1. ‘These chicks go just as hard as us!’ (Un)doing gender in a Dutch CrossFit gym
- Author
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Schrijnder, Suzanne, van Amsterdam, Noortje, McLachlan, Fiona, Organizational Culture and Change, UU LEG Research USG Public Matters, Organizational Culture and Change, and UU LEG Research USG Public Matters
- Subjects
CrossFit ,Sociology and Political Science ,Space (commercial competition) ,ethnography ,muscularity ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,0502 economics and business ,Ethnography ,gender ,Sociology ,gyms ,Movement (music) ,05 social sciences ,Gender studies ,030229 sport sciences ,body ,Social constructionism ,fitness ,heterosexual matrix ,Doing gender ,performativity ,Heterosexuality ,Performativity ,Organizational structure ,050212 sport, leisure & tourism ,Social Sciences (miscellaneous) - Abstract
CrossFit is a relatively new fitness movement/sport, where women and men train together in the same space, performing the same athletic movements and gender equality is celebrated in CrossFit marketing, promoting equal opportunities for men and women. This paper explores how the much emphasized gender-equality narrative in CrossFit unfolds in gender performativity in a Dutch CrossFit gym. To this end, we draw from an ethnographic case study through which we examine the gendered narratives and bodily gestures of CrossFitters. Using Butler’s heterosexual matrix, we found that gender ideologies emerge in explicit and implicit narratives, materials and organizational structure, and embodied performances in the CrossFit gym. CrossFitters, on the one hand, explicitly challenge gender norms and create a space where women can undertake behaviour that is traditionally considered masculine. However, traditional gender norms, including heterosexual desire, are nonetheless implicitly reproduced through performances, narratives and organizational structures present in CrossFit.
- Published
- 2020