Athletic Fatness: Forgiving Corpulence in Elite Bodies

Abstract

In crafting this analysis of professional golfers John Daly and Laura Davies, we were struck by the contradictions to corporeal rationality that elite, corpulent athletes might enact through their mere presence, as well as through their public ability to compete with idealized athletic bodies. That sport and dominant beliefs about sport contribute to disciplining bodies is not a point of contention for us. It is, however, unclear where the disciplining lines are drawn, and what happens when bodies that resist corporeal rationality refuse to disappear. What are the consequences of/for publicly successful, undisciplined bodies operating instead in a corporeal irrationality? Of course this entire line of questioning suggests fissures in the disciplining systems of corporeal rationality outlined by several scholars (Kirk, 2004; Shilling, 2005). It is to when and where such disciplining systems come unhinged that we aim this analysis of John Daly and Laura Davies.

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