This study examines women's use of leisure as politics, especially as related to leisure as resistance, leisure and social worlds, and women's body image. Interviews were conducted with fifteen participants and coaches in two all-women's triathlon training groups in Austin, Texas. Both training groups prepared women for participation in the Austin Danskin Triathlon. Qualitative methods, grounded theory and constant comparison guided the interviewing and data analysis process. It was determined that Danskin trainees formed a social world which allowed them to redefine their bodies and redefine the tenets of organized sport. This finding centered around three major areas: initial involvement, community building and resistance. Most participants became involved initially for social reasons even though they often were out of shape or had not previously participated in athletics. Several participants experienced barriers to involvement commonly discussed in gender leisure studies including weight issues, "ethic of care" concerns and fear of not deserving leisure time. During participation in their training programs, the majority of trainees formed a community with their fellow participants which provided them with a safe place and a support structure. As a result, many Austin Danskin triathlon trainees were able to communally resist cultural and societal norms surrounding women's bodies and competitive athletics. As a group, trainees redefined the way women should look and placed function above form. Furthermore, they reclaimed sport from the male norm and instead demanded that it go beyond bigger, better, faster or stronger and instead focus on community, support and teamwork. The results of this study urge leisure providers to create programs that appeal to the whole person - not just the physical. As a result of the data, several hypotheses may be suggested for future study: Do women's only recreation programs provide a crucial link between social world formation and leisure as resistance? What other programs may produce similar results and why?

ABSTRACT As the life expectancy in Taiwan has gradually increased, and more and more people retire at a young age, even below 50, the duration of retired life for Taiwanese may be prolonged to nearly 30 years. Most of the retirees are in very good health conditions and full of energy during the first 25 years or even longer. Hence, an early plan for arrangements for the 25-year retired life is indeed essential to creating a cozy, healthy living environment, allowing one to live happily after retirement while having a place for leisure activities. Finding an excellent environment for a resort for leisure and health purposes for retirees is thus an important tip. In recent years, the area of fallow and abandoned farms has rapidly increased, as a result of cheap produce since Taiwan joined WTO. The government has thus encouraged the use of idle farms in the leisure industry, as it may not only stimulate development of rural villages, but also facilitate the emergence of resorts for leisure and health purposes due to the excellent environment in rural villages. Consequently, many farm resorts for leisure and health purposes run by retirees sprouted. The purpose of this study is to figure out the development trend of farm resorts for leisure and health purposes, and to gain a further understanding of the key decision factors for retirees in selecting a farm resort for leisure and health purposes. ¡@¡@In this study, three individual health and culture villages established by Best Future, Gobo Service, and Formosa Plastics Group, are selected to perform an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) analysis of five possible key decision factors in selecting farm resorts for leisure and health purposes, such as prices, health care, geographic environment, hardware facilities, and leisure activities, in order to understand the factors that retirees have taken into consideration when choosing a favorable farm resort for leisure and health purposes. Interviewees comprise the following: 3 personnel from the industry, including Mr. Bai, Yao-Ren, President of Baofa Retirement Village, Mr. Chu, Tai-An, Director of Gobo Sheng-en Leisure and Health Club House, and Mr. Song, Ru-Kuei, responsible person of He-nong Health & Life Accommodation; 3 personnel from government agencies, including Mr. Su, Jhong-Yuan, Deputy Director-general of the Tourism and Traffic Bureau of Kaohsiung County Government, Mr. Yang, Siao-Jhih, Chief of the Agriculture Section of Meinong Township Office, and Ms. Jhang, Ting-Siou from the Social Affairs Bureau of Kaohsiung City Government; 3 scholars from the academia, including Dr. Chen, Wei-Ren, Chairman of the Department of Leisure, Recreation and Tourism Management of Shu-Te University, Dr. Hsieh, Ching-Hsiang, Ex-Chairman of the Department of Plant Industry of National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, and Dr. Luo, Rong-Heng, Chairman of the Department of Finance of Nan Kai University of Technology; and 3 customers living in each of the three health and culture villages established by Best Future, Gobo Service, and Formosa Plastics Group, a total of 18 participants from 4 different categories. In-depth interviews are then conducted with all of the interviewees to collect qualified and quantified data from AHP questionnaires for further analysis, in order to better understand the key decision factors in selecting farm resorts for leisure and health purposes. Through simultaneous collection and analysis of qualified and quantified data from AHP questionnaires, five key decision factors highly regarded by the government agencies, scholars, business owners, and customers in terms of health and culture villages are gained. The hierarchy of these five key decision factors, such as prices, health care, geographic environment, hardware facilities, and leisure activities, determined by their respective relative weights, is as follows: geographic environment (0.287) > hardware facilities (0.286) > prices (0.218) > health care (0.186) > leisure activities (0.176). The key decision factors in these three health and culture villages established by Best Future, Gobo Service, and Formosa Plastics Group with top five average weights are: 1. hardware facilities in Chang Gung Health and Culture Village (0.105); 2. geographic environment in Gobo Sheng-en Leisure and Health Club House (0.095); 3. geographic environment in Chang Gung Health and Culture Village (0.092); 4. hardware facilities in Gobo Sheng-en Leisure and Health Club House (0.090); and 5. geographic environment in Baofa Retirement Village (0.087). The above results roughly correspond to the results obtained through AHP analysis of qualified and quantified data. Key words: Leisure industry, Retiree, Farm resort, Analytic Hierarchy Process

Thesis--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. / This report was prepared for the Manpower Administration, U.S. Department of Labor, under research and development contract (grant) no. 91-25-75-17-1. Available from the National Technical Information Center, Springfield, Va. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 300-311).

Diss. Växjö : Växjö universitet, 2009.

The National Parks of the United Kingdom are characterised by their beautiful countryside and spectacular rural landscapes. They are also significant leisure based trip attracting locations, the dominant transport mode being the private car which typically accounts for 90% of all journeys made to these destinations. Excessive car use in National Parks is problematic since traffic congestion, environmental degradation, vehicle noise and parking problems serve to undermine the natural and recreational values which they are intended to promote. As recognition of the negative impacts of car use in National Parks has grown, so have calls for innovation and experimentation in approaches to traffic management and transport policy in these locations. Despite this, policy change has been slow. Sustainable and effective solutions to transport problems in UK National Parks appear no nearer to being found now than they were sixty five years ago. Accordingly, this thesis seeks to investigate the process of policy change with respect to leisure transport in UK National Parks. The study adopts the Multiple Streams framework (Kingdon, 1984) as the mechanism by which to explore policy change in the sector, and a case study method is chosen as the overarching research approach. Within the case study design, a three stage research method is undertaken, consisting of a) documentary analysis combined with semi-structured interviews with Transport Officers at UK National Park Authorities, b) two sub case studies at the local level in the New Forest and Yorkshire Dales National Parks, and c) semi-structured interviews with National Park transport planning experts at the national level. The Multiple Streams framework is shown to accurately identify important processes and mechanisms which can be seen to account for policy stability (and therefore inhibit change) within the National Park transport planning sector. As such, the thesis concludes that at the present time there is no significant window for policy change with respect to leisure transport in UK National Parks. A number of barriers exist which make this so. First are perceptions of public and political apathy towards transport problems in the National Parks, and a lack of quantifiable data by which to ‗frame‘ these issues. Second are competing agendas of key delivery agencies in the policy sector, where conflict between economic and environment objectives limit the consideration of certain transport planning instruments for use. Third are issues surrounding the technical feasibility (in terms of implementation) and public acceptability of a range of transport planning instruments, and fourth is a lack of advocacy for policy change amongst the general public and politicians at the local and national level. In light of the research findings, recommendations and advice to policy makers and practitioners seeking change within the sector are offered.

Scottish strip clubs are a highly under researched area. While there is a plethora of research emanating from North America, strip club research is in its infancy in Scotland. The little research that has been conducted on Scotland?s strip clubs is unrepresentative (Bindel, 2004; AEWG, 2006). This project is an in depth participant observation based analysis of two Scottish strip clubs. The fieldwork was conducted over a period of seven years, with over 7000 hours of fieldwork based observations. Much like the work of Frank (2002) and Egan (2006) this research was conducted using a dancer-as-researcher role, giving me unrivalled access to a research setting and population that remains off-limits to most researchers. Drawing on North American based strip club studies, this research compares the interactions, service provision and operations of the Scottish clubs in relation to their North American counterparts. While a useful comparative tool, this research argues that the North American studies are not representative of Scottish strip clubs. North American clubs embody a strong customer service ethos in their service provision and organisational culture (Trautner 2005). The Scottish clubs in this study do not.There is a significant emphasis in North American studies on the use of counterfeit intimacy (Enck & Preston, 1988) as a standard sales technique used by dancers. This involves feigning intimacy and emotion in interactions with customers to elicit maximum financial gain; the dancer will aim to be ?anything you want her to be?. There is an assumption in these studies that service provision is dictated by a combination of club management and the customer?s wishes. This research highlighted that it was not the customer or management who determined service provision, but the dancers. Rather than embodying a fervent customer service ethos, Scottish strip clubs are non-customer oriented service providers. The impact of dancers on service provision and social control in the strip clubs used in this study contradict North American findings. Both clubs in this study embodied pro-dancer policies towards social control.While strip clubs throughout the world supply a similar service, the dancers in this study thought they were selling their nudity, not creating a fantasy. The sales technique most commonly used by dancers in this study to sell dances is ?Do you want to see me naked?? Their approach was in general brash, upfront and (arguably) more honest than the approaches reported in the North American literature.

Amningshjälpen is a Swedish non-profit association where women, called helpmothers, provide breastfeeding peer-support. Purpose: The aim of this bachelor thesis is to examine how and where helpmothers experience information needs and seek information on breastfeeding, and what obstacles they face doing this. Method: The method used is qualitative email-interview where four helpmothers answered a number of questions via email comparable to questions in a semi-structured interview. Theoretical framework: This thesis rests upon the serious leisure perspective and the theory of cognitive authority, particularly institutional authority and the theory that cognitive authority is created in communication between people. Earlier research: Earlier research shows that seeking leisure-related information is an ongoing process. Participants use a variety of sources and the most common are other people and the internet. Result and discussion: The results show that the helpmothers information behaviour is similar to that of earlier studies in serious leisure. Their information seeking is an ongoing process that cannot easily be separated from information seeking in daily life. This could be an explanation to why they don’t experience many information needs. They use a variety of sources, including databases, books and homepages. The most common sources are other people: laypersons, health care professionals and other helpmothers. When seeking information helpmothers want the information to be unbiased and based on science, they also encourage each other to look for such information. This way they are both part of and affected by the process of making science as an institution a cognitive authority in society.

This dissertation is situated at the crossroads of sociology, anthropology, and marketing. Theories of the former two disciplines inform phenomena of the latter. The focal phenomenon is the role of aestheticized markets in contemporary formations of middle-class masculinity and femininity in the U.S. Aestheticized markets are those that incorporate refined notions of beauty, originality, and superiority. This process has been a core force in the expansion of consumer markets in early and late capitalism. In addition to opening up new markets, the aestheticization of markets opens up new subjectivities. It instills in individuals the desire to better themselves through the quest for novel, sensory-pleasing experiences, and it offers them renewed resources to define their social affiliations. My dissertation studies the formation of gendered and classed subjectivities using the empirical contexts of two middle-class, gendered markets that have been recently aestheticized in the U.S.: craft beer and knitting. Unlike three decades ago, craft beer drinkers can now indulge in a variety of flavors and premium styles, produced by more than 3,000 breweries. Likewise, knitters can now indulge in a variety of colors and premium fibers, as noted by a number of high-circulation magazines and scholarly papers. I studied these markets for about four years, conducting participant-observation, interviews, and document analysis. The results of this fieldwork are organized in two empirical chapters. The first focuses on the institutional and non-institutional processes that alter middle-class men's relationships with the aesthetic dimension of a particular market; the empirical context is craft beer. The second empirical chapter documents how middle-class women deploy the ideological and material resources provided by aestheticized markets in gender struggles; the empirical context is knitting. Together, these chapters explicate how gender positions shape the way middle-class individuals learn and display aesthetic expertise. The knowledge of these processes provides both theoretical contributions to the literature on taste, class, and gender, and managerial insight into how market institutions can develop programs that initiate a meaningful, long-term engagement with consumers based on classed and gendered approaches to aesthetic involvement.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate issues connected with planning urban futures from scratch and, conversely, with the development of long-term planning frameworks, by focussing on designs for the 'Legacy' transformation of the 2012 Olympic site. 2012 Games bid organisers claimed that Olympic-related investments would stimulate in east London - a region characterised by de-industrialisation and deprivation - the 'regeneration of an entire community for the direct benefit of everyone who lives there' (IOC, p. 19). The development of a long-term plan for the Olympic site post-2012 was said to be key in realising this objective, providing the basis for leveraging ongoing investment and restructuring east London's economy. I am interested in how conceptions of regeneration and legacy are formulated and evidenced in plans for the site's future and in what these mean for 'community' - historic, present and imagined constituencies of local residents and workers. Olympic sceptics argue that the problem with projected Olympic legacies is that there is all too little guarantee that they will actually come to fruition. Meanwhile, regenerations of other post-industrial sites in London are said to have produced unevenly distributed benefits, least advancing the prospects of those dispossessed by redevelopment and poorer, residual constituencies. This research considers how urban designs: a) frame future benefits connected with London 2012, and; b) mediate between the Olympic site as found, the needs and interests of local people and urban policy and planning objectives. Mixed methods and interdisciplinary perspectives are employed in examining conceptions and in empirically exploring the site's transformation from 2005 to 2010. Aside from the major themes of legacy and regeneration, chapters are linked through attention on how transforming relationships between authorities and owners influence forms of urbanisation and use. These transformations help to reveal both actual and potential outcomes of 2012's legacy plans.

Vykstančios reformos tiek politiniame, tiek visuomeniniame, tiek ekonominiame šalies gyvenime didele dalimi yra savaime suprantamos, tačiau visuomenė yra nuo jų pervargusi. Natūraliai didėja įtampa, auga užimtumas, atsiranda vis daugiau ir įvairesnių socialinių problemų ir pan. Laiko trūkumas, per dideli darbo krūviai, vis didėjantis užimtumas bei nesugebėjimas atsipalaiduoti laisvalaikiu bei pailsėti nuo varginančios kasdieninės įtampos tampa mūsų gyvenimo dalimi. Darbo tikslas - išsiaiškinti, kokią vietą laisvalaikis užima jaunimo prioritetinių vertybių skalėje, siekiant nustatyti veiksnius, turinčius įtakos požiūrio formavimuisi. Darbo metu buvo siekiama atsakyti į šiuos uždavinius: išanalizuoti laisvalaikio sampratą, formas ir funkcijas; susipažinti su vertybės aiškinimais; pateikti laisvalaikio kaip vertybės sampratą kitų vertybių kontekste; nustatyti veiksnius, įtakojančius jaunimo laisvalaikio praleidimo formas ir būdus; išsiaiškinti, kokią vietą laisvalaikis užima jaunimo prioritetinių vertybių skalėje. Darbo metu iškeltos penkios hipotezės. Pirmoji hipotezė, jog daugelis studentų laisvalaikį supranta kaip galimybę skirti laiką savo mėgstamam užsiėmimui, pasitvirtino. Antroji hipotezė, jog skirtingų specialybių studentai laisvalaikiui skiria ne vienodą vietą vertybinių prioritetų skalėje, nepasitvirtino. Trečioji hipotezė, jog studentų požiūriui į laisvalaikio praleidimo būdą didžiausią įtaką turi draugai, žiniasklaida ir finansinės galimybės, pasitvirtino iš dalies... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The over going changes in political, social and economic life of the country are understandable though the society is tired of them. The tension grows naturally as well as busyness, more and more various kinds of problems appear. The lack of time, the speedy pace of work and life, the inability to relax and have a rest from fatiguing tension of everyday become the part of our life. The aim of the paper – to find out what position does the leisure time occupy in the scale of the priorities of the youth‘s valuables as well as to determine the factors forming the attitude. Throughout the paper there was the object to get the following goals: to analyze the understanding of the leisure time, its forms and functions; to get acquainted with the interpretation of valuables; to present the understanding of the leisure time as the worth in the context of other valuables; to determine factors that make influence to the forms and character of spending leisure time; to find out what position does the leisure time occupy in the scale of the priorities of the youth‘s valuables. The fifth hypothesises there upraised. The first hypothesis that lots of students understand the leisure time as the possibility to dedicate time to their favourite occupation was proved. The second hypothesis that students of various specialities administer uneven position of the leisure time in the scale of the valuables failed. The third hypothesis that the attitude of students’ towards the form of... [to full text]