week 1— pilot project

[Last modified: October, 16 2024 03:59 PM]

Topic__ My interests stem from the perspective of body as material, my desire to encourage fluid expression of self, as well as definitions of success, morality/moral imagination and addiction. As the human body continues to be a prevailing medium through which visual culture is built on, we can approach these broader concepts through a variety of phenomena. My area of focus is athletes in aesthetic sports (eg. figure skating, diving, gymnastics, figure swimming, freestyle skiing. and martial arts routines), more specifically, the bodies of those who have transitioned out of professional or competitive landscapes to more traditional lifestyles. Considering embodied representations of structural compliance and freedom.

Questions__

1. What age did you begin your sport? What age did you stop? For what reasons?
2. Was your family involved in your participation of x sport?
3. How would you describe your involvement in the sport?
4. Were there processes you underwent to untangle standards re: perfection aesthetics/judging systems?
5. How has your body changed physically? Internally? Habitually?

Methods__ 

• Photo elicitation
  • Ask participants for photos of themselves that demarcate specific, foundational periods
  • Images where they find themselves visually beautiful v. not beautiful
• Digital ethnography
  • Consider social media profiles & online personas of participants — archived images on IG, etc.
• Multimodal Multi-site participant observation/Interviews/storytelling
  • Participant observation/interviews/storytelling in various settings
    • eg. the stage vs. practice vs. personal life
      • interactions with peers, instructors, authority figures, family, friends

Potential Findings__ 

• The body as capital
• Emotions and reactions participants have had throughout different stages of their transition out of competitive aesthetic athletics
• Competition v. collaboration
• Perception of the body in relation to life
• The passing of time represented through athletes’ efforts
• Visual denigration of the body, dichotomized by the stage