Sex, drugs and snowboarding’

(Il)legitimate Definitions of Taste and Lifestyle in a Physical Youth Culture

Bibliographic Data

ID11436244
AuthorsH Thorpe (0000-0002-2420-1929, University of Waikato, corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume31
Issue1
Pages33-51
Publication date2012-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueLeisure Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0261-4367 • E-ISSN: 1466-4496
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/02614367.2011.596556
OpenAlexW2137689889
LanguageEN
Citations received19
References cited45

This paper examines the hedonistic social interactions and lifestyles embraced by many contemporary physical youth cultural participants via the case of snowboarding. Drawing upon an array of primary and secondary sources collected over seven years, I present a three-part analysis of the hedonistic party lifestyle, alcohol and drug consumption (for both pleasure and performance), and the hyper-sexuality, at the core of the snowboarding culture. Engaging Bourdieu’s theory of distinction, and particularly his concepts of field, practice and taste, in dialogue with my empirical evidence, I reveal the definitions of pleasure and the hedonistic snowboarding lifestyle as highly contested. While many cultural participants are complicit to hierarchical and/or violent attempts to regulate the dominant tastes and practices within the snowboarding field, others are engaging in an array of symbolic and embodied struggles to (re)define meanings of ‘pleasure’ in the snowboarding lifestyle and après snow culture more broadly

Aesthetics · Art · Consumption (sociology · Embodied cognition · Epistemology · Human sexuality · Masculinity · Pleasure · Social science · Sociology · Taste · Adventure Sports and Sensation Seeking · Gender Studies · Psychology · Social Psychology · Sport and Mega-Event Impacts · Sports, Gender, and Society

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