Foucault, Flying Discs and Calling Fouls: Ascetic Practices of the Self in Ultimate Frisbee

Abstract

Dominant analyses of sporting subjectivities suggest the contemporary athletic subject embodies a win-at-all-costs instrumental rationality. Yet, as Carless and Douglas (2012) argue, athletes are able to find less problematic alternatives to this understanding of sport. In this article, I use Foucault’s concept of “practices of the self” to undertake a sociological analysis of ethical subjectivities within Ultimate Frisbee. I focus specifically on ascetic, or self-controlling, practices of the self through which players create relationships between their self, Ultimate’s moral code and others. I use this case study to argue that ethical subjectivities offer a productive perspective for sociology of sport.