Volenti non fit injuria: Women in boxing and the negotiation of identity and gender

Abstract

This thesis brings together works produced over a period of six years. It is a qualitative study of women’s boxing in England, centred on the ethnographic study of two mixed-gender boxing gyms in the Midlands region. The original plan for data collection involved 18 months of continuous ethnographic fieldwork, however the unprecedented context of the Covid-19 pandemic opened up new methodological possibilities. 28 online interviews were conducted during lockdown, and a new creative elicitation method was developed using the boxers kit bag and the kit contained as an elicitation tool. Data from the limited observations, online interviews, and subsequent kit bag encounters form the basis of this thesis. The material was analysed using thematic analysis, with methods and findings represented across three papers. The first paper introduces a novel elicitation method which used the contents of boxers’ kit bags to explore embodied practice with female boxers. While data vignettes are included to demonstrate usefulness of this method, the paper primarily highlights how immersive sensory encounters with activity-specific objects can reveal how material items foster belonging and support narrations of transition in and out of character. The second paper is an empirical study examining intersections of material culture and gendered identity in women’s boxing. Focusing on clothing and equipment, it demonstrates how these shape contested feminine identities, influence inclusion, and mediate experiences of resistance and belonging in the gym. The third paper employs a Lefebvrian framework to analyse women’s spatial experiences in boxing. Findings suggest that women’s inclusion is often more symbolic than substantive. Collectively, the thesis makes novel methodological and theoretical contributions to the sociology of sport and beyond. It demonstrates how in many ways, women remain minority interlopers within the culture of boxing, their presence tolerated yet continually negotiated within a landscape still shaped by masculine traditions, hierarchies, and expectations that govern belonging and legitimacy.