Stratification and Inclusivity in Ethnically Diverse Adolescent Athletes

: An Ethnography and Theoretical Evaluation of Emerging Masculinities in Multi-Cultural Contexts

Abstract

In this multi-pronged work, I use ethnographic methods to investigate contemporary masculine relations within an ethnically and religiously diverse boys high-school athletics team in California. Utilising an intersectional framework, the aim of this provisional research is to explore ways gender structures make diverse identities consequences of and vehicles for vulnerability or equity in a sporting context. Following two primary research periods, I re-contextualize my own prior research at the site to form a longitudinal ethnography, painting the maintenance and erosion of gendered relations at the site with overlapping but distinct cohorts. In doing so, I test Inclusive Masculinity Theory (IMT) to better understand its efficacy, applications, and potential theoretical implications. Observations, informal interviews, and semi-structured interviews formed the bulk of the methodological tools used in the research periods described. The themes generated in my MPhil specific analysis of these research periods suggest variability in gendered behavior and the maintenance of hierarchies are steeped in individualistic narratives which are blind to and obfuscate power relations. These narratives reflect colour-blind and sexuality-blind frameworks, even in the face of conditions which facilitate inclusive masculinities. Thus, this research supports future directions in masculinities and gender research which speak to theories of individualism and modernity. That research direction, unarticulated before this thesis, may reveal fundamental influences on gendered behavior and relations with which we will better understand what inclusive masculinities can achieve for gendered well-being.

Date of Award	31 Aug 2021
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Winchester
Supervisor	Eric Anderson (Supervisor)