- Title:
- Canoes and canvas : the social and spatial politics of sport/leisure in late nineteenth-century North America
- Creator:
- Dunkin, Jessica Diane
- Date Created:
- 2012
- Degree Awarded:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Subjects:
- Recreation
- Geographical Focus:
- Canada Us
- Supporting Materials:
- n/a
- Description:
- This dissertation explores the social and spatial politics of sport/leisure in the late nineteenth century within the context of the American Canoe Association (ACA). Beginning in 1880, the Association sought “to unite all amateur canoeists for the purpose of pleasure, health, or exploration.” Yearly encampments, which brought together enthusiasts from Canada and the United States to sleep under canvas, race canoes, “recreate,” and socialize, were central to realizing this mission. The encampments were profoundly meaningful events for many who attended. However, the construction of meaning was contingent upon practices of hierarchy and exclusion. For example, the ACA barred full membership to women, members of the working class, and people of colour, even as it engaged the “other” as labourer at the encampments. I pay particular attention to the ways in which class, gender, and race were mobilized to shape access to and experiences of recreation, but also to the broader effects of the encampments on the lives, livelihoods, and lands of rural whites, Aboriginal people, African Americans, and French Canadians. These were constructed places and communities, and the boundary-work of inclusion and exclusion that characterized them were extensions rather than departures from how place and community were being formed elsewhere. Throughout, this dissertation argues that this seemingly egalitarian and fun-loving organization, which located itself in what its organizers perceived as benign natural landscapes, also participated in a politics of exclusion, displacement, and dispossession at the core of late nineteenth-century liberalism, capitalism, and colonialism. In making such an argument, this dissertation also raises questions about what has historically constituted a “sportscape” arguing the space of competition, at least in the case of the ACA regattas, must be studied alongside those spaces of dwelling, administration, work, and travel to which it was connected. This dissertation is informed by and in conversation with literatures from the historv of sport, women'’s and gender historvy, the history of tourism, working-class and labour history, and environmental history, and it hopes that specialists in those areas will see not only its indebtedness but also some contributions back to these fields.
Source
- Preferred Citation:
- Dunkin, Jessica Diane. 2012. "Canoes and canvas : the social and spatial politics of sport/leisure in late nineteenth-century North America", Department of History, Carleton University
- Link to this page:
- https://cuhistory.github.io/grads/items/hist_100.html
Rights
- Rights:
- Copyright the author, all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.