In 2014, the Swedish leisure-time centres after school became widely criticized on several occasions by school authorities. The cause for its criticism was a reflection of leisure time-centres with lots of untrained staff and a lack of pedagogical aspirations. The conclusion of the criticism was that these leisure-time centres do not fulfil their potential. However, these assessments has only to a limited extent become a part of the public educational discourse in Sweden. This discourse has mainly focused on the decreasing results in the Swedish school, which has caught the attention in the media and ended up on the political agenda. The flaws in the leisure-time centres have been far more overlooked and its function has been unclear. This study explores representations of the leisure-time centres and its missions and aims. It also examines how after-school teachers and their skills, duties and attributes are represented. This has been done by studying descriptions of the leisure-time centres in three different municipalities and 154 recruitment ads for after-school teachers. The results of these data collections shows a dominant cooperative discourse, where many of the leisure-time centres and the after-school teachers most important tasks and assignments is more to be found in school activities rather than at the leisure-time centres. The conclusion of the study is that the leisure-time centres have lost its value-based core and instead its function has been integrated as a resource center in school to make sure that the aims for school is to be achieved. That has transformed the after-school teacher into a flexible employee, which constantly has to be prepared for and have a positive approach to new circumstances.

The nature of the leisure profession and the leisure professional has been recharacterised by a series of government policies first implemented by the Conservative government during the period 1979-97. Whilst the re-characterisation has been acknowledged by leisure professional bodies and also in an emerging body of literature, no systematic analysis of this process has been undertaken in the Scottish context. This thesis addresses this through an ideological analysis of New Right Conservatism and the impact of New Right policies in Scotland and on the Scottish Leisure profession. Scottish political and cultural traditions together with the notion of credentialism provide original dimensions to this critical analysis. Using a multimethodological research approach, this thesis examines the link between New Right government policies and the Scottish leisure profession. It establishes whether or not the process of professionalisation is a coherent one that will underpin a collective legitimacy for the Scottish leisure profession. It is concluded that the New Right undermined the professionalisation of leisure management in Scotland. Leisure management has been restructured and generalised and the resulting professional anticollectivism within the industry has left the standing of the profession in doubt. This original theoretically and empirically informed study of the leisure profession in Scotland makes a small contribution to the growing body of work on professionalism and professionalisation.

This research explores feelings of obligation to volunteer, which lie at the interface of volunteering as simultaneously individual and collective and challenge traditional understandings of volunteering as leisure. The study examined volunteering within the context of communitarianism, particularly how collective outcomes of volunteering are related to feelings of obligation to volunteer. Phase one of this research focused on scale creation of a measure assessing feelings of obligation in the context of volunteerism. Using exploratory factor analyses of data from a student sample, this first phase yielded two measures: an 18-item Obligation to Volunteer as Commitment measure (OVC), encompassing dimensions of reward, affective attachment, flexibility, and side bets; and a 14-item Obligation to Volunteer as Duty measure (OVD), encompassing the dimensions of expectation, burden, and constraint. In phase two, survey research was conducted with 300 volunteers at ten community organizations. These new measures were used to examine relationships between obligation to volunteer and the value orientations of individualism and collectivism, the experience of volunteering as serious leisure, and the community characteristics of sense of community and social cohesion. Both individualism and collectivism were associated with the commitment but not the duty dimension of feelings of obligation, and both value orientations, but particularly individualism, was linked to serious leisure. Serious leisure very closely aligned with the commitment aspect of obligation as well as sense of community and social cohesion, thus emerging as a possible pathway for nurturing sense of community in a culture of individualism. Correlation and hierarchical regression analyses link the commitment aspect of obligation to sense of community and social cohesion. Feelings of duty to volunteer, in contrast, were inversely related to sense of community. Thus, the nature of feelings of obligation related to volunteering as commitment or duty have significant implications for the collective outcomes of volunteering, particularly sense of community. Also notable are the strong theoretical and empirical relationships between the OVC scale and serious leisure, which suggest that the newly-developed commitment scale could be considered a measure of the agreeable obligation that accompanies serious leisure pursuits.

Using a feminist, autoethnographic methodology and in depth interviews with twenty-three participants, I sought to better understand the meaning of family memory keeping for women and their families through this research, paying particular attention to the ways that dominant gender ideologies shape family memory and the act of preserving family memory. This research also endeavoured to explore those instances wherein families lose that memory keeper due to memory loss, absence, or death. Interviews revealed that, despite its absence from the literature, women’s family memory keeping is a valuable form of gendered labour – and leisure – that makes significant individual, familial, and social contributions, while simultaneously reproducing dominant gender ideologies and gendered constructions of fatherhood, motherhood, and the family. Through an exploration of the loss of a mother’s memory due to illness, death, or absence, this study also demonstrated the loss of a mother’s memory is both deeply felt, and deeply gendered. However, this study illustrated participants challenging these dominant gender ideologies, as well, and using family memory keeping as a way to resist, critique, and cope. As such, this study speaks to the absence of women’s family memory keeping from the gendered work, leisure studies, social construction, and loss literature, contributing a better understanding of both the activity itself and the gendered ideologies that shape the activity, as well. Not only does this study speak to gaps in existing literature, but findings make fresh theoretical contributions to this literature through three new concepts: the notion of the good mother as the “remembering mother”, the concept of “compliance leisure”, and the re-envisioning of women’s unpaid labour as contributing to “the homing of the home”. And with these contributions to the literature, this research also provides valuable insight for professionals working to improve policy and services surrounding postpartum care, individual and family therapy, caregiving, extended care, and palliative care.

Persons 65 years or older are the fastest growing demographic in Canada (Government of Canada, 2011) and the need for 24-hour care and LTC support will continue to rise. An association is typically drawn between death and dying and the movement into LTC homes. Leisure can alternatively be important for promoting “living” and supporting wellness in residents. The notion of “living” in LTC shifts emphasis away from illness and death to placing value on wellness. This participatory action research (PAR) study aims to understand wellness from residents’ perspectives and the role leisure plays in their wellness. PAR stakeholders (family/care partners, staff, and residents) collaboratively discuss how to best attain, interpret, and disseminate resident perspectives on wellness and required supports. The PAR process highlights the necessity for academics and practitioners to involve residents in decisions about their care experience. Guiding questions include: (1) What does wellness mean to residents living in LTC? (2) What does a ‘well’ LTC home look like to residents? (3) What is the nature of the relationship between leisure and wellness from a resident perspective? (4) How can those involved in LTC support resident wellness? From the perspectives of residents living in LTC homes, findings inform a resident wellness model and provide insights into how wellness and “well” LTC homes can be better supported. Thus, filling a gap in the literature and shifting focus to living ‘well’ in LTC.

This thesis explores the role of comfort in adventure leisure and in recreational SCUBA diving in particular. In this chapter the study’s central elements of comfort, constraints and negotiation will be introduced. Human engagement with marine locations provides background to the evolution of SCUBA diving as a leisure activity. The concept of comfort is then introduced, with attention given to what comfort means from a range of disciplines. Following this, the use of the term comfort in adventure, leisure and tourism research is reviewed. Divers’ constraints to comfort are also briefly examined here in this introduction, to build understanding of how comfort can be experienced during adventure, and SCUBA diving. Leisure constraints-negotiation research is discussed briefly and linked to SCUBA diving experiences. The objectives of this study are then presented prior to introducing the qualitative research paradigm that guides the research, and the thesis outline.

This thesis explores the role of comfort in adventure leisure and in recreational SCUBA diving in particular. In this chapter the study’s central elements of comfort, constraints and negotiation will be introduced. Human engagement with marine locations provides background to the evolution of SCUBA diving as a leisure activity. The concept of comfort is then introduced, with attention given to what comfort means from a range of disciplines. Following this, the use of the term comfort in adventure, leisure and tourism research is reviewed. Divers’ constraints to comfort are also briefly examined here in this introduction, to build understanding of how comfort can be experienced during adventure, and SCUBA diving. Leisure constraints-negotiation research is discussed briefly and linked to SCUBA diving experiences. The objectives of this study are then presented prior to introducing the qualitative research paradigm that guides the research, and the thesis outline.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 1991.

Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1984. / Also available in print.

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