KINESIOLOGY 580, Section 001
GRADUATE SEMINAR ON BODY, EXERCISE AND SOCIETY
Dates:
Time:
Location:
January 9 – April 3, 2014.
Thursdays, 9.30am – 12pm.
War Memorial Gymnasium 100
Instructor:
Patricia Vertinsky
Professor, Kinesiology
Office:
War Memorial Gymnasium 214
Tel: 604-822-6235
e-mail: patricia.vertinsky@ubc.ca
Description of the course
Human bodies span an infinite plurality of cultural classifications and
historical discourses. Studies of the body and embodiment have become
increasingly central to discussions of sport and physical culture, technology,
film, media, performance and life in general. The body - how we exercise,
what we eat, how we present ourselves – is both a physical entity and a
medium of culture, a powerful symbolic form. It can be seen as a surface on
which the ideas and power relations of a culture are inscribed and reinforced.
The body also operates as a metaphor for culture – since an ‘imagination’ of
body morphology (the normal body, the disabled body, the toned and fit
body, the athletic body, the obese body) has provided a blueprint for
diagnosis and prescription, as well as visions of group solidarity, ‘healthy,
active living’ and athletic performance. Not just a text, the body (as
Foucault and Bourdieu have argued) is also a practical, direct locus of
control – a disciplined or docile body. Through the organization and
regulation of time, space and the movements of our daily lives, our bodies
are trained, shaped and disciplined with the stamp of prevailing historical
forms of selfhood, desire, masculinity and femininity. In this course we will
examine the ways in which the body has been fashioned in modern society
to express the self through modes of exercise, sport and physical culture.
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Seminar topics will include
 The ‘making’ of the modern body
 Understanding embodied practices
 Exercise, sport and the medicalization of the female body
 Masculinity, muscularity and the maintenance of gender boundaries
 Sports medicine : athletic performance, sex testing and the enhanced
body
 Normalizing the body: ideologies around body shape, size and diet
 The markings of race and ethnicity on the body
 Disability, technology and the Paralympics
 Sport, exercise and the aging body
 Space and place - sites of sport and exercise
 The politics of aesthetics : dance, gymnastics and physical culture
 Physical cultural studies
Assigned readings
There are 3 articles assigned for each class and students should be ready to
lead the group in discussion of at least one of them each week during class
discussion.
Course assessment
This is a seminar course which includes reading, writing assignments,
presentations and group discussion. Each student will be expected to
familiarize themselves with the selected readings, to take a leadership role in
class discussion on several of the course topics, and to submit a final paper
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which investigates in depth a particular research topic related to the broad
themes of the course.
i)
Participation, leadership activities and contributions to discussion
25%
ii)
4 (2 page) Article critiques selected from the required seminar
readings 20%
iii)
Class mini-conference, presentation of topic selected for final
paper 15%
iv)
Final paper (max 20 pages including bibliography), due April 26).
40%
COURSE OUTLINE (tentative)
January 9
INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE:
FIT- Episodes in the History of the Body
January 16 UNDERSTANDING EMBODIED PRACTICES
Introducing some theoretical and methodological approaches
to understanding embodied practices.
READINGS
Jennifer Hargreaves and Patricia Vertinsky, Chapter 1, Introduction,
Physical Culture, Power and the Body (Routledge, 2007).
Marcel Mauss, “Techniques of the Body,” Economy and Society 2, 1 (1973):
70-87.
Michel Foucault, The Means of Correct Training, Discipline and Punish. The
Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1977), 171-194.
(Extra article for background reading)
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Brett Smith and Nick Caddick, “Qualitative Methods in Sports : A Concise
Overview for Guiding Social Scientific Sport Research , Asia Pacific
Journal of Sport and Social Science, 1,1,2012,60-73.
January 23 EXERCISE, SPORT AND THE MEDICALIZATION OF
THE BODY
DVD - 100% Woman
READINGS
Shannon Jette (2006). “Fit for Two?”: A Critical Discourse Analysis of
Oxygen Fitness Magazine. Sociology of Sport Journal, 23 (4), 331-351.
http://journals.humankinetics.com/ssj-backissues/SSJVolume23Issue4December/FitforTwoACriticalDiscourseAnalysisofOxygenFitnessMagazine
Michael Gard and Jan Wright, Managing Uncertainty: Obesity Discourses
and Physical Education in a Risk Society,” Studies in Philosophy and
Education, 20, 2001, 535-549.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1023%2FA%3A1012238617836
Patricia Vertinsky, “Run, Jane, Run: Central Tensions in the Current Debate
about Enhancing Women’s Health through Exercise,” Women and Health
27(4) 1998, 81-111.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1300/J013v27n04_06#.Us2_8Z5dWoM
January 30 MUSCULARITY, MASCULINITY AND
THE MAINTENANCE OF GENDER BOUNDARIES
DVD - Million Dollar Baby
READINGS
Michael Messner, Gender Ideologies, Youth Sports and the Production of
Soft Essentialism, Sociology of Sport, 28, 2011:151-170.
http://journals.humankinetics.com/ssj-back-issues/ssj-volume-28-issue-2-june/gender-ideologies-youthsports-and-the-production-of-soft-essentialism
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Patricia Vertinsky, Muscularity and the Female Body, in Venus with Biceps,
David Chapman and Patricia Vertinsky, Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press,
2010.
Mary Louise Adams, “Death to the Prancing Prince. Effeminacy, Sport
Discourses and the Salvation of Men’s Dancing” Body and Society 11, 4,
2005: 63-86.
http://bod.sagepub.com/content/11/4/63
February 6 THE MARKINGS OF RACE AND ETHNICITY ON
THE BODY
DVD – Race : The Floating Signifier
READINGS
Anne Fausto –Sterling, “The Bare Bones of Race,” Social Studies of Science
38, 5, 2008: 657-694.
http://sss.sagepub.com/content/38/5/657.full.pdf
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25474604
Alan Klein, “Anti-Semitism and Anti-Somatism: Seeking the Elusive
Sporting Jew,” Sport in Society, 10, 6, 2007: 1120-1137.
http://journals.humankinetics.com/ssj-backissues/SSJVolume17Issue3September/AntiSemitismandAntiSomatismSeekingtheElusiveSportingJew
Brad Millington, Patricia Vertinsky, Ellexis Boyle, Brian Wilson, “Making
Chinese Canadian Masculinities in Vancouver’s Physical Education
Curriculum,” Sport, Education and Society, 13,2, 2008:195-214.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13573320801957095#.Us3EUp5dWoM
February 13
NORMALIZING THE BODY; IDEOLOGIES
AROUND BODY SHAPE AND SIZE
READINGS
Jaqueline Urla and Alan C. Swedlund, “The Anthropometry of Barbie:
Unsettling Ideas of the Feminine Body in Popular Culture,” in Jennifer Terry
and Jacqueline Urla (eds), Deviant Bodies: Critical Perspectives on
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Difference in Science and Culture (Indiana University Press, 1995), 277313.
Nadja Durbach, “Skinless Wonders: Body Worlds and the Victorian Freak
Show,” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 69,1, 2012,
38-67.
Ann F. La Berge, “How the Ideology of Low Fat Conquered America,”
Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 63, 2, 2008: 139177.
http://jhmas.oxfordjournals.org/content/63/2/139
Or
Kane Race, “Frequent Sipping: Bottled Water, the Will to Health and the
Subject of Hydration,” Body and Society, 18,3-4,2012: 72-98.
http://bod.sagepub.com/content/18/3-4/72
*********************************************************
February 17-21
MID TERM BREAK
February 27
SHIFTING BOUNDARIES OF SPORTS
MEDICINE: ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE, SEX
TESTING AND THE ENHANCED BODY
DVD - The Body Athletic/ Bigger, Faster, Stronger
READINGS
Jaime Schultz, “Caster Semanya and the ‘Question of Too:” Sex Testing in
Elite Women’s Sport and the Issue of Advantage,” Quest, 63, 2011, 228243.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00336297.2011.10483678#.Us3HWJ5dWoM
Katrina Karkazis et al., “Out of Bounds? A Critique of the New Policies on
Hyperandrogenism in Elite Female Athletes,” The American Journal of
Bioethics, 12,7, 2012, 3-16.
http://www.katrinakarkazis.com/out_of_bounds_ajob.pdf
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Nancy Theberge, “We have all the Bases Covered: The Construction of
Professional Boundaries in Sport Medicine,” International Review for the
Sociology of Sport, 44, 2, 2009, 265-281.
http://irs.sagepub.com/content/44/2-3/265.full.pdf
March 6
DISABILITY, TECHNOLOGY AND
THE PARALYMPICS
DVD - Murderball/ Paralympic Documentary/Sledhead
READINGS
Leslie Schwarz and Brian Westermeyer, “Cyborg Anxiety: Oscar Pistorius
and the Boundaries of What it Means to be Human,” Disability and Society,
23, 2, 2008: 187-190.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09687590701841232#.Us3Nfp5dWoM
P. David Howe, “The Tail is Wagging the Dog: Body Culture, Classification
and the Paralympic Movement,” Ethnography 9,4, 2008: 499-517.
http://eth.sagepub.com/content/9/4/499
Callie Batts and David L Andrews, “Tactical Athletes: The United States
Paralympic Military Program and the Mobilization of the Disabled
Soldier/Athlete,” Sport in Society, 14,5,2001: 553-568.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17430437.2011.574350#.Us3N4J5dWoM
March 13
THE INFLUENCE OF SPACE AND PLACE: SITES
OF SPORT AND EXERCISE
DVD – Asahi Baseball
READINGS
Patricia Vertinsky, Power Geometries, in Patricia Vertinsky and Sherry
McKay,eds. Disciplining Bodies in the Gymnasium: Memory, Monument
and Memorial (London: Routledge, 2004,chapter 3)
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Judith Farqhar and Qicheng Zhang, Biopolitical Beijing: Sovereignty and
Self-Cultivation in China’s Capital,” Cultural Anthropology 20,1, 2005:
303-327.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/can.2005.20.3.303/abstract
Laura Ginsberg Spielvogel, “The Discipline of Space in a Japanese Fitness
Club,” Sociology of Sport Journal, 19, 2002: 189-205.
http://journals.humankinetics.com/ssj-backissues/SSJVolume19Issue2June/TheDisciplineofSpaceinaJapaneseFitnessClub
March 20
EXERCISE, SPORT AND THE AGING BODY
DVD – Age is no barrier
Rylee Dionigi, “Competitive Sport as Leisure in Later Life: Negotiations,
Discourse and Aging,” Leisure Sciences, 28, 2006: 181-196.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01490400500484081#.Us3PfJ5dWoM
Emanuelle Tulle and Nika Dorrer, “Back from the Brink: Ageing, Exercise
and Health in a Small Gym,” Ageing and Society, 32,2012, 1106-1127.
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/search?searchType=CITEADVANCE&journals=ASO&volume=32&i
ssue=07&page=1106&author=Tulle&year=2012
Shannon Jette and Patricia Vertinsky, “ ‘Exercise is Medicine’:
Understanding the Exercise Beliefs and Practices of Older Chinese Women
Immigrants in British Columbia, Canada,” Journal of Aging Studies,
25,2011, 272-284.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0890406510000940
March 27
THE POLITICS OF SPORT, PHYSICAL CULTURE
AND DANCE
READINGS
Susan Brownell, Wushu and the Olympic Games. Combination of East and
West, or Clash of Body Cultures. In Vivienne Lo, ed, Sports, Medicine and
Immortality. London: British Museum Publications #188, 2012, 59-68. ISBN
086159 188 6
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Ryan Rodenburg and Andrea Eagleman, “Uneven Bars, Age Rules, Antitrust
and Amateurism in Women’s Gymnastics,” Baltimore Law
Review,40,2011,587-505.
http://gymnasticscoaching.com/new/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/SSRN-id1894684.pdf
Natasha Myers, Dance your PhD: Embodied Animations, Body Experiment
and the Affective Entanglements of Life Science Research,” Body and
Society 18,1,2012, 151-189.
http://bod.sagepub.com/content/18/1/151.full
April 3
PRESENTATIONS – Mini-Conference
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