Bodies in motion: The sociology of physical activity

Some have argued that the field of kinesiology is losing its vitality because of overspecialization and fragmentation; exercise science scholars are no longer able to find points of convergence with those in kinesiology subdisciplines other than their own. I contend, however, that this is not an accurate portrayal of every subdiscipline. Qualitative research in the sociology of physical activity lends itself to an interdisciplinary and broadly based understanding of human movement. To illustrate my claim, I present and explain six dimensions of the body: the imagined body, the consumer body, the disciplined body, the practiced body, the discursive body, and the transgressive body. Each of these dimensions ("bodies" of knowledge) may be thought of as a social movement, both in the literal sense of moving one's body in socially constructed ways, but also in the figurative sense of scholarly movement that crosses and blurs disciplinary boundaries.