The social world and event travel careers of leisure marchers

Abstract

Sport has been the context for a considerable number of studies on social worlds and event travel careers, with most focusing on individual competitive sports. The inherently social nature of team sport participation thus offers a potentially rich area of study. This study addresses this gap and responds to calls for more research on older women’s team sport, through an investigation of the unique sport of leisure marching. It examines how the social world and event travel career differs from individual competitive sports, and how these social practices are intertwined with notions of age and gender. Data was collected through participant observation and interviews and was subjected to qualitative deductive thematic analysis using Unruh’s (1979, 1980) social world concept. Findings highlight commonalities with, and distinctiveness from, individual competitive sports social worlds and reveal gender-and age-related nuances – particularly around the social world aspect of events.