Aging & Social Change: Ninth Interdisciplinary Conference

Abstract

The Canadian public and state have long linked national identity to Canada’s northern climate, claiming that winter sport is a natural outgrowth of its geographic locale. This construction links winter sports activities to the bodies of young, aggressive, white, ostensibly straight, able-bodied men. Ironically, while state actors, corporations, and culture-makers to continue associate youthful winter sport with Canadian identity, the nation has become demographically older. As the number of Canadians reaching retirement age grows, there is a “new moral panic” about the costs associated with these changing demographics, leading to increasing pressures on those in later life to stay healthy, especially through physical activity. Even as the press and policy-makers express concerns about seniors slipping and falling in winter weather, they urge seniors to involve themselves in outdoor winter activities, including Nordic skiing, skating, hockey, and curling. In light of these tensions, it is important to investigate the intersections of winter sports, Canadian national identity, gender, and embodied aging. Through policy analysis, ethnographic research, interviews, and media analysis, this work explores the place of late(r) life actors in sporting spaces, the ways they have been represented, and the meanings they bring to their winter sports participation. In so doing, it investigates the various ways that late(r) life winter sports participants challenge—or perpetuate—dominant national narratives linked to youthful bodies.