Hi Ron
Gees. What is leisure?..I have been studying and working in leisure since
undergrad days and now doing my Doctorate in the field. I am a lecturer in
a course called Leisure and Health. I cannot yet define leisure. Its not
the simple and flippant thing it is often thought to be. if everyone
reading this could think for a moment - if you had to choose between losing
work or losing leisure what would you say?...
Well we need to work to pay for our food, shelter and other essentials. OK
you choose to lose leisure. Let me clarify then. You can buy food but you
are not allowed to buy food which you enjoy. The motivation for eating must
be to relieve hunger and provide nutrition. You can not eat with people
whose company you enjoy. You must be alone or indifferent to those people.
No conversation unless its about work, the weather or politics (unless you
enjoy politics). Now shelter...well we need to pay rent or mortgage. OK
you can live in your house but you are not to have any media of
entertainment, books, magazines, newspapers (maybe the business section).
You are not to have any space where you are liable to feel relaxed and
comfortable. You cannot have friends visit. You cannot have friends
period. You cannot have a bath or shower that is enjoyable. It is to be
for hygeine purposes only. You are not to have sex unless for procreation
and then you are not to enjoy it (just like the catholics said). You can
only walk from your house if its to get somewhere and then it must not be
enjoyable - same with driving.
You cannot be amused by funny things. You cannot play and be silly. You can
not admire art or enjoy music and you cannot feel excited or thrilled by the
novel and new. You cannot keep pets nor pet other's. You cannot make
anything, collect anything or have an interest in anything unless its work
related and neccessary or obligatory. You can not access natural
environments and marvel at spectacle. You cannot practice certain aspects of
your culture and religion. You cannot celebrate anything. You cannot enjoy
study and must not enjoy your work!..need I go on?
I realise that for many people this idea of choosing work or leisure is
farcical because of the inequality of work opportunities and that many
people do not have work.
Indeed many people with disabilities do not have leisure - and i ask you all
to think again..Is this an issue or concern? Damn right.
The notion of leisure we know was around in the time of Aristotle. It is
what he aspired to. A life of pure contemplation without obligation to do
anything.
Older cultures such as those belonging to Aboriginal Australians did not
have any concept of leisure - nor did they have any concept of work. Those
were European importations.
Capitalism (Industrialisation) did indeed create a time and space called
leisure - it went hand in hand with the Protestant reformation and resultant
work ethic based on the notion that work was virtuous and leisure sinfull.
This was essentially a social control mechanism that sought to
compartmentalise a work time and a leisure time and thus the discpline of
the worker. This still permeates our notions of leisure today.
yes indeed (according to Simmel) we have become part of an objectified
culture of swiftly changing images and objects and a part of the circulation
and exchange of the modern money economy. Leisure is reified and very much
part of a consumer culture.
The relevance of the work/ leisure dichtomy has to be questioned nowadays.
Lines are blurred - the notions of freedom and choice are curiously vague -
we work longer and seek quick leisure fixes.
The requisites for leisure, considered to be the feeling of relative freedom
and intrinsic motivation, call for the defining of leisure as an attitude.
Phenomenologists would say a state of mind or a state of being. I see
leisure as a space. A space where we choose what to do, when and where we do
it and who is with us when we do it - a space to be ourselves, to be by
ourselves, to do for ourselves - this space exists within the crevices of
contraints yet it is in spite of these contraints that we find our space,
our freedom, our room of our own - a space for becoming.
Leisure is simple and flippant?
----- Original Message -----
From: Ron Amundson <[log in to unmask]>
To: Disability Research List <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, May 31, 2000 9:06 PM
Subject: Re: Rehabilitation?
> I'd just like to note as a preface that this was written before Laurence's
> recent post. I agree with him about education, which is implied below.
>
> R
>
>
> ====
>
> I think there are several tensions going on among the ideas of
> rehabilitation, leisure, and disability.
>
> First, as everyone seems to recognize, rehabilitation as "fixing" is a
> product of the medical model. Nevertheless, education and expert help in
> developing skills are valued by both disabled and non-disabled people. So
> perhaps the problem with rehabilitation is that it is defined as remedying
a
> defect rather than (like education) just improving a person's skills. It's
> also controlled by a different power structure than other education
systems,
> in particular a power structure that defines its beneficiaries as
defective.
> Aside from that, some of the things that rehabilitation people actually
_do_
> are no different or more objectionable than the things that school
teachers
> or hockey coaches do.
>
> Second, who invented the idea of 'leisure'? I'm not a social historian,
but
> I'll bet it's a late development of capitalist economics. Anything that is
> not productive labor is 'leisure'. (Especially since we can then define it
> as a commodity and make people pay for it.) Since rehabilitation systems
> are typically (at least in the US) justified by their goal of getting
people
> back to work, it's not a surprise that leisure activities within
> rehabilitation systems have to be functionally justified. So I suspect the
> conflict between rehabilitation and leisure comes from the economic
> assumptions of rehabilitation programs. (Massively obvious to everyone, I
> suspect.)
>
> Third, why should 'leisure' activities be assumed to be non-productive?
> (Probably the best answer is the economic answer above -- if they were
> economically productive we wouldn't call them 'leisure'). In the world at
> large, it seems to me that a lot of leisure activities are considered by
> their practitioners to be self-improving. Exercise and skill games
> (including mental exercise and skill games) are exhilarating to many
people
> because you think you're getting better, or at least keeping up your
skills.
> I know people who feel sluggish if they haven't had challenging bridge
> sessions recently (bridge the card game). I realize that leisure, to some
> people, is getting inert on a couch and watching stupid TV. But that's not
a
> defining feature of leisure.
>
> I understand Laurence's point that leisure ought to be a relief from
> therapy. But I think the important point is that it ought to be voluntary.
> The therapy involved in rehabilitation programs is not voluntary in any
> broad sense. So leisure would at least be a break from the routine.
Whether
> a wide enough range of options is available to call it voluntary is
another
> question.
>
> Some bureaucrats would argue that if leisure activities are voluntuary,
they
> are not self-improving or rehabilitative. I point out that they would not
> say this about the voluntary leisure activities of non-disabled people.
At
> least not to their face. Many non-disabled people (and others) consider
> their leisure activities to be very self-improving, and would spit in the
> face of the bureaucrat who told them otherwise.
>
> I think the important fact is that the leisure of disabled people is open
to
> scrutiny. Isn't that interesting?
>
> I don't mean this as a criticism of Laurence's or earlier posts -- I'm
just
> musing. In the past 5 years I've gotten involved in a very rigorouis
> exercise program, and I can give equally well justified therapeutic and
> non-therapeutic justifications for it. Why the hell should I have to
choose?
> Non-disabled people are quizzed about things like this.
>
> Ron
>
> --
> Ron Amundson
> University of Hawaii at Hilo
> Hilo, HI 96720
> [log in to unmask]
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Laurence Bathurst <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 30, 2000 9:33 PM
> Subject: Re: Rehabilitation?
>
>
> > Hello Alison
> >
> > In attending this enquiry, you have articulated a problem that is
relevant
> to
> > leisure service delivery within Rehab Units in Australia. I am glad
that
> > there is someone who has recognised this dilemma. The biomedical
> > model of rehabilitation is so antithetical to the notion of leisure, yet
> leisure
> > services are compelled (by funding agreement outcomes and by the
> > 'superior' position of therapists within a therapeutic environment -
many
> of
> > whom are trained by this School) to adopt a functionalist perspective -
to
> > 'use' leisure as a therapy.
> >
> > I think that leisure services in rehab settings should provide relief
from
> > therapy. To provide programs that facilitate opportunities for self
> > determination; that look toward the brightest future; that attend to
> > emotional upheaval with the comforts of continuity and the excitement of
> > change; and that lift the lid off the realm of possibility rather than
> lock it
> > and become the gatekeeper. I know of several people working in this
> > area who feel this tug between what is expected of them and what they
> > feel is right. It would be fabulous to have someone or something that
> > recognises and articulates the conflicting paradigms and how to travel
> that
> > road.
>
>
>
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|