Legitimization Strategies of the Social World of Polish Boxers: Aggression and Masculinity in Athletes’ Experiences

Abstract

The article presents the results of research aimed at getting to know the community of Polish boxers and at finding out how they legitimize the core activity performed in their social world, related to hurting others. On the one hand, in Western cultures, human life is a protected value and aggression is treated as a social deviation, but on the other hand, there are areas of life, such as sport and masculinity, in which the tendency to aggressive behavior is rewarded. I placed the issues of boxing in the framework of the theoretical concept of social worlds. I also used gender theory as understood by Raewyn Connell. I conducted individual in-depth interviews with twelve Polish boxers. Research shows that men strongly identify with their own social world and point to its uniqueness. They also use numerous legitimization strategies to protect the community from negative social perception. These strategies mainly deal with three aspects of boxing, namely danger, harm, and aggression. Athletes perceive boxing as a strictly gender-related sport, reproducing the hegemonic model of masculinity and manifesting hybrid masculinity.