During this period, even major companies like Bauer and CCM preserved a modest portion of their productive capabilities in North America – small factories and warehouses associated with upper tier products and quality control. “Overseas factories are fine for making entry level skates, but lack skilled workers to produce higher-end ones” – John Heinzl (1999, p. M1), for example, once reported.

But these Canadian-made products also featured, on the other hand, what may perhaps be best described as a ‘symbolic’ appeal to the sentimentalism of the consumers of hockey-related goods – particularly those who were prone to hold in high regard the links between hockey and Canadian national identity, and would be willing to go as far as to adjust their consumer choices based on that belief.

Over the last decade or so, however, the quality of hockey products manufactured overseas has improved considerably, as various participants told me – including the workers at Masks Co. There probably still are consumers who would deliberately seek Canadian made products64 when

64 Another interesting thing that I learned about the workers at Masks Co. was that they talked their talk and walked their walk when it comes to privileging local sports manufacturers. When they were buying supplies 123

looking for new pieces of hockey equipment – I met many mask enthusiasts who at least claimed so. Yet, overall, the distinction ascribed to the ‘Made in Canada’ claim appears to have lost some of its bearings in recent years. None of the goalies that I talked to seemed particularly concerned about the matter – they sounded, instead, largely indifferent to the origins of the equipment. Curiously, one of the younger goaltenders actually suggested the contrary of what tended to be the prevailing belief on the topic; in her opinion, the best equipment for goalies was, in reality, manufactured overseas: “It would be cool if the best stuff was made here, but unfortunately it isn’t, and I am not super, super patriotic that I’d want all my stuff made in Canada”.

5.5 Goalie masks dissected: Latent signifiers

A goalie mask is always, above everything else, a protective piece of equipment – Bernie repeatedly stressed. Its design is therefore highly contingent on functional imperatives – and it cannot be judged unless against this basic premise. To put it differently: Aesthetic elements, despite their appeal to the general public, should not take precedent in the making of goalie masks; they need to be integrated within the fundamental purposes of these items. The considerations that follow can be best interpreted with that assertion in sight.

As I explained earlier, there are fundamentally two ways in which aesthetic elements can be incorporated into the making of goalie masks. At the present day, the artwork is, without question, the most obvious sign of distinction that can be applied to such items, and I will discuss the matter more appropriately on Chapter Seven. Yet, in the past, the structural design of custom- made masks also varied a great deal – thus meaning that mask makers were yielded a fair amount of flexibility to add a wide range of distinctive, signature elements “upon”, so to speak, to the functional properties of the masks. When it comes to custom-made models, this is still the case to a significantly lesser extent today – provided that the emergence of the mask-cage combination as

for fishing, for example, they tended to favor pieces of equipment that had been ‘Made in Canada’ – including minor things like baits. I think that in doing so they felt as if they were indirectly attaching greater value to their own work, in a way.

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the prototypical structural design in the industry thoroughly reduced the ability of mask makers to play around with these signature elements.

On a mass-production scale, however, none of these artistic possibilities seem to matter as much. For self-evident reasons, custom-made masks cannot be mass-produced. Whereas the number of goalie masks that will ever be decorated by airbrush artists is fairly miniscule. Which distinctive features, then, have been incorporated into mass-produced goalie masks, in order to grant them a less-standardized look?

This less-standardized look has been obtained, in essence, through two different strategies. First, there are some distinctive features that have been commonly added at the request of the goalies – ‘customizable items’, to employ the business jargon. Second, there are little design twists and signifiers that have been added by the manufacturers, typically fused into the basic design of the masks.

When it comes to the former, goaltenders can choose, for example, between various cage models – the most popular of which is the ‘cateye’ style, mainly due to its prevalence at the NHL level. This style, however, is not approved by the CSA. The reason for this restriction concerns the steel bars along the region of the eyes, which are arguably positioned too far apart (intentionally so, of course, so the field of vision of the goaltender can be enhanced), allowing enough room for the end of a stick to accidentally punch through (this is not an official explanation; it was provided to me by participants). Only cages certified by the CSA, which tend to display more evenly distributed bar patterns, are authorized in junior leagues. Thus, by looking at the cage style alone, one can already get a good sense of whether the owner of the mask is more likely to be a beginner or an experienced player.

On a curious note: Not only the style of the cages, but also the colours in which they are coated can potentially hint at the bearers of the masks (a burgundy cage was, I think, the most eccentric I got to see). I did not stay on the factory floor long enough to add any depth to this claim. But Carey, having been involved in assembling goalie masks for many years, identified the following pattern: Requests for white cages came, almost in their totality, from American clients. Similarly, he told me that European goaltenders usually preferred to attach a folded cloth, rather than a sweatband, over the forehead.

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Customizable options such as the ones exemplified above, along with other things such as the colour of the shells and the colour of the protective foam, allow goaltenders to exercise some minor input in how the masks will ultimately look. Or at least they can nurture the illusion of agency, given that the narrow spectrum of different combinations made available to them has, in reality, already been decided in advance by the manufacturers: “The spectacle epitomizes the prevailing model of social life. It is the omnipresent celebration of a choice already made in the sphere of production, and the consummate result of that choice” (Debord, 1983, p.13).

The second major strategy customarily employed to grant goalie masks a less-standardized look concerns, as previously noted, the small design details and signifiers that have been incorporated into the masks by the manufacturers themselves.

To recap: In the ‘golden days’ of the goalie mask industry, a plethora of mask models came into being. For several years, widely different structural designs coexisted. Some of these designs were so unique that fans could easily guess who conceived them. No one epitomized the ethos of this era better than mask maker Michel Lefebvre, whose exclusive models could be distinguished even by casual spectators. With the emergence of the mask-cage combination, however, variation progressively stalled; the industry as a whole started to gravitate towards a few basic designs, which were structurally very similar (with respect to the general outline of the mask and the placement of the cavities).

This remains the case at the present day. Yet the masks produced by different companies do not look exactly the same. Just as in the old days, mask manufacturers continue to attach a distinctive character to the items that they produce – albeit in a much more limited scope. Small details that serve, so to speak, as signature elements for mass-produced goalie mask models.

These minor differences concern, for example, the general countenance of the masks. Some of them have more rounded corners, while others display sharper angles. The hollow areas that are formed right next to the ridges can, for their part, be shallower or deeper; while the line around the chin area may be thicker or thinner. Several other such details exist, which may be difficult to recognize at the first sight. Mask collectors and enthusiasts, by contrast, are able to identify these minor differences immediately, sometimes even being able to link these physical markers to the characteristic style of the mask maker who originally conceived the prototypes of the models in

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question – prototypes that, subsequently, were used to produce the negative molds employed in the process of mass-production.

Mask companies therefore employ small design details to yield a slightly unique character to the mask models that they produce nowadays. In a somewhat paradoxical fashion, several of these physical attributes appear to be linked either to elements from the past or to be seeking to emulate high-tech designs.

To be more specific: The most prevalent masks models on the market today contain, without question, several physical reminiscences of earlier, iconic designs (a few of which have functions that have remained virtually unchanged since the very first models, such as the fabric straps used to attach the back plate to the mask – although formerly these straps were for the most part made with leather). The ridges on the upper part of the mask are also a physical marker first introduced in the ‘golden era’; they still constitute one of the central elements in the design of contemporary goalie masks.

The ventilation holes are also largely reminiscent of earlier designs. With the advent of the mask-cage combination, ventilation holes became significantly less important, given that the cages permits much better ventilation. Most current mask models have three to five pairs of ventilation holes (in the custom-made masks fabricated at Masks Co., goalies could actually choose how many pairs they wanted, if any at all); the designs of the golden era, by contrast, often featured dozens of them.

In the current models, what truly matters with regards to the ventilation holes concerns the fashion in which they are cut: Some are rounded, some are oval, some are triangular, etc. This apparently insignificant detail is however relevant in a political sense – and this probably constitutes one of the most compelling findings of the present inquiry. For the logo of any company to appear on NHL ice, it incurs licensing fees. Players are allowed to use any piece of equipment that they deem fit, provided the official standards/measures of the league are met (in university leagues, so I was told, players tend to enjoy less freedom). But the name of the company that produced it cannot be displayed, unless an agreement is reached between the company and the NHL. According to Steve Davies, the owner of Winnwell, a small hockey equipment manufacturer:

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The cost of putting his equipment in NHL players’ hands would be crippling. Manufacturers must pay around $100,000 (U.S.) per category – sticks, helmets, skates – to get their products approved for use on the ice during games. “It’s not how good you can make a product any more, it’s whether you can afford the licensing fees”, says Mr. Davies. For Winnwell, which has a staff of eight and earned $8-million last year, the costs are prohibitive (Seale, 2015, B9).

One of my informants corroborated this perspective: “The NHL as a business has really changed since the 1970s. You know, they have many more revenues streams, it is a big, wealthy business. As we downsized, we were not really able to participate in any of the programs anymore, even though we do still sell some products to different goalies in the NHL”. Not surprisingly, therefore, small manufacturers of goalie masks have been in general unable to afford licensing fees. Yet through the shapes of the ventilation holes, spectators and viewers can more easily discern the company responsible for producing a given model. These ventilations holes function, in this connection, as a ghost trademark for the companies that manufactured the goalie masks.

As I suggested above, there are also minor details in the designs that seek to assign to the goalie masks a high-tech look. The most distinctive of such features is, I think, the internal protective foam that major manufacturers apply to most of their models, which often displays drawings and well-finished edges. Sometimes, moreover, the images on the foam lining attempt to mimic the sewing style and colours of, for example, the leather stitching on the seats of sports cars. These sheets of foam are typically attached with screws, thus dressing the inner part of the masks with a rather elaborate, professional decoration. As Fredric Jameson (1991) remarks,

What has happened is that aesthetic production today has become integrated into commodity production generally: the frantic economic urgency of producing fresh waves of ever more novel-seeming goods (from clothing to airplanes), at ever greater rates of turnover, now assigns an increasingly essential structural function and position to aesthetic innovation and experimentation (p. 135).

On a more abstract level, it appears that the names of the models, from both small and large manufacturers, are also commonly crafted to convey a high-tech impression. These are usually comprised of an amalgamation of words, numbers, and letters – as in, for example, computer models.

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5.6 Ice hockey on the factory floor

Before entering the field, I often wondered what would characterize the relationship between the workers and the sport of ice hockey. Perhaps somewhat naively, I expected hockey to be an integral part of the daily small talk on the factory floor, maybe even focusing, more precisely, on the performance of goaltenders.

But that was certainly not the case. When everything was flowing smoothly at Masks Co., I cannot recall a single time in which hockey emerged organically as a topic of conversation, including during the lunch breaks. I provoked the discussion on various occasions, given my interest in exploring the matter in greater depth. Yet these conversations rarely unfolded beyond the level of sports functioning as a form of bonding social capital (Nicholson & Hoye, 2008). We chatted about things like favorite teams, management and lineup changes, and the recent dominance of U.S. franchises in the NHL. The workers also liked to present themselves as old- timers, disgruntled with how soft they perceived hockey had become, while also highlighting, mostly through anecdotes, the roughness of the sport ‘back in the day’. This finding appears to reinforce the well-documented connection between ice hockey and the working class ethos, yet in this case articulated from a different standpoint.

The curious part was that the workers thoroughly enjoyed talking about other forms of physical activity, such as bowling, hiking, golf, or fishing. The latter was, to my knowledge, one of the few activities that would occasionally bring some of them together during the weekends. Carey was by far the most active of them, even though they all reportedly practiced some form of physical activity fairly regularly. As we were assembling the goalie masks, Carey loved to talk about sport, but he usually only focused on baseball or fishing. Occasionally, we would listen to sports commentators on the radio. In their youth, most of the workers played hockey as a pastime – except for Carey, who only tried street hockey. Other sports in which they engaged when they were younger were baseball and basketball.

At Masks Co., it was significantly different when, for example, a goalie was visiting the factory, in order to cast a new mold or add final touches to a custom-made mask. In the presence of goaltenders, Bernie and Pelle, in particular, would become much more absorbed and diligent when dealing with hockey-related topics, inquiring about matters such as training camps, young

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goalie prospects, the development of contract negotiations, and the temperament and in-game tendencies of certain star players. They would behave very similarly at mask shows or if they were around mask collectors – focusing on questions that had more to do with the masks themselves, such as evaluating how accurate replicas were.

I expected Bernie and Pelle, as established mask makers, to be very knowledgeable about hockey, as they effectively were. Bernie’s expertise was more restricted to the position of goalie, which he played in his youth. Yet Pelle appeared to be a ‘living encyclopedia’ of the game. Because he had been around the upper levels of the sport for decades, talking to him about hockey- related matters was always a great joy, especially given how rich and detailed his memories were; but the conversations that we had were mostly one-on-one, as he sculpted the masks, or in meetings outside his working hours. Neither Bernie nor Pelle still played hockey, although they sometimes talked about attending games to support family members.

In terms of accumulated knowledge and spontaneous interest concerning developments in the sport of ice hockey, then, a clear distance appeared to exist between the mask makers (Bernie and Pelle), on the one hand, and the remainder of Masks Co. workers, on the other. This seems to reinforce, as Harry Braverman (1998) so compellingly demonstrated, one of the marked characteristics of late capitalism, especially following the second industrial revolution: The growing separation between design and execution in the realm of production. At Masks Co., the designs of the mass-produced models had all been conceived by Bernie, and he was also the one in charge of researching and developing prototypes for the eventual introduction of new models. When making custom-made masks, Bernie would also usually only craft the mold (thus, as I will explain in detail subsequently, the design), leaving the rest of the (more mechanical) work to his employees. It was the same with Pelle, although he was expected to apply the fiberglass as well. The remainder of the workers were, in essence, responsible for bringing Bernie’s and Pelle’s designs to life.

Perhaps nothing was stranger, as I became more accustomed to the daily routine on the factory floor, than to be immersed in an environment where almost every object implicitly hinted at ice hockey, but where the sport was barely spoken about. There were not only goalie masks and shells; various other used pieces of hockey equipment, such as sticks, pads, and skates, were resting

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on the shelves, not to mention some pictures of iconic goaltenders on the wall – providing a constant reminder that this was, after all, a hockey place.

5.7 Politics on the factory floor

I conclude this chapter by adding a few remarks on the nature of the political talk I experienced in the context of the factory floor. Traditionally, the working-class has been perceived as a liberal jurisdiction – in most places in the world the emergence of the left itself may be traced back to the political aspirations of organized labour movements. And yet the results of the 2016 presidential elections in the United States appear to have signaled a highly symbolic shift in this position, not entirely unforeseen, but perhaps triggered by different causes.

Central to the growth of right-leaning political views in the ‘swing States’ that comprise the so-called Rust Belt was, as the coverage by major North American media outlets at the time suggested, the strong rhetoric adopted by the Republican Party against the processes of offshoring and outsourcing. The basis for this contestation rested heavily on nationalistic ideals – including the notion that some branches of industry needed to be reclaimed because they were dear to ‘American values’ and geopolitical interests, as well as the assumption that U.S. made products were of higher quality than items manufactured elsewhere.

Protectionist tariffs have been, thus far, the prime response articulated by conservative forces to contend with the challenges imposed by offshoring and outsourcing tendencies – contradicting (yet again) the widely advertised right-wing belief in the free market. The left, by contrast, having mostly forgotten its internationalist past, found itself unable to formulate any viable alternative that could move beyond the appeal along nationalistic lines proposed by the conservatives, remaining conspicuously silent about the matter. Much more could be argued about the process whereby the North American left increasingly removed the difficulties endured by the working classes from its core agenda over the last few decades – despite its alleged emphasis on ‘intersectionality’. But it should suffice to point out that the result of this process was that, in the year of 2016, a much greater number of workers than had previously been the case came to identify the program of the conservative party as the one that better addressed their needs and aspirations for the future. 131

I carried my fieldwork during the year before the 2016 elections – the period in which the anxieties of the American working classes were boiling hot, mobilized by the debate in the political sphere. In Southern Ontario, of course, these anxieties reverberated less strongly than across the border; yet I believe it is fair to suggest that these preoccupations were already brewing among Canadian workers by then, and this became even more pronounced in the 2018 provincial elections.

The workers with whom I shared my days at Masks Co. were in general far more frustrated with the government and with trade unions, than with multinational companies. They seemed particularly upset about what they perceived as some complicity of elected representatives in the thoroughly unregulated development of offshoring and outsourcings practices. “It’s hard to change anything”, one of them once told me, “when your own government keeps buying all these things from China, instead of supporting the local producers”. They struggled to explain precisely what they believed could be done, now that most industries had already been affected. They actually often sounded fairly pessimistic about the future: “I don’t think we’ll see any change in our lifetime”, Martin stated on one occasion. But they had all sorts of ideas about how the loss of manufacturing jobs could have been prevented, especially, so they claimed, if labour union leaders had taken a different approach.

The threat of offshoring was experienced in such an intense manner that it actually bonded together the workers and management. The workers often expressed to me how grateful they were to have a job – several of their friends were unemployed. Bernie was the closest thing, in that context, to an “organic intellectual” (Burawoy, 2005) – he could formulate their collective anxieties much more clearly than the others, who would occasionally repeat some of his points a few days later. Bernie also nurtured a strong sense of responsibility for the fate of his employees; as the leader of the enterprise, he knew that any failure on his part could significantly affect the lives of everyone around. In our group conversations about the global hockey industry, nothing fascinated me more than the stance that the workers at Masks Co. voiced, a few times, on behalf of the workers of the Global South: They spoke with passion about how labour was undervalued in many countries, expressing solidarity, in particular, with the workers who performed fundamentally the same activities that they did – as if they were somehow loosely connected to these workers in an abstract sense, through the fate that they shared as makers of goalie masks.

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Chapter Six: Custom-made goalie masks

In most scholarly accounts dealing with the development of the labour process, and in particular within the Marxist tradition, the process of mass-production and the sphere of artisanship are presented as contrasting poles: The former is typically characterized by an emphasis in quantity, celerity, lower skills, and the fragmentation of work; while the latter tends to be framed in terms of quality, refined abilities, and greater autonomy over the pace and the different stages of the manufacturing process. In these accounts, the industrial revolution widely signals, from a historical standpoint, the triumph of the mass-production approach over the artisan mentality (e.g., Debord, 1983) – at least on a world-stage scale. Eventually, this process led to “the emergence of a work routine more clearly structured to the needs of capital rather than labour” (Behagg, 1990, p. 53)65. In other words, “By the division of labour; the supervision of labour; fines; bells and clocks; money incentives; preachings and schoolings; the suppression of fairs and sports – new labour habits were formed, and a new time-discipline was imposed” (Thompson, 1967, p. 90).

In principle, then, the artisan and the mass-producer tend to entertain a different relationship with the productive process. Having always conceived these two fundamentally different approaches to the production of things in terms of their mutual negation, it was with some perplexity that I first came across both of these processes unfolding side by side on the factory floor where I carried out my research. The manufacture of mass-produced and custom-made masks was, in a sense, even organically connected, given that the raw materials, as well as some of the tools, were shared by workers and mask makers alike. Of course, I was not surprised to learn that custom-made masks still existed – pockets of artisanship thrive everywhere in the world, despite

65 Some authors go even further, claiming that the experience of time, as it is unfolds within the factory floor, was eventually translated into other walks of life, ultimately becoming hegemonic: “Along with the rationalization of the work process came the rationalization of the working time. Clock-time assisted industry’s need for a regular labour force and synchronicity of production. Thompson argues that the time of the industrial factory in a capitalist economy became hegemonic: that is, it became the central way in which time was organized in society. Time became something that was understood primarily in a quantified sense, something to be measured and accounted for. Time became something that was linked to productive ability, something to be saved, not spent, something that was equated with money. Time becomes a commodity to be used efficiently” (O’Carroll, 2015, p. 15). Guy Debord (1983), similarly, wrote about what he considers the rise of “spectacular time”, as opposed to “cyclical time”. 133

the hegemony of the mass-production approach. I just had not anticipated both methods being enacted simultaneously, under the same roof.

Hence, inside the factory, two modes of production co-existed. The workers had a stable routine, with regular working hours, from dawn to the late afternoon. They were there every day. If they needed to leave earlier on certain occasions, they would also arrive earlier – a few days in a row if necessary to gather enough extra hours. The workers displayed an almost instinctive work ethic: They always took breaks at the exact same time, not only for lunch, but also for trivial things such as smoking a cigarette. If Bernie was absent absolutely nothing changed. They kept working with the same intent, with the same steadiness. They had some flexibility to adjust the pace of production to the demand. During some weeks, they were in a hurried frenzy; other times, they could do things more composedly. Above everything else, they enjoyed administering themselves without much supervision. Bernie “could come in only one hour a day”, one of the workers once told me. He then continued: “I don’t need him telling me what to do. There is work to be done and I come and I do it. I have the orders so I come to make the masks. The only thing I need is someone to tell me if I’m doing something wrong. At my age, I don’t need anyone controlling me”.

The workers in general also liked to preserve their own spaces. On one occasion I asked Martin about his relationships with the rest of the crew and he responded: “It’s all good, as long as they don’t come inside my room”. The older workers were more contained among themselves – but I could see that they kept some track of each other’s actions. Carey, however, was far younger, and they acted quite differently towards him. Glenn, in particular, liked to keep an eye on Carey, often directing him to speed up with the assembly of the masks. But Carey was rarely in fact lagging – the comments were mostly to establish some authority, I think. Particularly if Bernie was not around, Glenn also felt the need to supervise Carey’s schedule. He even did it to me a couple of times, not in any disrespectful way; after I was able to establish some regularity with respect to the days I would go to the factory, he would get a bit frustrated if I missed a day I was supposed to be there. So I started to let him know in advance, in case I would have to skip a given day. All these seem to reinforce what Burawoy (1979) refers to as the role of the workers in patrolling, themselves, the rules of the workplace.

The work of the mask makers, by contrast, unfolded at an entirely different pace – an “irregular labour rhythm”, to borrow an expression from E. P. Thompson (1967). In the first place,

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they were not there every day. Sometimes they would start working on a custom-made mask and then leave it sitting there for almost a week. But at times they would also have some quite intense working stretches – such as staying in the factory until 2-3am, or going there during the weekends. Despite the enhanced flexibility in terms of schedule, there was a lot of routine method to the productive process – the precise steps are discussed below.

It takes a specific kind of commodity to allow for such circumstances – that is, two modes of production sharing the same floor. To begin with, in the goalie mask business, just as in many other branches of the market, consumer demand stretches from very basic products to quite sophisticated items (such as the masks used by professional goalies). And yet the mask industry as a whole already appears to be too much of a niche segment to enable more specialized manufacturers to emerge – who could possibly focus on high- or low-end products alone. For this reason, the same companies produce from the simplest to the most complex goalie masks available on the market today.

The interesting part is that not all of the top models are made equally. Most mask companies offer only mass-produced high-end models, meaning basically that they have a few special features and parts, sometimes even a thicker structural build. At Masks Co., for example, the inner portion of the finest models was coated in a different colour and the masks contained a few additional layers of carbon fiber, amongst other extra touches.

Various features can be adjusted in these high-end models; based on conversations I had with mask makers, this is likely what most mask companies do, if they wish to address the specific demands of a particular elite goalie66. A couple of ventilations holes, for example, could be added, while the foam lining could be made thicker in certain spots, allowing the mask to fit more closely. Yet the basic structure of the vast majority of high-end models follows the one-size-fits-all

66 Another commonly-held belief was that major companies had an entirely separate line of production tailored for elite players. According to a small manufacturer that I interviewed, this was one of things that set his products apart: “Probably in some cases the companies that are making it – it is different than what you would get in the store. So for example if you came to me and wanted one of our chest and arms it would be the same as we would send to an NHL guy”. In the case of goalie masks, I tend to favor the view that special adjustments are made to commercial models, rather than better quality products built from scratch. 135

approach, just like any other mass-produced piece; thus, very few of the masks currently worn by upper-tier goaltenders were effectively custom-made.

The custom-made pieces produced at Masks Co. constituted a fundamentally different strand of high-end goalie masks, in that they were sculpted upon the mold of a player’s face. I discuss the molding and sculpting processes in greater detail subsequently. In terms of retail cost, custom-made masks were significantly more expensive than the prototypical high-end mass- produced models67. Besides Masks Co., a small number of companies still manufacture goalie masks in this fashion, alongside a few individual mask makers who work alone.

It took me a while to comprehend exactly how special these custom-made masks were. I say so not because they were definitely far superior in terms of quality or fit. Having never played the position of goalie myself, it was difficult for me to appreciate how much they added in terms of comfort, in comparison to mass-produced items. I did hear many testimonials stressing that this was certainly the case, but mostly from mask makers or from goaltenders who happened to be their clients. Moreover, even some of the elite goalies that I talked to had never actually owned a custom-made mask, so they could not elaborate much further on the matter.

I used the word ‘special’, rather, to underscore how the manufacture of custom-made masks connects the craftwork that I had the opportunity to observe inside Masks Co. to the very beginnings of the art of mask making. The items produced there were highly regarded by mask enthusiasts not only because of their intrinsic, practical value as fine pieces of goalie equipment, but most notably because of how these masks were linked to a long-established Canadian tradition.

It takes a quite experienced eye to identify a custom-made mask right away. During my first weeks at the factory, I was not able to discern anything unusual about that line of masks, since I was only starting to learn how the regular ones were done. The final results of both methods of production, in most cases, looked almost entirely identical from a distance – considering that the custom-made masks typically came to display, as well, the same general outline that is found in the few standard models that dominate the goalie mask industrial landscape.

67 Eccentric parts, like cages that featured 18k gold, could cause the price of mass-produced masks to go much higher, but these requests were very rare. 136

In the 1970s and 1980s, it was less difficult to notice the particularities of custom-made masks, chiefly because mask makers had far more flexibility to experiment with unique designs. But another important element was that there were no holes for the cages; instead, the masks were framed closely around the countenance of the goalies, translating to the fiberglass the nuances of the original mold. I am not suggesting that one could literally tell to whom a mask belonged by what was printed on the fiberglass; my point is that it was easier to perceive that the masks contained individualized traits and asymmetries.

The personalized shape of custom-made masks represents, in the view of goalie mask traditionalists, the core reason why these pieces are prone to fit more comfortably. When the models of the ‘golden era’ are considered, this argument seems indeed compelling. But when it comes to the more recent models, it loses some of its cogency, because the surface of contact of the masks with the skin has, over time, been importantly reduced. Still, this remains the central rationale for those seeking to persuade goaltenders of the advantages of adopting custom-made items. These advocates would highlight, in particular, the stability provided by custom-made masks, given how well they tend to adjust around the forehead and back of the head.

6.1 Casting the mold

The process of casting the plaster mold is an art on itself – but also a little whimsical to those whose faces are being molded. Minor details of the process may change depending on the mask maker who is in charge of it, but, in essence, the procedure is as follows: To begin with, one must cover the hair and the ears with a nylon cap. The plaster tends to stick to facial hair, so it is recommended to cover as much of it as possible. Lubricant is applied over the entire face, to ensure that the mold will let go more easily. Then several layers of plaster bandage are applied, carefully placed around the outline of the face, as well as avoiding the nose or the mouth area (depending on what works best in terms of breathing for the goalie in question). The critical part is to tap the plaster bandages around the cavities of the face, gently adding the correct amount of pressure so that the surface remains smooth, while also ensuring that the facial nuances are properly transferred to the mold. This procedure tends to be very messy, given the white paste shed by the plaster. It gives the person a comic, mummified look, which must be held for roughly half an hour.

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I once took a mold of my own face, as I wanted to see for myself how it felt. I did not learn much throughout the procedure, since most of it consists of holding a still position, with the eyes and ears basically shut. I grasped significantly more from the opportunities I had to watch Bernie performing it on others. It was however worth doing it for one major reason: To experience the deep, unsettling anxiety that overtakes you when the mask maker is laying the plaster closer and closer to your breathing cavity of choice (I selected the nose). The discomfort appears to be enhanced by the position that one typically picks in order to stay still for the requisite amount of time – slightly inclined backwards – thus giving the impression that one is constantly trying to reach out for fresh air.

Many of the mask makers that I befriended had funny stories to tell about the molding process – mostly self-deprecating ones, about trying to make molds of their own faces. Bernie, however, was different. He did not enjoy highlighting the comic, surreal aspect of the molding process. Not only did he take the procedure very seriously; he believed that mask makers often failed to treat the matter with the proper diligence, and this was part of the reason why some elite goaltenders would procrastinate about getting their molds done, or even feel discouraged about trying the alleged advantages of custom-made masks. Bernie would also be concerned if what he considered safety measures in the process of casting the mold were overlooked. He told me, for example, about the use of pieces of straws as air ducts, so that the molds could be closed further into the nose hole – an outdated technique that he regarded as dangerous.

If feasible, Bernie would always prefer to cast the molds himself (including for the masks that would be built by Pelle). For the elite goalies, he would try to schedule a visit when their teams were playing somewhere near Toronto, during the hockey season. He would then work on the masks over the summer, so they would be ready for the upcoming season. He would also personally take the molds of regular clients, unless they lived too far away, in which case they were given the option to send their molds by mail. In our conversations, Bernie frequently implied that the quality and accuracy of his molds was one of the things that differentiated his masks from competing businesses.

The resulting plaster mold is only a thin, light white cask (in the format of a face). This cask is later carefully filled with regular liquid plaster and attached to a base, which functions as a

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pedestal. This larger piece becomes, by contrast, a heavy block – which, at Masks Co., was placed upon a tall square table, so that the sculpting process could begin.

6.2 Sculpting the masks

If the fiberglass was laid directly upon the plaster mold, the end result would be a mere reflection of the goaltender’s face. But this is not what mask makers want. The task at hand is, rather, to sculpt a positive mold over the plaster, which will allow for the shell of the mask to take form. This already hints at one of the fundamental distinctions between custom-made and mass- produced masks: Whereas in custom-made items the layers of fiberglass are placed upon a positive mold, in the mass-produced models the process is done inversely – that is, by pressing the fiberglass against a negative mold68.

A cement-like clay is used in the sculpting process, which is far easier to work with than the plaster. In the infancy of the goalie mask industry, only a small amount of it was used to even up the surfaces69, since the masks basically overlapped with the face of the goaltenders. But in the present day much more is needed. The clay, in essence, is meant to fill in the areas that later on will work as ‘empty spaces’ on the mask – such as the air void between the chin of the goalie and the chin of the mask. Of course, it also gives the mask its general outer appearance.

I do not know much about the exact techniques employed by other mask makers. But in the context of Masks Co., the molding process started with an overall adjustment of the mold, particularly aimed at aligning the lateral portions, where the cask (made with plaster bandages) met with the pedestal. Subsequently, two square chunks of clay were added, one on each side of the plaster mold. These will be responsible for the protuberance around the ears, so characteristic of contemporary mask models. Then, connecting both square segments on each side, a third large

68 The negative molds used in the process of mass-production were also initially crafted using positive molds – not necessarily taken from any particular goalie, but ‘ideally-shaped’ (the one-size-fits-all approach). The material used in the negative molds, if I recall correctly, was a thick plastic – maybe even fiberglass. 69 The objective was to minimize sharp angles, which could potentially cause the masks to crack more easily. 139

piece was placed over the plaster mold – this was a thick fillet of clay, which would later be reflected in the fiberglass as the bulkier frame around the forehead of the mask.

After these structuring pieces were in place, the nuanced part began. Different-sized spatulas and metal rulers were used in the sculpting process, as well as the hands (dressed with disposable gloves). The rulers were mostly meant to keep the proportions right – Bernie and Pelle did not have these proportions written down anywhere; but they knew them tacitly. So for example if they measured the mold to have an x number of centimeters of width, they knew that the chin area had to feature one fourth of x, and so forth. The rulers were also important to verify the angles in which the lines met. When I was around observing them work, I was frequently called forth to help with that, holding the ruler along one of the coordinates, while they could check the angles and inclinations with another ruler.

Some portions of the positive mold that was emerging, such as the chin area, demanded a lot of clay; other sections, like around the cheeks, needed only a thin layer. As more and more bits of clay were being added, the white colour of the plaster slowly faded behind the dark grey colour of the clay, progressively closing towards the region of the eyes and nose, where a hole remained, revealing the eyes and nose of the plaster mold. No sculpting was necessary on this area, since it would anyways be removed and replaced by the cage.

The halfway line of the mask guided the entire sculpting process, given the importance of structural symmetry. This was considered key even with respect to safety aspects, for the more balanced a structure is, the greater impact it tends to be able to absorb while maintaining its integrity. Bernie and Pelle would typically draw upon the clay a faint central line with the edge of the spatula, running from the top to the bottom of the mold. They would erase it after everything was finished, because they did not want it to be translated into the fiberglass. While it was there, however, it provided valuable orientation for the mask makers, as to what the appropriate distribution of clay was. In conversations with professional and amateur mask makers, I was told several stories about masks whose (imaginary) central line was bent, particularly over the chin. If that was the case and the problem was discovered only after the fiberglass shell had already solidified, the masks could very rarely be saved.

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The ridges and the chin were the parts of the mold that took longer to sculpt. They were also the areas that, in the current models, yielded greater latitude for mask makers to infuse with their own personal style. For example, the central section that coincides with the front of the ‘helmet’, towards which the ridges converge, could be made smaller or bigger, as well as in different shapes; while the chin could be carved shorter or more elongated. The curvature of the latter could, moreover, be tightened or broadened, amongst many other minor tweaks that mask makers can potentially choose to add. The upper portion of the cheeks tended to be the most delicate of the sculpting regions, usually flattened through the use of thumb pressure.

The sculpting process has historically been at the very heart of the art of goalie mask making. Having attended and studied several mask exhibitions and shows, I would not hesitate to suggest that, while it may be counter-intuitive to external observers (just like I happened to be), the great Canadian mask makers of the past have been chiefly cherished for what they were able to accomplish in terms of structural design. And not because of the painted artworks, which initially were, in reality, fairly basic. There is little doubt that the reputation of goalie masks has been greatly lifted through the confluence of both art forms – invaluable in their own right. And one may even compellingly argue that the balance of power has lately flipped, as the artworks have risen in prominence, while custom-made masks have become increasingly rare. However, it is safe to assert that, for mask traditionalists as well as to mask collectors, the techniques and skills required to sculpt the masks have, from a historical angle, usually been considered the abilities that mattered the most (including in assessing the value of the masks70).

Bernie and Pelle, well-aware of the tradition to which they belonged, approached the sculpting process quite soberly – almost with reverence. Bernie, in particular, was prone to small rituals, like spending some time alone in his office room, in order to get “in the right mood”, so he used to say. From what I could grasp, they genuinely experienced the whole endeavor as an artistic project. “I am so glad to live from my art”, I recall Bernie stating a few times. He would also often talk about leaving a “legacy”, through the masks that he was crafting. The fact that both mask

70 To elaborate a little further, the historic and monetary value attached to custom-made masks tends to be determined by an amalgamation of issues, which include: The performance/relevance of the goalies to whom the masks belonged; the uniqueness of the design; and the originality/symbolism of the paint job. 141

makers used to sign (on the inner part of the chin, using a special pen) the replicas and the custom- made masks that they molded seems to provide further evidence to this point.

We talked a lot – about the most varied issues – as they sculpted the molds. I also experimented helping with the process on many occasions, in case they offered (I especially enjoyed using the spatulas). Yet sometimes both of them would become deeply focused, closing their dialogue as they became more absorbed by the task at hand, remaining in silence for long stretches. Finishing the molds was a meticulous process. Many final touches were added here and there at a fast pace. The opinion of those around, especially with regard to the symmetry, would continually be requested. The workers really liked when Bernie was on the factory floor, constantly trying to help in what he was doing. All areas of the shell were built, so to speak, in excess, so the fiberglass could reach a little longer than it actually needed (the fiberglass excess was later trimmed when the shells were cut).

When the clay mold was finished, it was left to dry for a couple of days. The square sheets of fiberglass and carbon fiber, dyed in hardener fluid, were then applied upon it, just like in the mass-produced models. Bernie would rarely take care of this by himself (he would instead ask Martin to do it). Pelle usually did it for the ones he was building, but he also hardly enjoyed this part of the process. After the fiberglass was in place, the mask makers had to wait for a few days once again, so it could solidify properly. At this stage, the shells featured a translucent green look, typical of the fiberglass. The hardener slowly dropped along the edges as the shells as they dried, thus causing the contours to take on an irregular stalactites pattern.

Removing the shell from the mold was often a picturesque effort. The shells typically got stuck very firmly, so the mask makers had to use hammers and sharp bars to remove it. Sometimes they even had to push the molds with their feet against the ground, until they finally let go. These molds could be re-used every time the goaltender in question needed a new custom-made mask, typically by the beginning of the hockey season – so they were catalogued with the names of the respective owners. Elite goalies would also, on occasions, order more than one mask at once.

The shells were then subjected to the cutting process. Many of the custom-made masks of the ‘golden days’, despite their historical significance, were not very cleanly cut, especially around the circular region of the eye holes (I am referring to the models built before the introduction of

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steel cages). The ventilation holes were also frequently asymmetrically punched – I heard reports about mask makers who would literally pick the spots to clip by eye. This granted the masks a fairly artisanal feel. The matter became far less consequential, however, when it comes to contemporary custom-made masks, including the ones produced at Masks Co. Current models are typically cut in the same fashion as the mass-produced items, thus relying on the superior tools and techniques that tend to be available to mass-manufacturers.

This was also mostly the case with respect to the sanding process as well. But there was a caveat. A few sections – like the inner part of the ridges – were difficult to access very thoroughly with automatic tools. Some of the sanding was then performed by hand on the custom-made models – the process that I previously described as surprisingly complex, considering the amount of strength necessary in the tip of the fingers, so that the pressure applied over the sandpaper could be sufficiently concentrated upon a tiny sport, thus eroding the excess of resin. After that, the custom-made masks were painted and assembled just like the regular masks, yet with the most elite parts and materials available.

Sitting on the shelves as they waited to be shipped, custom-made goalie masks looked much bigger on average than regular, mass-produced masks – elite goaltenders nowadays are usually very tall, robust individuals. These masks remain among the few sporting commodities that continue to resist the overall push towards standardization that so distinctively characterizes the sports manufacturing industry more broadly.

6.3 Replicas

The manufacture of replicas from iconic goalie masks of the past was another of the streams of production at Masks Co. All of the replicas I saw, including in mask shows, were facemasks. Most of these replicas were from the ‘golden era’ of hockey; yet there were also many replicas of earlier designs, including ‘pretzel masks’, models used by Jacques Plante, Terry Sawchuk, etc. Every step in the production of these masks was a small event in the factory floor: All of the workers wanted to see how the job was progressing. Bernie would usually get all of them involved, inquiring about a particular detail, or asking for some help on how to address a given technical issue. He would take only two or three such orders every season – except in the summer, when he 143

was busier than usual working on the regular custom-made masks that had to be ready by the beginning of the hockey season.

There were basically two types of replicas. Clients could ask Bernie to make the replica as a mirrored copy of the original mask (using one of the several positive molds that Bernie already had, some of which he took from the originals themselves, as a courtesy of the mask collectors who owned them). Or clients could also ask him to build the replica using the same technique employed for the regular custom-made masks – that is, by sculpting a clay mold upon the plaster mold of the client’s face. In the latter case, the challenge was to produce a copy of the original mask that would fit a closely to a different face, seeking to mimic the structural lines of the original design.

One could see the joy of the mask makers when building these replicas, especially if they were making the custom-made ones that needed to be adjusted to the face of a given client. Clients that sought replicas had for the most part a very different profile, in comparison to that of the customers who would typically be interested in the standard custom-made masks: Instead of elite goalies, they were mostly hockey aficionados, the majority of whom were particularly enthusiastic about the position of goalie. They were, generally speaking, far more concerned with how authentic the models would look, rather than with how safe or solid the masks would turn out to be71.

This allowed the mask makers to operate with fewer constraints in the pursuit of the impeccable replica. For example, they sometimes sliced the sheets of fiberglass with a blade so it would fit better around the cavities around the eyes and the nose – something they would never do with their regular models, since it could compromise the structural integrity of the masks, making them more prone to shatter. Using fewer layers of fiberglass would also make the shells a little easier to handle, as well as lighter – the models of the golden era had, on average, fewer layers of fiberglass than the current ones, anyways.

71 I heard, however, that several of these mask enthusiasts would get so caught up in their nostalgia for the old days that they would actually sometimes use the replicas to play in house leagues, for example. 144

There were however certain minor characteristics of the original mask that Bernie and Pelle simply struggled to reproduce, often baffled by how the original mask maker could possibly have added this or that twist to the design. They would on occasion embark on really interesting conversations about such topics, speculating on the techniques that might have been used to attach a particular feature to the designs. As I was told, a typical misconception in popular books dealing with goalie masks, for example, is the idea that the ridges were traditionally built over the solidified fiberglass, using a mixture that includes epoxy resin. This resin was, in effect, commonly employed to fill in eventual cracks on the surface of the mask. Yet it was not used for the ridges. In the models designed by elite mask makers of the past, the ridges were already built into the positive molds, and therefore far harder to reproduce in the replicas, given how protuberant and thin these ridges happened to be in some of the iconic models.

Hence, in the production of replicas, there were a few technical details that contemporary mask makers would still labour to mimic, especially if using the same materials and tools available at the time when the original models were first created. And this was the case even though safety concerns could be given less attention – a ‘luxury’ that the mask makers of the past arguably never had. When the replicas were finished, some collectors would attach to them original back plates, which were in general easier to obtain – making the masks, in a tenuous sense, a hybrid of contemporary and old-school craftsmanship.

If the replica of a particular model looked especially authentic, as the ones made at Masks Co. frequently did, word would quickly spread throughout the local community of mask fans. Bernie would then likely receive a few requests for the same model, which he would then decide whether to make or not, based on his schedule. A positive point about the replicas, insofar as the development of my research was concerned, was that they attracted several mask enthusiasts to the factory. Talking to them was at times a true relief for me because, in contrast to the other workers who often could not take it anymore, these guys could ‘talk mask’, as they liked to say, all day long.

Through these initial contacts, I was eventually invited to attend a few goalie mask shows, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The structure of these events was relatively simple: Each member of the more cohesive core of the group would bring some items of their personal collections to put on display, and also invite a few guests, who could also be encouraged to bring replicas and

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memorabilia if they had any. I heard about a few high-stakes mask collectors who, alongside the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, own most of the iconic mask designs of the golden era. But this was certainly not the profile of the attendees in the shows that I attended. The organizers and participants at these shows were rather casual mask collectors, who owned only a few original pieces, mostly mass-produced items from the past. Replicas were more common, as well as original pads and skates.

Most of these fellows also crafted their own replicas – sometimes even standard goalie masks – as a hobby. During the shows, there appeared to be a strong sense of camaraderie amongst them; but also some veiled, pretty intense competition about who was able to produce the most accurate replicas. Less-elaborate replicas tend to be heavier, and their surfaces are not, for the most part, as smooth. On the Internet it is possible to find a wide range of replicas for sale, even from a same original mask model. Of course, the top quality ones sell for much higher prices, sometimes even three or four times the amount charged for the most basic reproductions, despite the materials featured being very similar. There are a few plastic replicas too, but these are mostly toys, which carry little interest for the argument being developed here. When Bernie or Pelle were around, as more established mask makers, they were often asked to become informal judges – which, cordially enough, they would try their best to escape from. The organizers and participants were, moreover, remarkably respectful – almost to the point of idolatry – towards iconic mask makers, if one of them happened to be present.

One day after a mask show I was hanging out with some of these mask makers, in a bar. They were carrying their masks around in hockey bags, sometimes pulling a few out in order to point out and discuss some feature in them. A small scuffle with guys sitting on another table suddenly took place, which I did not even notice at first. One of the mask makers then turned to me and explained what was going on: “We were being bullied by those punks! They were asking: Do you hang them on the wall, like animal heads? And then I said: Like human heads, you bastards!”. Humor aside, this comment can be interpreted as a small glimpse into the (borderline psychotic) toughness that these mask makers constantly sought to emulate when hanging out as a group, for it is also typically associated with the hockey goalie culture, as I discuss more thoroughly on the next chapter.

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PART IV: THE WAY OF THE GOALIE MASKS

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

Oscar Wilde (1891) 147

Chapter Seven: Goalie masks as a projection of a goaltender’s personality

Whether goalie masks leave the realm of production through more established distribution channels or directly to consumers, most of these items eventually reach a new home in which they will no longer be experienced chiefly in a quantitative sense – but rather in a qualitative fashion72 (as use values). The individual life of a goalie mask, so to speak, begins as soon as its fate becomes linked to that of a particular goalie. To be sure, it is reasonable to assume that not every mask will experience such fortune – some of them, for whatever reasons, might be discarded before they were even purchased or used, while others may be shared by various individuals (for example, in a goalie camp). This chapter however concentrates on what appears to be overwhelmingly the case: The instances in which goaltenders have developed a singular relationship with their masks.

7.1 Goaltenders

Perhaps a good starting point in making a better sense of this relationship is to consider, first and foremost, the figure of the hockey goalie. It is nearly impossible to determine the exact causes that have helped to establish the reputation of specific positions in contemporary sports – for these causes are often underpinned by various nuanced, subjective circumstances. And yet it is safe to assert that not every position is valued equally. By analyzing the matter from a historical standpoint, a somewhat clearer picture seems to emerge as to which positions have been able to exercise greater fascination amongst sports fans – goaltenders in ice hockey, at least in Canada, certainly appear to be near the top of the list:

Canadians may be particularly fascinated by goaltenders because we are historically more accustomed to the role of defender. Unconsciously, we favour the goalie because we don’t have the big guns, and maybe we don’t endorse the big guns. We like goalies because they are the eternal underdogs. Perhaps because we feel the game is ours, we need to maintain more intense archetypes. If goaltending is about being one of a kind, aiding your peers, knowing your

72 This is how Guy Debord (2008) frames these contrasting approaches: “For bourgeois thought, however, speaking methodologically, only the quantitative is valid, measurable and efficient, whereas the qualitative is no more than vague subjective or artistic decoration of the really true, which is gauged solely by its actual avoirdupois. For dialectical thought, by contrast, and hence for history and for the proletariat, the qualitative is the most decisive dimension of real progress” (p. 82) 148

territory – if it’s about standing on guard – then the goalie is Canadian, and maybe the goalie is you (Cameron & Cameron, 2014, p. 56).

Indeed, the prestige of the position of goaltender appears to be so deeply-entrenched in the culture of ice hockey that it sometimes exceeds the performance of whoever is in fact doing it: Hockey players, for example, typically line up to greet their goalies after a winning effort, regardless of how the goaltender in question played on that particularly day – as if the reverence was being paid to the position itself, and not to a specific player. If I was asked to speculate on the matter, the major reason for this reverence, I suspect, concerns the ability of goaltenders to almost single-handedly influence the outcome of a given game, maybe only second to quarterbacks and pitchers, insofar as the major North American sports are concerned. Jacques Plante once controversially stated that the “goalie was worth 50 to 65 percent of the team” (Plante, 2004, p. 35).

How a position is valued in financial terms also provides a good indication of its perceived significance – particularly in leagues with a hard salary cap, in which managers are forced to weigh the importance of positions in comparison to one another when trying to determine how much to pay each player. Yet this is only part of the picture. More accurate perhaps would be to suggest that every position is associated with a subset of values, most of which are fairly conventional. Quarterbacks, for example, tend to be the highest-paid players in the National Football League; but this condition also comes with expectations about leadership, work ethic, and intelligence73. From a pass rusher, on the other hand, much more physical prowess would typically be expected, and so on. Sociologists of sport have demonstrated extensively how these characteristics are often unfairly linked to racial stereotypes (Nivem, 2005), but I will not venture too deeply into the matter here. I simply want to point out that the stereotypical view on the character of hockey goaltenders also encapsulates a subset of values – yet in this case there are a few elements that, at least in other walks of life, would not be considered very flattering.

So what are the general characteristics typically associated with those playing the position of goalie in ice hockey? The financial element, while significant, does not appear to play a very crucial part: Goaltenders rarely rank amongst the highest-paid individual players in professional

73 ‘High football IQ’ is a term that sportscasters now like to invoke, for instance. 149

ice hockey nowadays – although, if the averages for each position were considered, they would probably be near the top. Leadership skills do not seem to factor into the stereotypical conception of hockey goalies either: Until recently, goaltenders were not even allowed to serve as captains of their teams based on the rules of the NHL, for it arguably took them too long, in certain circumstances, to skate to where the referees were gathering74.

From what I could gather throughout my research, the allure around the position of goalie appears to be constructed, instead, by subset of values that, to my knowledge, is nowhere else to be seen in the world of sports. To begin with, goalies are generally believed to be very brave. I do not mean brave in a smart, bold sense; but rather in a blind sense – a notion that probably springs from the old days of hockey, in which goaltenders played without a mask. Second, goaltenders are widely perceived as individuals who are more prone to deviate from the highly disciplined lifestyle led by most professional athletes, at times even acting carelessly about their personal lives and careers. They are typically expected to lead the team, not perhaps as traditional role models, but as more edgy, ambiguous figures, and certainly beyond the ice: “If you’re looking to have a good time, bring a goalie” (Cameron & Cameron, 2014, p. 56), so the saying goes. Third, goalies are often represented as individuals with the mental disposition to occupy a rather ‘solitary’, more introspective position on ice; in other words, the ‘last line of defense’ – a war metaphor occasionally invoked by the owners of small goalie equipment businesses as well. Fourth, “goaltenders tend to be individualists” (Orr, 1976, p. D1). But this imputed individualism is rarely conceived of in any straightforward fashion; rather, what is usually implied is that goalies are more likely to display an unconventional personality and to nurture eccentric – if not obsessive – habits: “It takes a unique individual to voluntarily stand in the way of a puck traveling 160 kilometers an hour” (Hayley, 2008, p. L1). According to Cermak (2017), moreover,

Films frequently mobilize the goalie role to meet the cinema’s need for eccentric or picturesque types because the player’s image in popular culture is that of an odd duck who is borderline compulsive about his gear and whose training and skills set him apart from his teammates (p. 249).

74 This rule was implemented in 1948 and was eventually amended in 2008, when Roberto Luongo, then playing for the Vancouver Canucks, became one of the team’s three captains. Interestingly enough, he wore the C insignia on his mask (this was later adopted by other goalie-captains), further stressing the centrality of this item for goaltenders. 150

Cultural stereotypes, of course, often encapsulate problematic, unfair characterizations. Some of the tendencies that I listed above seem indeed quite inaccurate to describe the goalies that I interviewed – particularly in terms of their off-the-field behaviour. But I also do not know much about the personality of that many hockey goaltenders, so I might not be the best person to give the matter the scrutiny it deserves. There is, however, one element of the stereotypical conception of the hockey goaltender that I considered to be warranted and which I explore a little further: The notion that goaltenders tend to entertain a special relationship with their equipment (despite some of them noting how this equipment is “heavy and hot”) and, most notably, their masks.

All of the goalies with whom I spoke to appeared to nurture a deep connection with their equipment. They detailed to me all kinds of pre-game rituals that they liked to engage in – which included, for example, not allowing anyone else (except in some cases their parents) to carry their bags to the arena. “I feel territorial”, one of them explained to me. “If something is broken”, another goaltender once told me, “I obviously want the equipment manager to take care of that. I want them to sharpen my skates. But if it’s taping my stick, I have to be the only one who does that. I don’t want anyone else taping it. If it’s the stick that I am gonna play with, I have to be the one to tape it”. This ritual helped him, so he later elaborated, to “get myself psyched into it, kinda be in the zone. Getting myself into the game, dialed in”. Goalie masks, some players reported, also sometimes featured in these pre-game rituals, especially through cleaning liturgies. From what I could grasp, giving pieces of equipment nicknames was another common practice amongst goaltenders.

Pads and masks tend to be the pieces of equipment that goalies are the most protective about – even jealous. Contrary to the stereotypical belief, moreover, goaltenders often expressed fear about getting hurt, and emphasized how they needed to trust the equipment that they were wearing. An experienced goaltender, so I came to learn, can actually sense when a particular protective item is starting to wear out, for the endeavour progressively becomes more painful. ‘Cushion’ is a term that the goalies commonly evoked, in order to account for the greater protection yielded by pieces of equipment that still retained most of their structural integrity.

Goaltenders could in general provide very detailed accounts of their older masks as well, those that were no longer in use. While it is fairly common for goalies to sell their used equipment

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to second-hand stores, given how expensive new pieces can be, they rarely did so with their used masks (particularly the very first ones that they had); although these players often complained about how heavy they remember these masks were, which is usually the case with entry-level models. I also heard on many occasions goalies expressing the now clichéd idea that the equipment becomes “an extension of the goaltender’s body”. This interpretation was typically ascribed to goalie masks, not only in a more practical sense (that is, by emphasizing the ‘continuity’ between humans and objects), but also in a more abstract regard, as a perceived materialization of individual traits, as I seek to demonstrate in the subsequent section.

7.2 The artworks

I wrote briefly on Chapter Four about how the tradition of painting goalie masks was initiated, according to one of the most celebrated stories that populate the hockey imaginary – by the Halloween prank played on Doug Favell. From largely incidental beginnings, the ‘paint-jobs’ gradually became more elaborate, eventually evolving into one of the most distinctive features of contemporary goalie masks. As O’Connell (2015) suggests,

Goalie masks have evolved from a simple piece of equipment into a showcase for elaborate, intricate art during the past several decades. After a few goalies began adding color and designs to the masks, the concept blossomed. Now every NHL goaltender wears a personalized piece of art, an exception to the rest of a professional sports world overrun with corporate sponsorship and strict uniform regulations (p. 7).

There appears to be little controversy about the fact that painted goalie masks are nowadays deemed “pieces of art”, as the quote above indicates. Some authors would be even more eloquent when praising the work of airbrush artists: Rubins (2012), for example, suggests that when he first conceived the goalie mask, Jacques Plante “couldn’t have known that the functional armour would, decades later, be overshadowed by sensational art” (p. S11).

To say that painted goalie masks are “pieces of art” of course hints at their individuality. As artworks, these goalie masks are invested with manifold expressive features – yielding to each of them a unique, singular character. However, collectively taken, painted goalie masks can also be grouped and interpreted based on the general traits that many of them seem to bear in common (against which the original features introduced by a given mask model may actually appear more 152

pronouncedly). These common traits also help to explain why these items have become socially and culturally significant – as a ‘class of objects’. As Lévi-Strauss (1999) points out,

I realized that, as is the case with myths, masks, too, cannot be interpreted in and by themselves as separate objects. Looked upon from the semantic point of view, a myth acquires sense only after it is returned to its transformation set. Similarly, one type of mask, considered only from the plastic point of view, echoes other types whose lines and colors it transforms while it assumes its own individuality (p. 14).

Conceptually, then, I opted to divide the history of painted goalie masks into three fundamental phases, which largely overlap with the three phases in the broader history of mask making that I outlined previously – but not completely.

The first of these phases is not particularly relevant in an artistic sense: “For many years goalie masks were just painted white and some had a small club insignia on them” (Orr, 1976, p. D1). Comparing the paint-jobs of this first period with the artworks later introduced by mask maker Greg Harrison75, Bowen (1981) states that “Harrison’s highly sophisticated designs contrast sharply with the simpler, earlier goalie masks in the show. Some of these are typical of the first fiberglass type ever worn in NHL games, they are usually quite thin and painted just in one colour – red or white, for example” (p. F7). These basic, initial paintworks were however paramount in one respect: They helped to establish the autonomy of goalies in choosing the colours and themes that would be added to the masks.

Around the mid-1970s, a second major phase in the history of painted goalie masks started to take shape – chiefly characterized by the introduction of far more complex drawing techniques and visual elements. “Some goalies were reluctant to wear the flamboyant designs at first, but gradually the idea caught on” (Orr, 1976, p. D1). This period also marked the birth of what was to become a true obsession within the scope of painted goalie masks: The idea that the artworks applied on the mask could function as projections of the goaltender’s identity.

This conception tends to be particularly prevalent in how goalie masks are represented in the media. According to Rubins (2012), for example, “Decorated masks allow goalies to make

75 “The acknowledged Michelangelo of mask painting” – Liz Pead (2012, p. 61), as a fellow artist, once referred to him. 153

personal statements”. The painted goalie mask is, according to another writer, “a unique work of art made to showcase both the team and the netminder's personality” (Lowrie, 2017, E5). “In today's NHL, the mask does more than protect a goalie's head from flying pucks. It's also a billboard to showcase his personality and his brand” (Brady, 2016, p. E6). Goalies, too, often voiced similar perspectives: One of them once told me that he would like his mask painted with “little accents here and there that describe my personality”. Another goaltender explained the matter to me in the following fashion:

Your mask it’s like a big focal point, it represents your team, it represents you, and so it’s a unique thing. As hockey players we don’t really get an opportunity to wear or to put something on ourselves that speaks to who we are as people, because it’s all about representing your team. Like on your sticks you can’t do any fancy tape jobs because it’s not allowed. So your mask is kinda like your canvas, the one place that you can do whatever you want.

The artworks of the second phase were usually centered upon a single, main element. This central element typically featured some design related to the hockey club, like the logo of the team. During this period, a significant emphasis on intimidation and aggressive looks thrived, mostly through essentialized representations of wild animals; yet many of the abstract renderings popular at the time were also meant to intimidate, for these artworks tended to display thick lines around the region of the eyes, which yielded a threatening feel to the compositions. There are several artworks of this era that became particularly well known for their ambiguous meanings. This is the case, for example, of the mask worn by Gilles Gratton, which featured a roaring lion – also his astrological sign; or the mask used by St. Louis Blues goaltender Ed Staniowski, which featured a teardrop running over the cheek – ‘crying the blues’. Since the artworks of this period were for the most part performed upon traditional facemasks (form-fitting), the focal point of these pieces was the front part of the masks.

In the third phase of the history of painted goalie masks, by contrast, the focal point of the artworks shifted to the top of the helmet, as an outcome of the emergence of the mask-cage combination. In this phase, moreover, the designs gradually began to bring together several different themes (a central motif, however, usually remained), scattered around the surface of the mask, as opposed to the largely monothematic compositions of the previous era. Some parts of the mask came to be more closely associated to specific motifs. According to airbrush artist Jason Bartziokas, for example, goalies "use the back plate almost as a journal: things like their

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grandfather's initials, town where (they're) from, or the home country's flag", while "The chin is the usual area to put a number or a nickname" (Lowrie, 2017, p. E5).

This era saw, in addition, an explosion in the variety of themes that goaltenders wanted to have painted on their masks. Team colours and logos remained quite prevalent – to the extent that some airbrush artists would consider it “freeing to design a goalie mask without having to tie the design to a team's color scheme” (O’Connell, 2015, p. 7). Yet a wide rage of other motifs entered the scene: “Everything from superheroes to rock bands, hockey legends to cartoon characters, cherished family memories to city landmarks” (Brady, 2016, p. E6). For the goalies, the themes that they choose to explore in the designs function, to borrow an expression from Atkinson’s (2003) work on tattoo art76, as “signifiers of social identity” (p. 85).

It is interesting to note that several original drawing techniques and styles were introduced in recent years, thus highlighting that the art has not ceased to evolve: “The painting of goalie masks is a competitive market, and many artists also try to stand out with signature techniques and special effects” (Lowrie, 2017, E5). Amongst these new approaches are, for example, 3D effects; holograms; covert drawings; and special paints that glow in the dark or reveal hidden figures in case heat is applied.

Despite such advances in the technical realm, however, the art of painting goalie masks has remained fairly conservative, perhaps even more so with the highly commercialized and even infantilized themes that started to be featured far more extensively. It is true that this has always been a fairly conventional form of art – notably through the emphasis it placed on nationalistic themes and essentialized animal representations. But this tendency has certainly intensified over the past few years. Similar to the trend that Wenner (1998) identified in the memorabilia used to

76 There appear to be in effect several parallels between tattoo art and the art of painting goalie masks. A goaltender once described to me the process of choosing which themes to select for a paint-job in the following words: “I still need to do a lot of thinking. It’s a process to figure out what you want and where you wanna put it, and I need to talk to the artist and make sure that we can have things worked cohesively and mesh well together”.

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adorn sports bars, painted goalie masks have largely come to offer, in my opinion, ‘individuality in the generic’ – often trivializing and overusing all kinds of thematic representations that could have been explored in greater depth. Maybe it was less so in previous times, when the masks were painted, so a cogent argument could be advanced, to convey a clearer message to the public (as well); as opposed to the current trend, which places much greater emphasis on elements linked to the preferences and lives of the goalies. I would have liked to be able to mention, as Atkinson (2003) argued with respect to tattoos, that painted goalie masks have been “utilized as a form of cultural dissent” or “construed as a process of political identity work” (p. 176). Of course, a few individual, nuanced examples exist77, particularly when it comes to the masks that pay homage to controversial figures of the past, such as Jacques Plante who, for a while, campaigned against the hockey establishment. But none of the artists that I researched seemed to be consistently advancing an oeuvre of deep, thoughtful designs that do justice to the political work often associated with avant-garde art.

7.3 Alter-egos

I conclude this chapter by analyzing, in brief, another topic that emerged consistently in my conversations with goalies and airbrush artists: The notion that, when partnered with their masks, goaltenders take on, momentarily, a different personality – as if enacting an alter-ego, according to my interpretation.

Alter-egos are not necessarily positive projections. Strictly speaking, the concept simply alludes to aspects of someone’s personality that may be dormant, but which can come into full fruition under certain circumstances. “Even though the goalies are part of the team, the individual comes out in his mask – on the ice he takes on another persona” (Ybarra, 2001, p. B10). In the case of hockey goalies, it is precisely the goalie mask that is typically perceived to unleash these

77 Entities like the International Olympic Committee can also hinder efforts in this direction: Even a mask featuring an image of the statue of liberty, for example, was banned from the Winter Olympics for its alleged political underpinnings (Mosbergen, 2018). 156

latent characteristics, arguably turning the goalies into a different, more confident version of themselves.

The alter-egos that goalies tend to assume, so I came to learn, are invested mostly with positive traits, such as courage, athleticism, and unwavering focus (especially, a few of them mentioned, in anticipating plays). “I feel like a superhero”, a goalie once translated the feeling of wearing a goalie mask to me. But a few more controversial elements are also sometimes brought into the fold, such as the notion of fierceness:

When Manny Fernandez wears his custom-designed goalie mask, his head looks as if it’s about to be swallowed. His face is surrounded by razor-sharp teeth and fangs, and manic eyes peer from atop the helmet, suggesting the beast Fernandez wants to be when he’s in the net for the Minnesota Wild. “It’s pretty mean. It’s part of me when my game’s on and that’s how I feel inside”, Fernandez says. “My teeth are out and I am ready to go” (Ybarra, 2001, p. B10).

In some of the accounts that I was able to obtain, moreover, it is the mask itself, in a more empirical sense, which embeds the divide between the usual personality of the goalie and the character that he or she espouses when on ice. The physical protection provided by the goalie mask functions, so to speak, as a safe space for the alter-ego personality to emerge:

You don’t feel like you’re the person that you are, but you feel like you’re the sport that you’re playing. I don’t wanna say it is something to hide behind, but it’s almost like a barrier between you and the rest of your life. It is like when you put your mask on, you shut the rest of the world out, and it doesn’t matter anymore, because in the next two or three hours you’re here, you’re in this place and you’re in this bubble and that’s all you have to do.

However, as in the example presented above in an excerpt from Ybarra (2001), the alter- ego projections that goalies embark on are also often linked to the artwork featured on the mask. Hence, not only the structural making of the masks, but also the painted elements that it contains are mobilized by the goaltenders in order to bring forth the alter-ego that they want to emulate: “It’s like as if the images in your mask become part of who you are, part of who you want to be when fighting for your teammates and your team”, a participant stated to me on one occasion.

Yet perhaps it is not only the goaltenders who are inclined to venture into different mental dispositions through the artworks of the goalie masks. Spectators and fans may also on occasion be moved by particular designs, especially if they resonate more thoroughly with themes that these spectators and fans might hold dear. According to Wilsher (2006), in remarks originally tailored

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to discuss the use of masks in theater, but which I believe also apply in great measure to the engagement with goalie masks,

In an age far removed from the belief in miracles and transformation, masks allow us to enter into a mind state where we witness performers creating an otherness […] Masks offer us a spiritual experience when we least expect one – not in a religious sense, but certainly a feeling of being taken outside our selves, a chance to lose oneself in the world of our imagination, much like listening to a piece of transcendental music (p. 7).

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Conclusion: The commodities of sport

Sports and physical culture are integral parts of the everyday life of most contemporary societies – increasingly so in many parts of the world, one may even coherently postulate. Individuals engage in/with these activities either directly or indirectly (as participants or as more passive consumers, for example).

Different lenses have been used to analyze the participation in sports and physical culture from the standpoint of the social sciences and humanities. Some scholars have favored more classical historiographical and sociological approaches, which include nuanced analyses of variables such as class, gender, race, sexuality, ethnicity, and age; as well as statistical cross- examinations based on demographical data. Other researchers have sought to focus more closely on the lived experiences of sports and physical culture, exploring in greater depth how these practices unfold through bodies and spaces. Not so much attention has been given, however, to the ways in which the contemporary sporting experience revolves around objects. This is the line of inquiry that I tried to pursue in this study.

Following what has been described as a ‘critical turn’ in the sociology of sport (Ingham & Donnelly, 1997), a marked preoccupation with the material underpinnings of the world of sports and physical culture gradually emerged in the discipline, ultimately becoming one of its most distinctive features. As part of these efforts, a vibrant and diversified Marxist tradition came to be established in the sociology of sport. The present inquiry can be partially understood as a late ramification of these early materialistic concerns, especially when it comes to the basic premises that it seeks to uphold. Yet, I intend not to suggest that this scholarly legacy was uncritically endorsed. On the contrary, I attempted to address in this dissertation what I perceive as shortcomings within the Marxist scholarship in the sociology of sport and to suggest a few directions in which this perspective could be further developed. I implied, in particular, that the emphasis on physical objects enables the researcher to revisit fundamental queries such as the interplay between material and ideological elements in the context of sports and physical culture; thus slightly recalibrating the scope of the Marxist framework of investigation in the field – heretofore largely centered upon questions such as workers’ sports, athletes’ labour, the social stratification of sporting practices, and the economics of sport. To undertake such an analysis becomes especially relevant, I think, if it succeeds in bringing together more conventional Marxist

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themes, such as the analysis of class antagonisms and the process of commodity production (themes in general linked to Marx’s mature works), and questions of a more methodological and philosophical nature (and thus arguably deriving from Marx’s early writings) – which, in my opinion, seem better suited to the current social and political debates in North America.

The significance of objects in structuring and ascribing meaning to lived experiences in the context of sports and physical culture has been, in my estimation, vastly understated. This appears to be particularly the case when one considers the matter from a historical standpoint. As sports and games evolved, so did the objects used in their practice. But this is only the broader version of the story. Looking at the question more closely, it becomes apparent that the development of modern sports has not only engendered new and upgraded sporting products; this development has in reality also been partially enabled by improvements in these very same products. It follows, then, that there are aspects of the evolution of sporting practices that cannot be fully comprehended unless the evolution of sporting objects is also examined, as mutually constitutive dynamics.

It is not always possible to apprehend with great precision how twists and changes applied to sporting objects might have affected the development of a given sporting practice – or vice versa. Usually, these dialectical processes unfold very subtly, only revealing their full scope through historical comparison. Over time, however, the accumulation of such gradual changes tends to become much more pronounced.

Certainly a tendency exists to naturalize these gradual transformations, as if they could not have happened otherwise. But this way of interpreting the flow of historical events appears to me thoroughly insufficient, for it oversimplifies what is instead a long-established conundrum in the social sciences and humanities: To determine the degree to which the actions of individual actors can be interpreted as manifestations of agency and free will; and the degree to which these actions are conditioned by the broader cannon of social and political development in which these individuals are immersed (e.g., Abbott, 1997).

This is a profound problem that I will not venture too deeply into. I will limit myself to indicate that, regardless of the view that one might hold on the matter, I encountered along this study creations and innovative features as they pertain to sporting objects that seemed more aligned

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with broader societal tendencies; as well as creations and innovative features that appeared to have developed, instead, from very particular turning points.

Let me be more specific. A great deal has been said in the field of sports studies about the ‘civilizing process’ and how this framework beautifully explains why sports and games have in general tended to develop in certain directions (e.g., Elias & Dunning, 1986). The emergence of the goalie mask, for example, can also be understood in this connection: It tempered the occurrence of gruesome injuries, which, as this theoretical account implies, were progressively rendered less tolerable within the public eye, as an outcome of maturing societal standards. By contrast, the custom of painting goalie masks, as described earlier, seems highly contingent on very specific, arbitrary circumstances – for it goes against the general drive towards standardization that largely characterizes the sports equipment industry more broadly.

To reflect upon the fashion in which the evolution of sporting objects is not entirely natural but partially driven by such contingent elements becomes especially stimulating if one proceeds to inquiry, as well, about the reasons why certain things did not happen. Soccer, for example, often ranks very high on concussion rates, but the use of helmets in this sport is still very incipient. Why this is so? Very likely, it has a lot to do with the cultural landscapes in which the sport developed, as opposed to the other major North American sports.

Perhaps because soccer is now becoming increasingly popular in the United States, a conversation focused on the possible adoption of helmets has begun to gain track. One may thus ask: Who is advocating for this? Who is resisting it? Is this push mostly driven by scientific evidence? Is it endorsed by corporate interests? One could go even deeper: Does the debate around the introduction of helmets spring from actual ‘needs’ in the game of soccer or, to employ the Marxist vernacular, from “imputable needs” (Illich, 1977, p. 22)?

By framing the evolution of sporting objects as an ongoing process, rather than an accomplished fact, the researcher thus opens up manifold lines of investigation, which include the efforts to link the present and the past. This same type of scientific curiosity can, of course, be directed towards any object that populates the world of sports and physical culture – in a material or in a symbolic sense.

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Not every physical object encountered in the world of sports and physical culture is a commodity (rocks and tree branches are for example typically used in all sorts of outdoor activities). Yet most of them are – thus meaning that these objects possess a ‘commodity- dimension’, which, albeit not always readily available, can be brought into light through careful consideration. To produce such an inquiry is, however, a fairly difficult task; for as Karl Marx remarks in the first volume of Capital (2011) “A commodity appears, at first sight, a very trivial thing, and easily understood. Its analysis shows that it is, in reality, a very queer thing, abounding in metaphysical subtleties and theological niceties” (p. 81).

The same is arguably true for any commodity one wishes to consider. But when sporting commodities are examined, in particular, a new subset of problems seems to emerge, which concerns the special status that certain sports and games appear to enjoy as cultural products.

As commodities, these sporting objects may be said to contain at least three discernible dimensions: A ‘physical presence’, which is readily accessible to the participants of the sport; a ‘material history’, which concerns the trajectory of that specific sporting commodity, from the field of production to the playing field; and a ‘conceptual history’, which accounts, so to speak, for the history of the ‘class of objects’ to which the object in question belongs – how the concept of that sporting commodity came into being, what needs it seeks to address, how it evolved in terms of design, why it is comprised by this or that material, etc.

It is not difficult to comprehend, in a tacit sense, that these three dimensions must necessarily be interwoven. Yet even though one instinctively understands that they are linked, very little is in general known about the ‘material’ and the ‘conceptual’ history of sporting commodities. This is, first and foremost, how this study aimed to contribute to the scholarship on the field: In other words, by shedding some light on the processes that lie beneath the ‘material presence’ of sporting commodities; thus seeking to (re)assemble, in conceptual terms, the complex interconnections between the field of production and the playing field in sporting contexts.

The major sociological contribution of this research is therefore to offer an original analysis of sporting commodities that seeks to apprehend how these products are experienced both as ‘exchange values’ and as ‘use values’. By engaging with anthropological methods, I represent this experience not only in an abstract, general sense; but also in a more subjective, immediate level,

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as articulated by the participants. In the examination presented here, the sporting commodity functions, so to speak, as an axis between the field of production and the playing field – an ongoing remainder of their necessary, intrinsic connection (even though, in practice, these domains have often been artificially driven apart). In contrast to the other materialistic approaches prevalent in the sociology of sport that focus more distinctively on bodies and spaces, the study of sporting commodities presupposes a working understanding of the factory floor, thus adding an extra layer of complexity to the endeavour. In this research, the factory theater is given a largely unprecedented significance in shaping the engagement in sports and physical culture – as well as the other way around.

When it comes to the sport of ice hockey in Canada, as I tried to demonstrate, what was once a more ‘organic’ connection between the field of production and the playing field has become increasingly severed. In my investigation, I identified four driving forces behind this process: 1) Major leagues came into being, eventually establishing themselves as mediators between the “needs” experienced by the players and the “solutions” offered by the hockey manufacturing industry; 2) Almost the totality of the productive capabilities that this industry had once established in Canada were gradually transferred to other countries, in the pursuit of cheaper labour; 3) While for some of time countries like Finland or the Czech Republic (where hockey is also popular) were involved in the production of hockey goods for the Canadian market, the manufacture of hockey equipment eventually became highly concentrated on the Global South, where hockey is seldom a meaningful part of the symbolic universe of the workers; 4) The profile of the executives of major hockey equipment manufacturers has changed significantly over the last few decades; new hires tended to privilege business and management skills, rather than deep affiliations with the game.

When studying the hockey manufacturing industry, for reasons I detailed already, I opted to focus, more thoroughly, on the manufacture of goalie masks. In my analysis, the history of mask making can be divided, in essence, into three major moments: 1) The emergence of the first models, defined mostly by functional properties; 2) The introduction of aesthetic elements, materialized in the experimentation with designs and artworks, bringing forth what has been characterized as the golden era of hockey/mask making; 3) The advent of the mask-cage combination, a triumph of design that rendered other mask variations largely obsolete, thus also setting the stage for the consolidation of the one-size-fits-all approach in the elite levels of the sport. 163

At the present day, mass-produced and custom-made goalie masks still exist. The mass production approach widely dominates the goalie mask industry, while the custom-made approach presents itself, largely, as a reminiscence of the art of mask making, as originally conceived, most distinctively, from the 1970s onwards. I had the opportunity to observe both productive approaches in motion, deriving the following conclusions:

The mass production approach, as it would be expected, unfolded at a much faster and steady pace. The workers that carried it out 1) Did not seem to have any special attachment to the masks that they produced, typically experiencing the process of production in a rather mechanical way; 2) Were mostly uninterested in hockey, even though they had good familiarity with the sport; 3) Were largely complicit with the devaluation of manual labour, which they framed as inferior to intellectual endeavors; 4) Were very vocal about their dissatisfaction with the de-industrialization of Southern Ontario, sometimes also claiming some solidarity with workers of the Global South engaged in the same activities (mask making) that they were.

A flexible and largely irregular pace, by contrast, characterized the custom-made approach. This process was undertaken by mask makers that 1) Had long and deeply rooted affiliations with the sport of ice hockey, having often played the position of goalie in the past; 2) Were quite appreciative of the Canadian tradition in goalie mask making, which they sought to keep alive; 3) These mask makers largely represented the sculpting of custom-made masks as an art form. Alongside most of the owners of small hockey equipment businesses, a few employees of traditional hockey retail stores, and some ‘old timers’ of whom I heard that are still employed in major hockey equipment companies, custom-made mask makers belong to the small group of individuals that, today, still enable steady channels of communication between the field of production and the playing field in ice hockey.

When analyzing the goalie masks themselves, as material entities, I also was able to reach a few conclusions. The mass produced items were: 1) Manufactured in Canada, but several of the raw materials came from abroad; 2) Contained minor traits that allowed one to tell which company produced the item, even if the overall designs were generally very similar. The custom-made items, on their part, arguably provided a better fit, because they were built upon an actual mold of the goaltender’s face.

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With regards to the engagement with the goalie masks as use-values, I arrived at the understanding that goaltenders: 1) Often incorporate goalie masks in numerous pregame, superstitious rituals; 2) Tend to comprehend the work of airbrush artists as a medium whereby goalies can project a certain aspect of their personality on the masks (sometimes also some symbolism associated with the team more generally); 3) Are prone to experience their use of the goalie mask as a braver, even more athletic alter ego.

The goalie mask was, all things considered, a remarkable Canadian invention. It became especially known for the creative artworks and designs it came to display, becoming one of the most distinguished symbols of ice hockey, far beyond the playing field. But it affected the game, as well, in more practical ways. When the mask first came into being, its purpose was basically to protect the goalies from getting injured. But goaltenders would still for the most part try to evade pucks, since the facemasks of that era transferred a lot of the impact to the head, not to mention how exposed the eyes tended to remain: “With only a quarter-inch of fiberglass between a goalie and the outside world, the puck still hurt. […] So goalies tried their best not to get hit in the head” (Dryden, 2016, p. 288). As the structure of the designs improved, goaltenders started to deposit more trust in their masks. As an outcome of this process, they gradually became less hesitant to expose their heads in the areas more likely to be targeted by incoming pucks. New goaltending techniques, such as the butterfly style and diving for loose pucks, then emerged as a result of this enhanced connection between the goalies and their masks. Later, goalie masks began to feature things like ridges and slightly curved surfaces over the ears, which were intended to channel the pucks that eventually hit them away from the net (towards the back glass, rather than keeping them alive in front of the net).

Over generations of goaltenders and mask makers, this back and forth collaboration went on, with minor adjustments being gradually introduced. Until in recent times a complete reversal was produced: There are now goaltenders who claim to be purposely using their heads to stop pucks, as a technique that they have trained and perfected – thus meaning that goalies now have so much confidence in the structural making of their masks that they sometimes use it to attack the puck, rather than the other way around. A true testament to the great collective effort put forth by those who have, in different capacities, contributed to the art of goalie mask making.

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Any sporting commodity can, in principle, be analyzed according to a framework similar to the one that I employed in this study. But to explore the interconnections between the ‘material presence’, the ‘material history’, and the ‘conceptual history’ of all of the commodities that one runs into in the everyday experience of sports and physical culture would of course represent an impossible task. In effect, the researcher, as this dissertation shows, would be hardly able to exhaust the manifold determinants that are behind even a single piece of equipment.

However, I should like to conclude this work by suggesting that this immense complexity needs not be conceived in a paralyzing fashion; that is, as an excuse to remain oblivious to the historical underpinnings of the commodities that shape the world of sports and physical culture. Rather, I would hope that this research would help to raise greater critical sensitivity towards such matters, encouraging scholars and students to engage with the commodities of sport with their eyes wide open.

The sports manufacturing industry and the commodities that it yields are, of course, an important aspect of the material conditions that underpin the historical development of sporting practices. As I tried to illustrate in this study, the historical development of any particular sport can be interpreted in light of changes in its material content – a proposition that echoes, in many senses, the framework of historical materialism. However, the amount of historical evidence available about the growth of certain sports (particularly the most popular ones) is so vast that one can actually represent their individual evolution with reference to a single piece of equipment, as I attempted to do here through the focus on goalie masks.

I believe this exercise opens up some stimulating possibilities to be explored further. For example, one could try to make sense of the historical development of ice hockey by concentrating on a different commodity (say goalie pads); then, through a comparative analysis, it would be possible to verify whether the patterns observed in each individual case tend to be complementary or disparate. One could choose to investigate, in addition, how analogous improvements in a same commodity – for instance skates – have perhaps affected sports such as ice hockey and figure skating in different manners. Ultimately, the researcher’s goal could be as bold as to develop a basic typology, which could provide a generic template as to how to trace the impact of a certain commodity in a given sport over a delimited period of time and vice versa.

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In further studies, moreover, I believe it would be important to explore, in greater detail, how social inequalities may become materialized in the commodities of sport themselves. A tentative line of inquiry would be, for example, to question whether there are traits in a particular commodity that seem to have been conceived specifically for the male body, thus causing some discomfort to women. Another problem that I consider relevant is to better examine the materials employed in the production of sporting goods. An analysis of the use of leather, for example, could be linked to the burgeoning scholarship on animals and sport – things like footballs, for instance, have been informally nicknamed ‘pigskin’, which is even more to the point. Yet certainly the most obvious further development of the present inquiry would be to enact a similar methodological approach in factories in the Global South.

A separate matter that may as well be worth exploring in greater depth concerns the question of control over the manufacture of sports equipment. In a wider sense, one can speculate whether policy-makers would be willing to contemplate the idea of crafting regulations to reclaim self-sufficiency over industries to which a country arguably has deep ideological attachments – as they tend to do when it comes to industries considered strategic in a military or economic sense. At a more immediate level, the question of control may also be discussed in terms of the degree of input that participants should ideally have in the equipment that they would like to use in order to engage in a given sport. It is known that in some amateur sports, for example, participants are still able to exercise substantial latitude in choosing the equipment that they prefer. While in highly structured sports, little flexibility has been retained.

To reflect upon the commodities of sport in the fashion that I attempted to in this study contains as well, in my opinion, a marked pedagogical component. By inserting or extracting certain physical objects from games, for example, teachers can encourage students to think about how these games can be adapted or even reinvented.

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Appendices

Appendix A: An overview of the scholarship on ice hockey in Canada

The sport of ice hockey has been studied from a multi-disciplinary standpoint in Canada, including from the perspective of the social sciences and humanities. It is the latter that I want to discuss in brief in this appendix.

The discipline of social history, as a collective enterprise, came into being in great measure as a reaction to what its proponents perceived as an “elitist” way of accounting for the past, which arguably placed too much emphasis on white, male political/influential figures and short-lived events, paying little attention to the lives of women and ordinary people (including, of course, the perspective of marginalized groups) and the long-term development of the social structure (Braudel, 1980; Bloch, 1953).

Perhaps because sport is still a relatively new social phenomenon, such elitist views have tended to dominate the field of sport history since its inception (Gruneau, 1988). This is expressed, for example, by the numerous publications released every year featuring biographies of famous athletes of the past, or focusing solely on the history of particular leagues, clubs, or teams. The picture is no different when it comes to the domain of hockey, in which most historical inquiries have drawn upon similar concerns.

Notwithstanding, there are as well many notable works pertaining to what one could perhaps refer to as the “social history” of North American hockey. Russell Field (2009), for example, provides an interesting account of the making of professional hockey spectatorship in Toronto and New York around the late 1920s and early 1930s, seeking to shed some light, in particular, upon the distribution of these fans in terms of gender, ethnicity, and social class.

In like manner, several authors have also sought to revisit different moments of the long- established struggles for participation in organized hockey engendered by Canadian women (Kidd, 1996a; Stevens, 2006; Etue & Williams, 1996) – an aspiration that was often confronted with fierce opposition from the male establishment, whose commitment to the perpetuation of the links between hockey and manhood has effectively undermined many of the early efforts towards the democratization of the sport. Perhaps quite relevant for the purposes of this study is the research 180

conducted by Carly Adams (2009), who gave special attention to the manner in which the struggle for participation in hockey was articulated by working class women and their instances of (athletic) representation around the early 1920s – a fight that later came to be equally dismantled, partly due to the outburst of manliness associated with World War II.

When it comes to the involvement of Aboriginal populations in the making of Canadian hockey, Michael Robidoux’s Stickhandling through the Margins (2012) is certainly among the most comprehensive accounts. Yet I believe that this is a terrain where a lot remains to be done, particularly to transcend the romanticized view that overemphasizes the input of Native Americans in the creation of the game – showing greater sensibility instead towards the opposite process, that is, the manner in which Western sporting practices have frequently been imposed upon these populations at the expense of their own traditions (Paraschak, 1998). In any case, it is quite evident that hockey plays today an important part in the everyday life of many of these communities, and a need remains to develop a better understanding of the motivations underlying such manifold processes of assimilation and resistance.

With respect to more “structural” transformations, historians of hockey in Canada have explored various topics that include, for example, the transition from amateurism to professionalism in this sport (Howell, 2001; Gruneau & Whitson, 1993), as well as the emergence of the hockey monopolies that played a pivotal role in the commercialization of the game (Wong, 2005; Kidd & Macfarlane, 1972). Beyond any doubt, however, the preoccupation that has been more widely articulated, by historians and sociologists alike, concerns the links between hockey and Canadian national identity.

I would be unable to do justice here to the extensive scholarship that deals with this problem, for almost every study about hockey in Canada contains remarks on the matter. Yet, I believe it is safe to say that Rick Gruneau and David Whitson’s Hockey Night in Canada (1993) is the most influential book exploring the complex entanglements between hockey and Canada’s very diverse cultural landscapes, a work that remains remarkably original over twenty-five years after it was originally published.

Moving towards what may be deemed as more “sociological” concerns pertaining to this articulation between hockey and national identity, a very interesting dimension of this problem

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relates to the ways in which the sport has sometimes been implicated in the tension between English and French Canada (Kidd, 1992; Bairner, 2001; Harvey, 2006; Gruneau & Whitson, 1993). This is, in effect, one of the manners whereby scholars have sought to illustrate the fragility of accounts that take for granted any sort of cohesive national discourse around hockey in Canada.

The same holds true when it comes to the arenas of gender and racial oppression. A great deal of work has been invested in bringing into light the systematic forms of marginalization to which women have been subjected when partaking in the game of hockey (Theberge, 2000), leading some scholars to argue that hockey has in reality never constituted a “national” sport for this share of the population (Adams, 2006). Likewise, blacks, Native Americans, and other ethnical minorities have encountered manifold hardships when seeking to penetrate the white-dominated culture of Canadian hockey (Pitter, 2006; Kahn, 2009), and only “the most colour-blind history” of the sport “could fail to note the difficulties experienced by non-white players – both black and Aboriginal – in getting opportunities to play the game at high levels” (Whitson & Gruneau, 2006, p. 18).

Scholars have also devoted substantial efforts to develop a better understanding of the links between hockey, on the one hand, and masculinity, whiteness, and warfare, on the other (Allain, 2008; Adams, 2006; Barlow, 2009). Admittedly, hockey in Canada has historically been characterized as a hyper-masculine preserve, in which various forms of homophobic and aggressive behaviours have come to be tolerated. The problem of the naturalization of physical violence in the realm of professional hockey, in particular, has been extensively discussed in both academic and policy-making circles; yet little progress has been made in the sense of eradicating violent practices such as fighting or bodychecking, among other things because “those involved in professional ice hockey continue to resist intervention from the State in the process of controlling player violence” (Atkinson, 2010b, p. 27). Bearing similarities to the rationale typically provided for the emergence of hooliganism in the United Kingdom, the development of an aggressive, hyper-masculine hockey culture in Canada is often explained in connection to the working class “ethos” (Lorenz & Osborne, 2006) – even though the game has today arguably become, paradoxically, too expensive for working-class families. Perhaps quite sadly, however, none of these problems afflicting the game of hockey have been able to significantly affect its ongoing commercial and popular appeal – something that would, one could hope, push those who benefit financially from the game to increase their efforts towards the mitigation of these issues. 182

Appendix B: University of Toronto ethics approval letter

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Appendix C: University of Toronto ethics amendment approval letter

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Appendix D: Interview Guide (Current Workers and Small Business Owners)

NB: This is a rough guide to the interview. Semi-structured interviews may lead to unexpected avenues of discussion beyond the questions listened. This is a normal event in qualitative in- depth interview research. Herein I provide an overview of topics that I intend to explore in interviews and some examples of questions drafted prior to the document analysis.

1. Employment history and day-to-day employment experiences:

 Factories in which the participant worked and currently works (size, ownership, etc.)*  Types of hockey-related equipment produced there  Types of employment*  Time spent in the industry*  Duties and routine in the factory floor

2. The Hockey Manufacturing Industry in Canada Today:

 The challenges and opportunities generated by offshoring and outsourcing policies  The landscapes of the industry (types of products, types of business, types of employment)  The division of labour (globally and locally)  The participant’s assessment on the current state of affairs in the industry  The participant’s assessment of the future of the industry

3. The Relationship of the Workers with the Outcomes of their Labour:

 How the participant makes sense of his/her own craft  Feelings that the participant nurtures towards hockey  What it means to the participant to be involved in the hockey manufacturing industry  Feelings that the participant nurtures towards Canadian identity  Pride and nationalism in the factory floor

* These questions provide important background to participants’ life history, but will be only vaguely described in any publications arising from this research; this is to protect the identity of participants, some of whom could be easily identified if these specific details were included in published material.

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