Keynotes

Professor Cara Aitchison (Professor in Leisure and Tourism Studies, Dean of Education and Sport, University of Bedfordshire)|
Professor Richard Bailey (Professor of Sport and Education, College of Social Sciences, University of Birmingham)
Professor Frank Furedi (Professor of Sociology, University of Kent)
Dr. Martin Hagger (Reader in Social and Health Psychology, University of Nottingham)
Professor Simon Shibli (Director, Sport Industry Research Centre (SIRC), Sheffield Hallam University)
Professor Chris Shilling (Professor of Sociology, University of Kent)

Mapping the Culture and Matter of Leisure: Synergies in Social Science

This paper explores the ways in which geographical contributions to the study of leisure, sport and tourism theory and policy have developed through a series of distinct phases over the last quarter of a century. This chronological account considers the influence of the 'cultural turn' in recent social science and the ways in which social and cultural geography, together with cultural sociology, has shaped leisure studies since the early 1990s. The paper challenges the dominant view within contemporary social and cultural geographies of leisure, sport and tourism where the mapping of culture has become a largely qualitative and theoretical pursuit. Instead, the paper calls for the development of a more integrated social scientific approach to the study of leisure, sport and tourism policy and practice where the social, cultural, environmental and economic are, like qualitative and quantitative methodologies, seen as mutually informing in explaining both cultural and material manifestations of leisure. The argument is supported by the use of illustrative examples from the author's recent theoretically informed empirical research that has adopted multi-method, multi-phased and multi-disciplinary approaches. It is argued that these approaches offer increased potential to understand ways in which leisure can be better developed as a sustainable and inclusive site and process of social, cultural, environmental and economic well-being.

Cara Aitchison is Dean of the Faculty of Education and Sport at the University of Bedfordshire, where she is also Professor in Leisure and Tourism Studies and Director of the Institute for Sport and Physical Activity Research. Until 2008 she was Professor in Human Geography and Director of the Centre for Leisure, Tourism and Society (CeLTS) at the University of the West of England. Her major books include Gender, Sport and Identity (Routledge 2007), Geographies of Muslim Identities: Diaspora, Gender and Belonging (Ashgate 2007), Gender and Leisure: Social and Cultural Perspectives (Routledge 2003) and Leisure and Tourism Landscapes: Social and Cultural Geographies (Routledge 2001). Cara is an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences, a member of the Leisure Studies Editorial Board and was previously Chair of the Leisure Studies Association (2001-2008), Chair of World Leisure's Commission on Women and Gender (2002-2008) and a Member of the Arts and Humanities Peer Review College (2004-2007) and the UK Research Assessment Exercise 2008 Panel for Sport-Related Studies (2005-2008).

Sport, Leisure and Human Flourishing

This paper examines the popular claim that sport and other leisure activities contribute to the development of young people's well-being. It questions the 'standard view' in which the value of sport and leisure activities and their relationship to well-being is conceptualised and researched within a subjectivist framework which focuses on experiencing pleasure and enjoyment, or fulfilling individual desires and preferences. I criticise and reject this framework on the grounds of its impermanence, hedonistic shallowness, and its epistemological inadequacy. In contrast I argue that the value of sports and leisure activities ought to be situated in fundamental arguments about the necessary conditions for human flourishing. According to this view, there are certain necessary elements of a good life without which human flourishing becomes impossible. I argue that sports and leisure activities offer distinctive ways to help realise these objective elements. I conclude by discussing the implications for this view in terms of justifying public expenditure on sport and leisure in schools and the wider community.

Richard Bailey has studied physical education, philosophy and anthropology; his current work focuses on the philosophy of learning and expertise. He has had Chairs at Canterbury. Roehampton, and most recently Birmingham, and has been Expert Advisor for UNESCO and a member of the Executive Board of the ICSSPE. Recent books include Multidisciplinary Perspectives in Talent Development (with Dick Fisher, 2008) and The Routledge Physical Education Reader (with David Kirk, 2009). His work on well-being, on which his keynote presentation is based, was undertaken with Prof. Mike McNamee and Dr Andrew Bloodworth, at Swansea University.

Leisure and the Ambiguities of Risk Taking

How do people manage to engage with risk in a culture that often associates risk taking with the idea of responsibility? Increasingly people's 'free-time' and leisure experience has become subject to both formal and informal forms of risk assessment. And yet individuals still aspire to engage with unpredictable and open ended experiences. The tension between the institutionalisation of risk aversion and the human desire for authentic risky experience constitutes the focus of this paper.

Frank Furedi is Professor of Sociology at the University of Kent in Canterbury. He is Author of Invitation to Terror: The Expanding Empire of the Unknown; Culture of Fear Revisited (2006); Politics of Fear; Beyond Left and Right (2005); Where have All The Intellectuals Gone (2005); Therapeutic Culture; Cultivating Vulnerability In An Anxious Age (2004); Culture of Fear (2002), Paranoid Parenting (2001). Furedi's research is oriented towards the study of the impact of precautionary culture and risk aversion on Western societies. In his books he has explored controversies and panics over issues such as health, children, food and new technology. Furedi comments on radio and television. His articles are published in the New Scientist, The Guardian, The Independent, The Financial Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Sunday Telegraph,The Express, The Daily Mail, The Wall Street Journal, The Independent on Sunday, The Times, The Sunday Times, Toronto Globe and Mail, The Christian Science Monitor, The Times Higher Education Supplement, The Times Literary Supplement, Harvard Business Review and Die Zeit amongst others. For more information visit www.frankfuredi.com

Motivation and Leisure-time Physical Activity

A wealth of epidemiological evidence exists on the health-related benefits of regular leisure-time physical activity. This has compelled governments and policy makers to design and implement national and regional campaigns in an attempt to change people's behaviour towards engaging more leisure-time physical activities. In this keynote presentation I will examine the theory and research that has informed these behaviour change interventions and argue that more translational research needs to be done in terms of designing and implementing such interventions. I will also focus on theories that have focused on the role of promoting intrinsic motivation to engage in leisure-time physical activity for the fulfilment of fundamental psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Finally, I will highlight the ethical and moral issues surrounding changing behaviour in the general population and people's perceptions of behaviour-change interventions with respect to their leisure-time physical activity.

Martin Hagger is a research psychologist (School of Psychology, University of Nottingham) with diverse research interests in the areas of health and social psychology. His main focus is the social processes involved in people's 'self-regulation' and motivation of health behaviour, applying social cognitive and motivational models to change diverse health behaviours such as leisure-time physical activity, dieting, and binge drinking. He is editor-in-chief of Psychology of Sport and Exercise, co-editor of Psychology and Health, associate editor of Stress and Health, and member of the editorial boards of British Journal of Health Psychology, Psychology, Health, and Medicine, and International Review of Sport and Exercise Psychology. He has written and edited 2 books: Social Psychology of Exercise and Sport and Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Exercise and Sport with Nikos Chatzisarantis. He recently served as part of the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellent (NICE) Guideline Development Group for Physical Activity and Children. For more information visit www.martinhagger.com

The economics of leisure places: silos or synergies?

Applied economics and management accounting have taken the Sport Industry Research Centre team at Sheffield Hallam University on a journey through: the economics of sport; sports participation; events and festivals; elite sport, and performance management over the last 13 years. As a market-led research centre we are increasingly being asked to undertake research and consultancy that is interdisciplinary and based on a mixed methods approach. This change in direction from being discipline driven to adopting a more holistic approach will be the theme of my presentation. I will argue that as our field of research matures and technology enables previously discipline-based techniques such as Geographical Information Systems to be more widely accessible, there will be convergence of the methods used to understand leisure and place.

Simon Shibli is Professor of Sport Management and a Director of the Sport Industry Research Centre (SIRC) at Sheffield Hallam University. He is a graduate from Loughborough University in Physical Education, Sports Science and Recreation Management and is also a qualified management accountant (ACMA). Since the establishment of SIRC in 1996 Simon's work has focused primarily on the applied use of economic and management accounting techniques in sport and leisure.

The Body Pedagogics of Performativity and Performance

In this presentation I shall explore how notions of performativity in social life are shaped by the body pedagogics of contrasting technological and religious formations. By exploring the dominant cultural means through which a collectivity seeks to transmit its values, habits and techniques, the characteristic experiences associated with acquiring or failing to acquire these affordances, and the habitus based outcomes of these processes, I analyse how prevailing notions of performance seek to shape embodied standards, knowledge and experience, and have important consequences for the relationship between work, leisure and well-being.

Chris Shilling is Professor of Sociology at the University of Kent in Canterbury. Recent publications include Changing Bodies: Habit, Crisis and Creativity (Sage, 2008), Embodying Sociology: Retrospect, Progress and Prospects (editor, Blackwells, 2007), The Body in Culture, Technology and Society (Sage, 2005), The Body and Social Theory (2nd edition, Sage, 2003), and The Sociological Ambition: Elementary Forms of Social and Moral Life (with P.A.Mellor, Sage, 2001). He is the editor of The Sociological Review Monograph Series, and serves on the editorial boards of The Sociological Review, Body & Society, and Sport, Ethics and Philosophy. For more information visit www.kent.ac.uk/sspssr/staff/academic/shilling.html