In order to make some brief concluding comments on Chapter 5, it is necessary to return to the fundamental notions of empowerment as laid out in the Introduction, and ask some important questions. First of all, is there any form of individual empowerment? The women cited feelings of empowerment in the form of strength, power, self-control, discipline and determination. In terms of increased self-esteem, self-confidence, positive body image and self-awareness (Hall 1990), the situation appears complex and can be interpreted as liberating or oppressive depending on the specific issue scrutinized. Second, do muscular women’s bodies change the nature of gendered relationships and social structures for women in society? As these women actively seek to redefine femininity to include muscles, physical size, power and mental strength, they appear, at least symbolically, to reconstruct elements of cultural discourses regarding female attractiveness and behaviour (Spitzack 1990).
However, further questions need to be asked. Does female bodybuilding lead to permanently changed subjectivities and improved lives? Does it actively empower and affect women’s position in society? The findings of Chapter 5 appear to raise as
many questions about the potential of female bodybuilding to empower women as they seem to answer. To reiterate, the situation appears complex, contradictory and confusing. Depending on the context and the biography of the muscular woman, the practice can be seen both to liberate and to oppress.
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Chapter 6 continues the main themes identified in Chapter 5 (e.g. exploring how the women maintained a feminine and positive sense of self, revealing the
motivations of female bodybuilders and espousing the complexity of
‘empowerment’) by examining the most extreme and controversial aspects of the women’s lifestyle – muscle worship and steroid use. By focusing on the women’s experiences, both ‘deviant’ practices are argued to be more complex phenomena than they have previously been portrayed as. Throughout this book I have argued that in order to shed light on these extraordinary women, we need to turn to their phenomenological experiences and explore how their subjectivities are negotiated through bodywork (Obel 1996:196). The ‘dark side’ of female bodybuilding consequently revealed some of the pleasures and affirmative lived experiences of the women. For example, some of the women articulated sensuous satisfaction and enjoyment in holding muscle worship sessions, rather than them being simply a financial transaction. In addition, the phenomenology of drug taking (particularly steroids) was explored, looking at the positive aspects – allowing these women to create a body of their choosing, strength, power, aggression, confidence, sexual pleasure – and not just the negative experiences. In addition to understanding the identity of the female bodybuilder outside the gym, to further understand their motivations we need to explore the key environments of the female bodybuilder: environments which play an important role in shaping these experiences. For these reasons, I now focus on the findings from the two chapters ‘inside the gym’ – a place where these women feel most at home and experience the ‘workout’ as the peak phenomenological heightened pleasure in their daily lives.
Chapter 7 provided an ethnography of the gym, focusing on women’s empowerment through underexplored narratives of space. For the women in the study, the gym acted as a partial refuge and retreat against the malevolence of the outside world. It was a place where female bodybuilders could move about without having to be so concerned about the responses which their ‘unfeminine’
physiques, postures and movements may provoke on the street. Not only does the gym provide an arena where they can build their bodies; it also creates a comparatively protected sphere whereby female bodybuilders can rebuild and repair any damage caused by ‘attacks’ on their identity elsewhere in their lives. This identity restoration happens both through self-affirming interactions with appreciative and
‘like-minded’ others, and through a complete immersion in their weight-training endeavour.
The female bodybuilders in my study carved out a powerful niche for themselves – of space, and of accomplishment. They articulated a sense of confidence, control, autonomy, bodily expression and strength that was confirmed in observations of their training (manifest through their demeanour, gestures and appearances). This provides evidence for the argument made by sports feminists that dynamic activities, such as heavy weight training, can teach women to trust their bodies and to enjoy their physical competence and capabilities. Furthermore, the women appeared ‘unapologetic’ with regard to taking up body space not only in terms of size and structure, but also in terms of bodily movement, mobility and actions. Hence, these women remained undeterred that their bodily behaviour and
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deportment did not conform to hegemonic notions of femininity, such as being
‘delicate’, ‘graceful’ and ‘passive’.
In this way, despite gendered interactional ‘obstacles’, the gym might be seen overall as a place of empowerment for the female bodybuilder: a space in which she can use her body in an instrumental, aggressive and authoritative manner and potentially take ownership of this new-found power and use it for her own advancement. Furthermore, bodybuilding could be perceived as liberating women, as it attacks traditional notions of femininity and replaces them with new constructions of women’s bodies, behaviours and practices. However, yet again the situation is complex. Cultural, essentialist and radical feminists argue that for women to take on masculine pursuits and activities would be for them to take on the same traits of violence, aggression, oppression, masochism and dominance as men. For example, Grimshaw (1999) points out that dominating space and striving to reach the limits of physical capacities may terrorise or oppress others. Thus on one hand, female bodybuilding can be discerned as empowering, as it enables women to embody male traits such as power, strength and muscularity, thereby challenging cultural constructions of gender and sexual difference (Schulze 1990); on the other, it can be argued that despite these women building new bodies, new femininities and identities for themselves, they ultimately do not act in a sphere of ‘bodily empowerment’, as they still submit to the dominant masculine cultural structures and ideologies on which bodybuilding is based (Klein 1993).
To investigate this debate further, Chapter 8 focused on the phenomenological
experiences of these women in the gym, looking at how their subjectivities are expressed, lived and created through their bodies and through the amalgamation of muscle and iron incorporated within their physical selves.
My findings in Chapter 8 suggest that whilst many female bodybuilders did
indeed embrace both the hypermasculine attitude towards pain and the satisfaction of being able to conquer it, there are alternative interpretations to those given by critical feminist and sports psychologists, who see it simply as a pathological manifestation of self-hatred and inferiority. As Monaghan (2001) and Crossley (2004) suggest in their comparative studies on male bodybuilders and circuit trainers, traditional understandings of pain exist within, yet are also subverted by, the centre of the subculture itself. Thus female bodybuilders reworked the meanings and physical sensations of ‘pain’, so that they became pleasurable, enjoyable and desirable. The women cited feelings of ‘heightened awareness’,
‘euphoria’, ‘flow’, ‘release’, ‘erotic intensity’ and gratification. In this context it is hardly surprising that female bodybuilders wish to dwell in the gym for as long as possible, in order to savour and relish these sensations. Furthermore, it is the actual experiences, feelings, emotions and intimate accounts of the bodybuilding process articulated by the female bodybuilders themselves which help to explain their commitment to a muscular order. The ethnographic findings in this research oppose the argument made by critical feminists such as Bordo (1988: 98) that bodybuilding is an ascetic act lacking sensuality: ‘preoccupied with the body and deriving narcissistic enjoyment from its appearance… [with] little pleasure in the experience of embodiment’. Indeed, t
he ‘pain’ ‘of the actual process of
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bodybuilding’ and ‘their subjective and corporeal effects are central rather than peripheral to the experiences and motivations of many contemporary body modifiers’ (Sweetman 1999b: 205). This substantiates the importance of focusing on the ‘lived reality’ of such practices, rather than simply treating them on the basis of their status as a ‘text’ or ‘outer appearance’ (Featherstone 1991: 171; Radley 1991: 112–3).
However, in terms of bodybuilding’s potential to ‘empower’ women in society more generally, the situation appears far more complicated. Although the women articulate an increase in confidence and self-esteem that helps them to re-enter the ‘outside’ world again, they are still confronted with the same discriminations and stigmatization that they experienced before they entered the gym. As they leave the refuge of the weights arena, they seem to face the same difficulties and problems as before. However, a final assessment could not be made until the most extreme and important moment in the bodybuilding calendar was explored: ‘the competition’, an event that deals with the culmination of their ambitions and ‘sets the seal’ on these women’s identities.
Chapter 9 assessed the ‘outcome’ of the competition for female bodybuilders by focusing on Michelle’s experiences. It concluded that whilst the female bodybuilders perceived the rite of passage as an event that was taking them somewhere – to a new identity and life within the bodybuilding community (associated with elevated status) – there was no liminality in absolute terms. Indeed, despite conquering their ‘gruelling’ and ‘soul-destroying’ diet and beating their opponents on stage, there was no full transformation. The activities and roles associated with female bodybuilding result in no post-liminal realignment of social norms and roles. Indeed, there is no vocation awaiting the women within the subculture and, moreover, there is no resolution to the problems, conflicts and ostracism that female bodybuilders contend with in their daily lives. Thus the women’s sacrifices and commitment to the muscular order have no impact on the social role they occupy outside the subculture.
In light of the evidence from Chapter 9, it is difficult to comprehend how competitive female bodybuilding can provide societal empowerment for women. Whilst there is a re-definition of normative gendered appearances (as discussed earlier in the findings
of Chapter 5), under the gaze of the judges, women’s bodies are still judged, objectified and found wanting (according to the criteria laid down by male leaders in the sport).
Furthermore, there is little to suggest that the competition holds a ‘transformatory potential’ (Young 1993: 157) that permanently changes women’s political and social positions, resulting in a step towards gender equality. This is, however, not to ignore the satisfaction taken individually by the women. For the competitor, there is a huge sense of accomplishment in achieving this fleeting perfection of the body. Feelings of individual uniqueness, self-control, autonomy and self-respect are equated with a sense of individual empowerment. Nevertheless, as socially discredited individuals facing an unaccepting world (Goffman 1983), there exists no place for these stigmatized women in the moral order of society; they are ‘cut off’ from respectable society, as other subcultural groups have been in the past (e.g. Hall and Jefferson 2006).
For the female bodybuilders in my study, the costs and sacrifices – even the possibility of an early death – are worth it. The satisfaction intrinsic to building
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muscle outweighs the disadvantages. Their involvement in this muscular order is a sensual and visceral affair that ‘eats into’ their identities as they pursue physical transformation (Falk 1994). Female bodybuilding is based in restricted leisure space and may appear to be no more than a symbolic threat, or an ‘imaginary solution’, to gendered norms (Clarke et al. 2006). However, I would argue that whilst ‘the body cannot even temporarily transcend ideology – it can certainly bother [it]’ (Schulze 1997: 29). In any event, female bodybuilders offend the sensibilities of society’s stylistic, experiential and physical norms. They affect people’s sense of normality and find pleasure and self-affirmation in what is deemed unacceptable. As was concluded in Chapter 9, the women in my study
seemed to be developing personalities of the Weberian ‘heroic’ type by carving out a life of their own choosing, of dignity, lived in accordance with their own values. They have chosen a body regime which involves all of their effort, which serves to organize and evaluate their lives, including their relationships and other goals, on the basis of coherent and singular criteria. The female bodybuilders have been the agents of their own bodily transformation and created a ‘life-space’
of their own, for which they take full responsibility. They have chosen a ‘heroic journey’ through life that gives them meaning, purpose, fulfilment and drive.
Their lifestyle gives them both pleasure and pain; it frees them and constricts them. For those outside the female bodybuilding subculture, it may be very difficult to comprehend the women’s all-encompassing desire for and commitment to muscularity – indeed it seems fair to state that you have to live it and feel it to really know it.
Research conclusions
My research findings highlighted the contradictions and complexities in the lives of female bodybuilders, demonstrating how these women actively negotiated, resisted and upheld hegemonic notions of femininity. Furthermore, it captured the complex ways in which female bodybuilders create (and continually renew) their identity through everyday practices. These findings illustrated the dialectical processes at work between agency and structure. Indeed, for these women,
‘the conscious refusal to be defined as [a] victim provides them with a sense of agency’ (Sparkes 1996: 173). Unlike Bordo, who claims that these women are living under a ‘false consciousness’, as cultural dupes, I have argued it is vital that we take seriously their voices, experiences, desires and intentions as crucial sources of information. This is not to claim that we should take these women’s stories of resistance as the complete truth, providing a pure reflection of its effects and outcomes, but rather to say that these women are active agents within constraining contexts.
These empirical discoveries indicate that it is reasonable to conclude that no practice can, in absolute terms, emancipate and empower women. ‘No body’ can stand outside of the society that we inhabit and be heralded as a total and complete empowering practice or icon (Grimshaw 1999). Instead, therefore, it is necessary to research the ways in which women negotiate, accommodate and resist within the given social context. In the same way as Pitts (2003: 81), my study ‘highlights
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the female body as a site of negotiation between power and powerlessness, neither of which are likely to win fully’. Empowerment then can be seen as a shifting, transitory and evolving process full of complexity and contradictions – just as one
‘problem’ seems to be resolved, others are revealed.
Furthermore, this research has argued that the lived experiences of enfleshed subjects are pivotal to understanding the motivations and identities of the female bodybuilder. This reveals the importance of focusing on the phenomenological experiences of ‘actors’ – an approach that allows the subjective experiences of women to be expressed, as embodied agents who think, act and know through their bodies. I espouse this position not with the belief that it captures an authentic experience which is ‘epistemologically self-sufficient’, but rather in the belief that an appreciation of the lived female body is ‘epistemologically indispensable’
(Alcoff 2000) to understanding women’s lives within specific cultural and social positions. As my research findings highlight, it is important that feminist theory takes into account real, fleshy, corporeal bodies – ones which touch, smell, taste and have internal organs – without falling back on the simplicities of biological essentialism.
What does the future hold for these women?
Pitts (2003: 78) argue
s that in order for extreme body projects to be ‘reclaimative’ rather than mutilative and ‘harmful’, they must at some point eventually come to an end. The competition ritual, however, does not seem to act as a full completion of events, as the competitor must then prepare herself for the next competition – to create a ‘better’ body than before. I am left concerned as to what will happen to these women in the future – in 20 years’ time, for example.
The birth of new drugs, alongside scientific and technological advances, has meant that the creation and building of what some regard as ‘grotesque and monstrous’
bodies has been made possible in an unprecedented manner. The long-term effects of these drugs are still not known. Whilst ‘side effects’ such as arthritic problems and hernias commonly occur, we do not know what the life expectancy is for competitors or ‘serious’ bodybuilders today – for example, we cannot be sure about their risks of heart, liver and kidney failure. In addition, women who take steroids risk permanent ‘gender defects’ (i.e. excess facial and body hair, enlarged clitoris, deep, ‘broken’ voice) that will never allow them to be fully accepted back into the gendered interaction order – the effects on them are real, permanent and irreversible. For the women in my study, it is still too early to know the full consequences of their actions, in terms of their drug taking and hardcore lifestyle. However, they are fully aware of the risks they take and have a fatalistic attitude to the future, as demonstrated by Michelle’s comment: ‘I would rather live a short life and do what I want to do, rather than a long life of regret’. Indeed, their bodies, identities and lives are so wrapped up in the pursuit of muscle that I find myself wondering if they could ever afford to doubt the life they have chosen. I am reminded here of the negative articulations of an American ex-IFBB professional female bodybuilder (cited in Kwiatkowski 1995: 58) who had retired after becoming
162 Conclusion
disillusioned with the sport. Towards the end of her career (resonating with some parts of Michelle’s story), she feels ‘trapped within her body’ and trapped within her life. Furthermore, she is filled with feelings of remorse, guilt, self-blame and self-hatred. For example, when she is in terrible pain because of her joints, she reminds herself: ‘you know, you wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t done this to yourself’ (ibid.: 50). The full extent of her emotional anguish is captured in the following comment:
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