Critical Readings in Bodybuilding Edited by Adam Locks and Niall Richardson Critical Readings in Bodybuilding Routledge Research in Sport, Culture and Society 1. Sport, Masculinities and the Body Ian Wellard 2. India and the Olympics Boria Majumdar and Nalin Mehta 3. Social Capital and Sport Governance in Europe Edited by Margaret Groeneveld, Barrie Houlihan and Fabien Ohl 4. Theology, Ethics and Transcendence in Sports Edited by Jim Parry, Mark Nesti and Nick Watson 5. Women and Exercise The Body, Health and Consumerism Edited by Eileen Kennedy and Pirkko Markula 6. Race, Ethnicity and Football Persisting Debates and Emergent Issues Edited by Daniel Burdsey 7. The Organisation and Governance of Top Football Across Europe An Institutional Perspective Edited by Hallgeir Gammelsæter and Benoît Senaux 8. Sport and Social Mobility Crossing Boundaries Ramón Spaaij 9. Critical Readings in Bodybuilding Edited by Adam Locks and Niall Richardson Critical Readings in Bodybuilding Edited by Adam Locks and Niall Richardson First published 2012 by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2012 Taylor & Francis The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice : Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Critical readings in bodybuilding / edited by Adam Locks and Niall Richardson. p. cm. — (Routledge research in sport, culture and society; 9) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Bodybuilding—Social aspects. 2. Human body—Social aspects. I. Locks, Adam. II. Richardson, Niall. GV546.5.C75 2011 796.41–dc22 2011001224 ISBN13: 978-0-415-87852-4 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-80945-7 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by Glyph International Printed and bound in the United States of America on acid-free paper by IBT Global Contents List of Illustrations vii Acknowledgments viii Introduction ADAM LOCKS PART 1 Practices 19 Introduction to Part 1: What is the “Practice” of Bodybuilding? 21 NIALL RICHARDSON 1 Buff Bodies and the Beast: Emphasized Femininity, Labor, and Power Relations among Fitness, Figure, and Women Bodybuilding Competitors 1985–2010 29 ANNE BOLIN 2 Outside and Inside the Gym: Exploring the Identity of the Female Bodybuilder 58 TANYA BUNSELL AND CHRIS SHILLING 3 Accounting for Illicit Steroid Use: Bodybuilders’ Justifications 73 LEE F. MONAGHAN 4 Bodybuilding and Health Work: A Life Course Perspective 91 BRIAN BAILEY AND JAMES GILLETT vi Contents 5 The Shame–Pride–Shame of the Muscled Self in Bodybuilding: A Life History Study 107 ANDREW C. SPARKES, JOANNE BATEY AND GARETH J. OWEN 6 Building Otherwise: Bodybuilding as Immersive Practice 122 LESLIE HEYWOOD PART 2 Representations 141 Introduction to Part 2: Bodybuilding as Representation 143 NIALL RICHARDSON 7 The Self Contained Body: The Heroic and Aesthetic/ Erotic Modes of Representing the Muscular Body 151 KENNETH R. DUTTON 8 Flayed Animals in an Abattoir: The Bodybuilder as Body-Garde 166 ADAM LOCKS 9 Strategies of Enfreakment: Representations of Contemporary Bodybuilding 181 NIALL RICHARDSON 10 Getting Hard: Female Bodybuilders and Muscle Worship 199 NICHOLAS CHARE 11 Aphrodisia and Erotogenesis 215 JOANNA FRUEH Contributors 231 Works Cited 235 Index 257 List of Illustrations Figures 0.1 James Llewellin x I.1 Noel Gordon 19 II.1 Rene L. Campbell 1 41 7.1 James Llewellin 150 9.1 Markus Rühl 186 9.2 Markus Rühl 1 87 9.3 Nasser el Sonbaty 196 10.1 Catherine Boshuizen Flexing 200 10.2 Grandma48 Flexing 203 10.3 Crystal Rivers Flexing and Measuring 204 Tables 1.1 Comparison of Women’s Bodybuilding Weight Classes 1984–2009 41 1.2 Convenience Sample: Total Number of Competitors June 2002–May 2004 in 59 Shows 50 1.3 Comparison: Women Bodybuilders, Fitness, Figure Competitors and Models 53 Acknowledgments An earlier version of Chapter 3 was published as Monaghan, L.F. (2002) ‘Vocabularies of Motive for Illicit Steroid Use among Bodybuilders’, Social Science & Medicine 55: 695–708 (Elsevier). Chapter 7: ‘The Self Contained Body: the Heroic and Aesthetic/Erotic modes of representing the muscular body’ is a slightly edited version of the chapter entitled ‘The Self-Contained Body’ in the work by Kenneth R. Dutton entitled T he Perfectible Body: The Western Ideal of Physical Development (1995), published in the UK by Cassell, in the USA by Continuum and in Australia by Allen and Unwin. Chapter 11 is an excerpt from ‘Aphrodisia and Erotogenesis’, in Joanna Frueh (2001) M onster/Beauty: Building the Body of Love. Copyright 2001 by the Regents of the University of California. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press: 59–88.