Four wheels and one board: studying the skateboard tribe and their loyalty towards skateboarding brands

Skateboarding is considered an extreme sport, but for its practitioners it represents much more. Skateboarders share a deep link because of the high level of passion and emotion revolving around skateboarding itself. In line with the previous, it is believed that we live in a postmodern-era suggesting that consumer’s value more symbolic and emotional aspects of products and services, rather than economic and functional ones. Furthermore, authors like Cova and Cova (2002) argue that consumers are willing to re-compose their social universe by connecting on an emotional basis with other consumers, forming consumer tribes. The First objective of this thesis is to understand if a consumer tribe can be identified within the Portuguese skateboarding panorama. The second one is to analyze how through a tribal marketing strategy skateboarding brands can achieve a true and emotional brand loyalty among the tribe. In order to accomplish these objectives an exploratory study was developed based on qualitative and ethnographic research including as main tools participant observation and in-depth interviews. Through the gathered data it was possible to verify that typical characteristics of consumer tribes were observed among skateboarders and sharing of common values such as non-competitive spirit and sense of freedom. Concerning the behavior and loyalty towards skateboard brands, the present findings support that these brands must establish an authentic and emotional relation with skateboarders by actively supporting and understanding the tribe and additionally take in account the main social influences in brand choice and loyalty.O skate é definido como um desporto radical, mas para os praticantes este representa muito mais. Os skaters partilham uma forte ligação devido à forte paixão e emoção relacionada com o skate. Na actualidade, é defendido que vivemos numa época pósmoderna significando que os consumidores dão maior valor aos aspectos simbólicos e emocionais dos produtos e serviços do que aos racionais. Adicionalmente, autores como Cova e Cova (2002) defendem que os consumidores querem recompor o seu universo social estabelecendo uma ligação emocional com outros consumidores, formando tribos. O primeiro objectivo desta dissertação é compreender se uma tribo de consumidores pode ser identificada no skate nacional. Em segundo lugar pretende-se analisar como é que as marcas de skate, adoptando uma estratégia de marketing tribal, conseguem atingir uma lealdade autêntica e emocional face aos membros da tribo. Para atingir os objectivos foi realizado um estudo exploratório baseado numa metodologia qualitativa e etnográfica utilizando como principais ferramentas a observação participante e as entrevistas semiestruturadas. Através dos dados obtidos foi possível verificar que características típicas em tribos de consumidores também são observadas no skate, e que estas partilham valores idênticos tais como a atitude não-competitiva e o sentimento de liberdade. Relativamente ao comportamento e lealdade face a marcas de skate, os resultados obtidos reflectem que as marcas devem procurar desenvolver uma relação autêntica e emocional demonstrando compreensão e suporte face à tribo, e adicionalmente ter sempre em conta as principais influências de escolha e lealdade de marcas

The organization of turn-taking in poolskate sessions

This study takes pool skating, where only one skater rides at a time, as an example of a turn-taking system, albeit one that is organized not through speech but through bodily actions. This allows us to revisit Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson’s (1974) famous “turn taking” paper—in particular, their initial broad conception of turn-taking systems as including activities other than the speech-exchange systems studied by conversation analysis. Despite the original declaration, non-speech turn-taking systems have evaded close scrutiny for the past four decades. By turning our attention to such a system here, this study makes two contributions: firstly, to the sociology of turn-organized activities (through a comparison of the central features of turn-taking for conversation with pool skating) and, secondly, to the study of how bodily actions can accomplish pre-beginnings (since in pool skate sessions, this is the place to settle the matter of turn allocation in order to avoid overlaps in riding)

Ciné Parkour: A cinematic and theoretical contribution to the understanding of the practice of parkour

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Through a meeting of practice and theory this thesis shifts the locus of attention from the spectacle to the everyday practice of parkour. Using documentary filmmaking with anthropological intentions and extended access over a six year period, this thesis explores the subjective everyday lived performances and essence of parkour, as experienced by a select group of experienced practitioners, as well as those who were involved in parkour’s creation and development. Parkour is a multidimensional phenomenon that can be experienced as an art, training discipline, sport, set of values, and practice of freedom, depending on an individual’s motivations, cultural understanding and exposure to the history of the practice. The research establishes that parkour is an imaginative and particular way of thinking; remapping the landscape with ‘parkour vision’. Parkour transforms how one experiences, moves, connects and participates in the environment, challenging notions of normative behaviour, socialisation, identity and self-determining actions through explorations of, as well as expressions of the self. The results of which are a means to find a more authentic deeper inner sense of self, producing feelings of inclusion and an enhanced sense of freedom through the creation of an autonomous social body. Parkour encourages self-reliance and mutual co-operation whilst enabling participants to reclaim the wonderment and magic of the human experience, valuing confrontations of fear, pleasure and pain in transcending the real and imagined boundaries of one’s own limitations, play and freedom of expression. This thesis explores themes such as shared cinema, collaborative filmmaking, participant observation and issues of representation. Parkour is discussed theoretically from the perspectives of Eichberg’s work on body cultures, Foucauldian relations of power and technologies of the self, alongside Merleau Ponty’s phenomenology, Csikszentmihalyi’s optimal flow experience, Wellmann’s insights into networked individualism and Charles Taylor’s work on the search for an authentic self and the complexities of a modern identity. This thesis contributes to the growing field of research into body cultures and the continually evolving culture of parkour

Skateparks : trace and culture

Tucked away on the fringes of playing fields and brownfield land, skateparks have a reputation for being unsavoury, and even dangerous spaces, where anti-social behaviour is to be expected. Research shows however, that much of the activity that occurs in the space is positive, both physically and socially. This study aims to explore both anti-social and pro-social aspects of skateparks, and investigate the complex relationships that occur with and within skateparks. The study questions whether current sports-focused planning models are appropriate for an activity that is so steeped in urban culture. Utilising photography as a research tool, the study documented 136 skateparks in Australia and overseas. These photographs reveal ways to read the visual traces left behind by the users of the skateparks, and demonstrates the important role that the skatepark plays for users of the space. The documented skateparks have been re-coded as a result of their usage by individuals and groups, and the recurrence of these traces from site to site, country to country, proves that this is not an isolated phenomenon, but that skater communities on a global level speak a common visual language. Rather than a skatepark being developed solely as a functional sporting venue, as is often the case in Australia, this research supports an alternative approach to design development—as vibrant cultural zones that contribute positively to the physical, social and cultural wellbeing of young people who use these spaces

Skateboarding in Seoul:A Sensory Ethnography

As skaters increasingly engage with and respond to socio-political surges across the globe, skateboarding begins to refract into a multiplicity of situated practices. This includes a new wave of collectives and communities who re-imagine what cities could sound, feel, and be like.Combining filmmaking with ethnographic writing, Sander Hölsgens traces the lived experience of a small group of skaters in South Korea. As a skater among skaters, he unravels the site-specific nuances and relational meanings of skateboarding in Seoul – working towards an intimate portrait of a growing community

Chasing Rx: A Spatial Ethnography of the CrossFit Gym

CrossFit is a group fitness program that incorporates a variety of weightlifting and gymnastic movements performed at high intensities. Although there is growing research on CrossFit’s physiological and behavioral outcomes, few studies have qualitatively examined the program’s psychological and sociological characteristics. Drawing from Henning Eichberg’s (1998) work on spatial geography, this five-month ethnographic study examined the space and place of two San Francisco Bay Area CrossFit gyms as an introduction to a broader discussion on CrossFit subculture and evolving discourses about the body, health, and fitness. Specifically, three major themes about the CrossFit space emerged from the participant-observation data, including: a place to experience hard physical labor in an otherwise sedentary and technologized society; a place that encourages all genders, ages, and abilities to participate equally as long as one pays the premium membership; and a hyper-competitive place that inadvertently leads to wild and untamed bodily movements. Results of the study suggest that CrossFit’s popularity is related at least as much to psychosocial factors as it is to the physiological benefits derived from participation. The gym’s location, layout, and open arrangement of moving bodies reveal underlying social patterns that allow for a more complex interpretation of CrossFit space as a place that blurs the line between exercise and menial labor, and elite sport and recreational activity

The Organization of Turn-Taking in Pool Skate Sessions

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Research on Language and Social Interaction on 18th November 2015, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/08351813.2015.1090114.This study takes pool skating, where only one skater rides at a time, as an example of a turn-taking system, albeit one that is organized not through speech but through bodily actions. This allows us to revisit Sacks, Schegloff, and Jefferson’s (1974) famous “turn taking” paper—in particular, their initial broad conception of turn-taking systems as including activities other than the speech-exchange systems studied by conversation analysis. Despite the original declaration, non-speech turn-taking systems have evaded close scrutiny for the past four decades. By turning our attention to such a system here, this study makes two contributions: firstly, to the sociology of turn-organized activities (through a comparison of the central features of turn-taking for conversation with pool skating) and, secondly, to the study of how bodily actions can accomplish pre-beginnings (since in pool skate sessions, this is the place to settle the matter of turn allocation in order to avoid overlaps in riding)

"Free sports": organizational evolution from participatory activities to Olympic sports

Free sports are the phenomena that have rapidly developed from lifestyle activities to professional competitive sports over the last several decades. Known for distinctive counter-culture values, many popular free sports, such as snowboarding or BMX, have recently become largely commercialized and experienced significant organizational change. The main research question of this study is how free sports have organizationally evolved over time. This thesis focuses on patterns and mechanisms of structural change and evolution of values of these sports. The research utilized a multiple case qualitative methodology and is presented as a cross-case study of three international sports: competitive snowboarding, competitive skateboarding, and sport climbing. A review of existing literature identified the theory of new institutionalism as being particularly relevant to this study and thus, supplemented by resource-dependence theory, this forms the theoretical framework for this research. This study found that as a result of organizational evolution, informal organizational arrangements, which were historically typical for free sports, have not been uniformly replaced by formalized structural arrangements of mainstream sports. In addition, the organizational fields of these free sports are found to have adopted multiple logics, such as commercial, competitive, and traditional free sport logics. The notion of cultural legitimacy of international sport organizations appears to be central to explaining organizational evolution of free sports. As conflicts revolving over the “ownership” of international sports and the practice of “umbrella” governance are found to be of great concern in free sports, it is the relationship between cultural and regulatory legitimacy that these issues are addressed through. Finally, it is found that multiple power/dependence relationships existing in organizational fields of free sports are largely underpinned by commercial interests and strategies of the Olympic movement. In terms of contribution to theoretical knowledge, this study extends previous applications of institutional and resource-dependence theories to free sports and reveals that the process of institutionalization of sports does not necessarily lead to change of values in macro perspective. However, it can facilitate and foster a separation between two different “versions” of the same sports: competitive sports and traditional sports. This study contributes to wider practical sport management knowledge by raising a question of sustainability of culturally legitimate but unconventional international sport organizations in the global sport business. Another implication of this study is challenging the IOC as a source of regulatory legitimacy for sports and questioning the belief that all sports strive for the Olympic Games, which is taken for granted as the ultimate goal of evolution of sports in a global context. This is a major call of this study to both academics and practitioners, as governance of international sports is expected to remain the topic of a great debate in academic literature and popular media