Counterpunching with culture: Boxers in relation to the dominant ideology By: Hector Mackie BSc (hons), University of Bath, 2012 A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Master of Science Graduate Department of Exercise Sciences University of Toronto ©Copyright by Hector Mackie 2015 Counterpunching with culture: Boxers in relation to the dominant ideology. Hector Mackie Master of Science Graduate Department of Exercise Sciences University of Toronto 2015 Abstract Numerous scholars have studied the sociological underpinnings of boxing and the boxing site; however, few studies have looked at the cultural level of boxing. This study endeavours to introduce boxing as a cultural practice that is part of a particular group’s cultural milieu. The study employs Willis’ (1977) Learning to Labour to engage with why working class people play working class sports. Much like ‘the lads’ in Learning to Labour the boxers are vulnerable to the dominant ideology. However, in contrast, their own ideology reveals that they have agency, which is performed in relation to other dominant cultural practices. The boxers create an Other (Hall, 1996/2000) and reject and separate themselves from normative cultural practice, thus deliberately reproducing their culture and place in the society. ii Table of Contents Abstract ii List of Tables vii List of Appendices vii Chapter 1 Introduction 1 1.01 Introduction 1 1.02 CCCS and PCS 2 1.03 CCCS 3 1.04 PCS 5 1.05 Boxing 7 1.06 Engaging with the Boxing Literature 9 1.07 Sugden, Boxing and Culture 13 1.08 Culture 15 1.09 Concluding Remarks 18 Chapter 2 Review of Literature 19 2.01 Introduction 19 2.02 Contextualising contemporary academic boxing literature 20 2.03 History, sport and their impact on the rich and the poor 24 2.04 Boxing’s early inception and its connection to the poor 27 2.05 Contemporary Sociological Understanding of Boxing 33 2.06 Boxing and the Poor and Working Class 34 2.07 Contemporary Boxing Literature and Culture 37 iii 2.08 Introducing Paul Willis and Learning to Labour 40 Chapter 3 Theoretical Underpinnings 45 3.01 Introduction 45 3.02 Theory 45 3.03 Ideology 47 3.04 Penetrations and Limitations 53 3.05 Penetrations 54 3.06 Limitations 56 3.07 Concluding Remarks 61 Chapter 4 Methodology 63 4.01 Introduction 63 4.02 Cultural Studies underpinning Methodology 63 4.03 Methods 65 Part 1 – Participant Observation 66 4.04 Participant Observation 66 4.05 Negotiating Access into the Research Site 68 4.06 Stage 1 – Starting Off - participant-as-observer 70 4.07 Stage 2 – Settling In - observer-as-participant 74 4.08 Stage 3 – Stepping Back - non-research position 77 4.09 - Stage 4 – The Last Month - observer-as-participant 79 Part 2 - Interview procedure 81 4.10 Recruitment of Participants 81 4.11 Getting to Know Them: Interviewing The Boxers 83 iv 4.12 Semi-structured, one-on-one interviews 84 4.13 The Active Interviewing Technique 85 4.14 The Interview 87 4.15 Data Analysis 90 4.16 Concluding Remarks 91 Chapter 5 Results 93 5.01 Introduction 93 Part 1 Introducing the Interviewees 5.02 Introducing the interviewees 93 5.03 The Boxers 94 Part 2 The Boxers’ Opinions 99 5.04 Introduction 99 5.05 Our Developing World and its Effect Upon our Day-To-Day Experience 101 5.06 Keeping the Dominant Expectations at Arm’s Length 106 5.07 The Sense of Defeat from Conforming to the Dominant Institutions 109 5.08 Creating a ‘them’ and ‘us’ 113 5.09 Being Able to Choose 116 5.10 Conclusion 122 Part 3 Manifestation of Ideologies Clashing 125 5.11 Manifestation of Ideologies Clashing 125 5.12 The Location of The Gym 126 5.13 Internal Aesthetics/ Design of The Gym 136 5.14 The Gym and Apparel 142 5.15 Conclusion 146 v Chapter 6 Discussion / Conclusion 149 6.01 Introduction 149 6.02 Summary of Findings 150 6.03 Re-engaging with Willis’ Concept of Limitations 156 6.04 Contribution 159 6.05 Limitations 161 6.06 Future Research 163 References 164 Appendix 1 175 Appendix 2 176 Appendix 3 178 vi List of Tables 1. Table 1: Late 18th century amateur boxers p. 30 List of Appendices Appendix 1: Information Letter p. 175 Appendix 2: Informed Consent Form p. 176 Appendix 3: Interview guide p. 178 vii viii Chapter 1 Introduction 1.01 Introduction In an email conversation with Lucia Trimbur (personal communication, March 31, 2015) I expressed concern about my thesis becoming an anecdote that failed to offer something tangible or relevant to someone, and ‘was just another case study’. She offered some advice that has been central to this thesis and to my academic outlook; she said that I should “pick a person and write to them.” This advice had a dual function: it motivated me to produce meaningful political scholarship for a person/s, and it encouraged me to find an academic home that could offer intellectual, methodological, and political support from which I could write to that person/s. In this introduction, I determine and engage with certain intellectual genealogies in order to find an academic home. I introduce the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham (CCCS) and the concept of Physical Cultural Studies (PCS); and I consider the relationship between PCS and CCCS cultural studies. This leads to my engagement with boxing and the boxing literature, which eventually leads to my interpretation and use of the concept of ‘culture’. 1 1.02 CCCS and PCS The foundational writings of Raymond Williams, Edward Thompson and scholars at the CCCS, together with elements of PCS, created a space for my academic work and a space where I am comfortable working. The two schools of thought are not identical, and while their agendas diverge they share much in common. Elements of the PCS framework have been taken directly from the CCCS outlook (more specifically, Stuart Hall’s perspective) and reconfigured to fit what is presumed to be required in the sociology of sport today. From my understanding of the work of the CCCS, I am much more comfortable situating my work within its genealogy rather than with PCS. Although there is an historical and geographical displacement, the work of the CCCS represents a united force defined by emancipatory politics at its core. With PCS still finding its direction, and with me being within it and a part of its formulation, I have yet to see a politics emerging to which I am willing to attach my work. (History will judge PCS as it has judged the work of the CCCS; perhaps it will eventually be represented alongside other critical leftist academic formulations). It is necessary to briefly explain my understanding of each framework in order to express the academic politics of this work – politics that will perhaps have real world political implications. 2 1.03 CCCS Richard Hoggart founded the CCCS, but Stuart Hall is considered to be the ‘father’ of Cultural Studies. According to Rojek (2003), it was Hall “who played the decisive role in establishing the field of research and pedagogy and supervising the first cohorts of students” (p. 8). Indisputably, Hall had a major influence on the legacy of the CCCS and the way in which its work and influence are understood. Hoggart was opposed “to the pomposity and self-regard of elite culture,” and he aimed to “demonstrate that marginal and subordinate forms of cultural expression have their own validity, and are worthy of scholarly regard” (Rojek, 2003, p.64). But even with this original political dimension, it was Hall who took the CCCS down a more political route. It became a part of the neo-Marxist project under the Hall’s directorship. Sparks (1996) describes how Hall, when director of the school, invented ‘marxist cultural studies’ and shaped its characteristic features. Richard Johnson, Stuart Hall’s successor, maintained this political dimension and pushed the CCCS, and the growing area of Cultural Studies, “to constantly resist academicism, and strive to relate cultural questions to the analysis of power, and ‘social possibilities’” (Johnson cited in Rojek, 2003, p.64). I argue that the legacy of the CCCS is an analysis of power and radical leftist scholarship, and it has inspired me since I began reading about it and reading the work of scholars associated with the Centre. Hoggart wrote that, under Hall’s 3 direction, the school became “a) more political and b) more theoretic” (cited in Rojek, 2003, p.66). Correspondingly, Hall's theoretical stance demonstrated the worth of theory and helped me understand the true political project and academic and political relevance of the CCCS. The political imperative is illustrated in the following example of Hall engaging with real problems outside academia. In the late 1970s and early 1980s when the influence of the CCCS was at its height, there was a spike in incidences of HIV and AIDS the UK. Hall, in an article addressing the theoretical legacy of the CCCS, asks: Against the urgency of people dying in the streets, what in God’s name is the point of cultural studies? What is the point of the study of representations, if there is no response to the question of what you say to someone who wants to know if they should take a drug and if that means they’ll die two days later or a few months earlier?... I think anybody who is into cultural studies seriously as an intellectual practice, must feel, on their pulse, its ephemerality, its insubstantiality, how little it registers, how little we’ve been able to change anything or get anybody to do anything.