“‘No Tough Guys Here?’: Hybrid Masculinity in a Boxing Gym”

Abstract

In this article, I explore manifest and latent discourses about masculinity in a predominantly white, middle class boxing gym. In this gym, the owner and coaches promote a discourse that emphasizes love, bridgework, and sparring with care. This discourse is part of the gym’s white-collar boxing culture. A key part of this discourse is distancing themselves from other gyms, claiming they promote a violent masculinity. While on the surface the gym criticizes certain ideals and practices associated with American hegemonic masculinity, it still reproduces discourses, norms, and practices associated with it. Employees use a latent discourse that constructs a hybrid masculinity. I argue that employees and members construct a hybrid masculinity by perpetuating ideals and practices associated with American hegemonic masculinity.

Etnografía del aprendizaje pugilístico en un club deportivo amateur de Temuco (Chile) (Ethnography of pugilistic learning in an amateur sports club in Temuco (Chile))

“…En segundo lugar, y una vez consolidado y reconocido el espacio dedicado al boxeo dentro del club, emerge el papel del practicante en relación con su cuerpo y el cuerpo de los demás (Wacquant, 2007), es decir, boxear implica reconocer falencias y virtudes, ya sea en el plano de la psicología deportiva o en el culto corporal. El boxeo, como deporte donde el cuerpo es empleado para la defensa y el ataque, exige autocuidado y autosuperación (Rabii, 2021). Ejemplo de ello se encuentra en la alimentación, el tiempo dedicado al descanso del cuerpo y el trabajo autónomo para mejorar la técnica, que transciende el tiempo exclusivo de la clase.…”

“…En términos particulares, el vínculo entre la actividad deportiva y las clases sociales ha despertado un relevante interés al interior de las ciencias sociales durante las últimas décadas (Jump, 2020;Rabii, 2021;Christiansen, 2022). Al respecto, Sánchez García (2008) sostiene que la posición de clase implica un alto nivel de distinción al momento de analizar el tipo de deporte que realizan aquellas personas que desarrollan trabajo manual (generalmente de clases subalternas) respecto a las clases dominantes.…”

The gender of bruising: A critical literature review on gender in boxing

“…In contrast to the violent and pathological masculinity that often characterizes boxing in wider culture, research in boxing and masculinity shows that more modes of masculinities are performed in the boxing gyms (Nash, 2017; Oualhaci, 2022; Rabii, 2021; Woodward, 2004). In his study of the Life Gym in the US, Watoii Rabii (2021) understands boxing gym as a site of conflict between various masculinities with the continuum of the hierarchies between men as between men and women. Studying boxing gym in French banlieue Oualhaci (2022) argues that young men from marginalized groups in France do not embody only one type of pathological masculinity but are able to negotiate more complex forms of masculinity.…”

“…He writes that “without totally giving up their hegemonic or street masculinity, to display a hybrid masculinity allows the boxers to climb up the gym's hierarchy, and by extension to acquire respectability even outside the gym, in the neighbourhood” (Oualhaci, 2022, p. 267). Heiskanen's work brings a nuanced perspective to the studies on boxing masculinities that discuss them in the context of hegemonic masculinity (Nash, 2017; Oualhaci, 2022; Rabii, 2021; Woodward, 2004) (Heiskanen, 2012). Instead of analysing boxing spaces through the lens of hegemonic masculinity she looks at the ways women's presence in boxing has desegregated the male‐only space of gym.…”

“…Gerald Early has once beautifully written that “prizefighting is about man's preoccupation with trying to live in an adversative Eden, a world that loves and hates him, made by a God that both comforts and ignores” (Early, 1988b, p. 182). Since the early beginnings of modern boxing many scholars have fallen in love with boxing (Early, 1988a, 1988b; Hare, 1971; Sugden, 1985; Weinberg & Arond, 1952) and many still keep falling in love with it (Heiskanen, 2012; Lafferty & McKay, 2004; Mennesson, 2000; Nash, 2017; Paradis, 2012; Rabii, 2021; Trimbur, 2013; Woodward, 2004).…”