Valeria J. Freysinger

Women's Leisure: Affiliation, Self-Determination, Empowerment and Resistance?

Abstract Because of leisures relationship to the quality of life, mental health, and development, access to or opportunity for leisure has been the topic of much study. This research has shown that women across cultures face numerous constraints to leisure—both material and ideological. Leisure is a context of womens oppression and exploitation. However, oppression or hegemony “is never complete, always in the process of being reimposed, and always capable of being resisted” (Weiler, 1988). Indeed leisure, which is defined by relative freedom and rolelessness, may not only be a realm of cultural reproduction but also a context for womens empowerment and cultural resistance. This research explored that question. It was found that the female gender role was not only reproduced in leisure (leisure as affiliation) but also challenged (leisure as self-determination). In self-determined leisure women were empowered to resist falsifying, but also to regain or create, their sense of themselves.

Leisure with children and parental satisfaction: further evidence of a sex difference in the experience of adult roles and leisure.

While it is often claimed that leisure enhances family quality and cohesion, little empirical research exists on this relationship (Orthner & Mancini, 1990). In particular, the relationship between...

The activity involvement of women and men in young and middle adulthood: A panel study

Abstract In a secondary analyses of a 36‐year panel study of 267 Euro‐American women and men, this research examined gender differences in (a) the frequency of individuals’ involvement in discretionary or free‐time activity in young and middle adulthood, (b) change in activity involvement between young and middle adulthood, and (c) predictors of activity involvement in young and middle adulthood. Activity involvement included participation in recreational, formal and informal educational, and voluntary (club and organizational) activities. Results of this panel study suggest both change and continuity in activity involvement with age. Results also indicate that gender distinguishes patterns and predictors of participation in discretionary activity.

Coaches’ Communication of Sport Body Image: Experiences of Female Athletes

The purpose of the study was to explore female athletes’ experiences of coaches’ communication of sport body image. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I female athletes. The results revealed that coaches encouraged nutrition and physical development during training thereby communicating a healthy, fit sport body image. The coaches communicated the sport body image through the sport and training environment, body comparisons and criticisms, recognition of athletic body change, individualized athlete-centered training, and role modeling. Individualized athlete-centered training and goal-setting were viewed as supportive means of communicating guidance about sport body image.

Race and leisure.

In this chapter race and leisure are examined. Interest in race, and how and why it shapes leisure practices and experiences — and leisure (re)constructs perceptions and notions of race — is relatively recent in the field of leisure studies. The discussion in this chapter is informed by the scholarship on race and ethnicity in the field of recreation and leisure as well as well as that in sport sociology, cultural studies, race and ethnic studies, and feminist studies. That is, leisure is broadly constructed in this chapter and the thinking in fields outside of recreation and leisure is considered as relates to the subject of race and leisure. The literature reviewed is primarily North American, British and Australian. In other words, this chapter presents particular ways of thinking and talking about leisure and race that are rooted in the cultures and scholarly traditions of particular societies, most notably, white-dominated cultures where aboriginal and (select) immigrant peoples are marginalized.

How can coaches build mental toughness? Views from sport psychologists

ABSTRACT Much has been written about athlete mental toughness in the past 15 years. Most of this literature is based on interviews with coaches, athletes, and to a lesser degree, parents. The present article presents views of sport psychologists who had applied and research experience in mental toughness and thus more integrated views of how coaches should build mental toughness. Results revealed that to build mental toughness, sport psychologists believe coaches need to be thoughtful and purposeful both in how they think about athletes (i.e., be instructive and encouraging, foster autonomy, see them as individuals) and their staff (i.e., be multidimensional and educate), as well as what they do (i.e., create adversity and at the same time teach mental skills).

“What Do I Think About Title IX?” Voices From a University Community

Despite the apparent benefits of Title IX, the implementation of the law remains controversial, and there are divergent beliefs regarding its impact on collegiate sport. The purpose of this study was to examine how members of a university community, whose intercollegiate sport programs have changed, perceive and make sense of Title IX and the changes it incurred. Using a gendered lens (Birrell, 2000) and qualitative interviews with 13 individuals connected to the university community, insight was gained into their perceptions of Title IX and womens and mens athletic opportunities. The theme of opportunity gained and lost was central to how these individuals perceive Title IX and resonates with the liberal (feminist) concerns out of which Title IX was born.

A qualitative investigation of early childhood teachers’ experiences of rhythm as pedagogy

Rhythm has been found to enhance not only biological functioning (e.g. balance, timing and coordination), but also to facilitate learning across sociocultural contexts. That is, rhythm may be a method of supporting child development and well-being. Hence, to the extent that children are not exposed to or engaged with rhythm, their development or the realization of their full potential may be limited. However, little research has explored the use of rhythm in early childhood education—a major context (in terms of time and importance) of children’s lives—or teachers’ experiences with rhythm in their pedagogy. Therefore, we conducted a qualitative study to investigate elementary teachers’ experiences of rhythm in their classroom teaching specifically, and in the teaching–learning process generally. A phenomenological approach that assumes that peoples’ perceptions present us with evidence of the world not as the world is thought to be but as it is lived was employed. Our goal was to understand the everyday pedagogy of a group of elementary school teachers, specifically, to understand how they experienced and constructed the role of rhythm in elementary education. Semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with study participants to probe and generate a rich description of the phenomenon of rhythm in the teaching–learning process. Results consisted of nine themes that convey (1) what rhythm meant to the teachers, (2) what they saw as the importance of rhythm in their teaching, and (3) the challenges they faced in incorporating rhythm in their teaching. Findings suggest that a broader and more inclusive range of activities (i.e. because rhythmic activities such as music, dance, oral rhymes, and other bodily movement) in the academic curriculum is important as such activities have the potential to improve the learning, development, and well-being of elementary school-age children and enhance the lived experiences of schooling for both educators and their students. However, a number of challenges also confront elementary educators who seek to incorporate rhythm into their pedagogy.

The World Leisure Commission on Leisure in Later Life (LLL)

While for most of human history, older persons (i.e., those 60 years of age and older) have never comprised more than 3 4% of the world’s population, today they comprise 15% on average in developed countries and in these countries they are expected to average 25% by the middle of the twenty-first century (Center for Strategic and International Studies (CISI), 2012). According to CISI, ‘‘[b]y the 2040s, Mexico will be nearly as old as the United States and China will be older. Meanwhile, South Korea will be vying with Germany, Italy and Japan for the title of oldest country on earth.’’ Population aging is occurring most rapidly in ‘‘low’’ and ‘‘middle’’ income countries and is ‘‘inextricably linked to socioeconomic development’’ (World Health Organization, 2012). That is, radical economic changes, along with shifting demographics, are two of the many forces that have combined to make the aging of populations worldwide a topic of much interest to nation states and their governments as well as to the individuals, families and communities which comprise them. To whit, on 8 October 2009, the United Nations (UN) commemorated the tenth anniversary of the International Day of Older Persons (occurring every 1 October) ‘‘to seek new ways to strengthen older persons’ involvement in global efforts to improve their quality of life, and to harness the social and economic opportunities that aging offers’’ (United Nations, 2009). In the European Union (EU), 2012 is the Year for Active Aging and Solidarity between Generations. According to a EUROPA press release (2012),