Tales from the Ring: Narrative Accounts of Men’s Experience of Violence, Desistance and Boxing

• In Event: The Gendered Contexts of Victimization and Offending

Abstract

This paper addresses the relationship between the sport of boxing and young men’s desistance from violence. It examines how men make sense of violence as a result of participating in the sport, and how they rehearse and practice violence in their lives both in and outside of the gym walls. I pay particular attention to the participant’s understanding of violence and also how the logic of the gym reinforces attitudes favourable to violence and the maintenance of respect. This research discusses and elaborates on previous assumptions in sporting and desistance literature, and argues that while relevant, diversionary activities and sport-based rehabilitative programmes are only one element in the theory of change. In conclusion, arguments are put forward that state that boxing actually traps men in an attendant culture of respect that requires them to respond in aggressive ways to maintain an image of both masculinity and respect. This attendant culture - that is transposable between gym and street – can override the pro-social desisting elements that the gym can offer, and reinforces the logic and discourses that evokes and traps men in habits of responding to violence, therefore in terms of future policy and practice new directions need to be sought.

Author

• Deborah Jump, Manchester Metropolitan University