Recreation and Leisure Theory Final

• Leisure as a privilege


  Leisure needs to be earned
• Leisure as a right


  Leisure is essential for human life
• Inclusion


  Valuing all people regardless of their differences
• Diversity


  Celebrating differences in people
• Pluralism


  A form of society in which minority groups maintain their independent cultural traditions
• Feminism


  Belief in and action toward political, economic, and social equality for men and women
• Constraints on feminism


  • Women's Flag Football Tournament
• The traditional family structure


  Statistics show that the family structure is changing
• Leisure constraints for families

  • Temporality of participation
  • Financial constraints
• Family leisure


  • Fosters togetherness
  • Strengthens relationships
  • Teaches life lessons and morals
  • Increases life satisfaction
• Family leisure


  • May not be freely chosen
  • Can be an obligation, sense of duty or responsibility
  • Can be purposive (e.g., volunteering)
• Core plus Balance Model of Family Leisure Functioning


  • Core = accessible, predictable, closeness
  • Balance = require resources, planning, organization
• Working mothers


  Have less time for leisure and face stigma of not working
• Men have more hours of pure leisure


  • Men have more quality leisure time
  • Women's leisure tends to be harried leisure
  • Mothers spend time caring for children
  • Fathers spend time playing with children
• Stereotypes of leisure pursuits & activities

  • Masculine or feminine
  • Western perspective is opening to women in "male" activities
  • Stigmas exist
  • Constraints around leisure activities
  • Opportunities for genders
  • Feelings of appropriateness & workloads
• Leisure permits people to

  • Challenge, maintain, diminish or lose stigmas
  • Resistance through agency and freely chosen action
• Barriers exist in societies to achieving full fairness in leisure opportunities
• Leisure can contribute to a high quality of life
• Inclusion and celebration of diversity can accomplish equality of opportunity
• Leisure


  • Reproduces and resists traditional gender roles
  • Constraints and benefits of inclusion for persons with disabilities
  • Issues of recreation & leisure participation for racial and ethnic minorities
  • Importance within Aboriginal and Francophone cultures
  • Implications of class and poverty
• Barriers to inclusion


  • Self-determination
  • Self-determined goals & initiatives
  • Self-advocacy
  • Voice of and for the self
• Leisure for Persons with Disabilities

  • Normalization
  • Making available leisure experiences with peers
  • Integration
  • Benefits of leisure
• "enabling persons with and without disabilities to participate together" (Russell, 2013, p. 238)
• First Nations & Leisure in Canada

  • Church & state attempted to replace traditional activities with Euro-Canadian activities
  • Some traditional activities were presented as sport to ensure continued practice
  • Sports and games at residential schools
  • Traditional activities were seen to be counter productive
  • Traditional learning was practical and increased knowledge and physical fitness through activities
  • Mainstream sporting practices
• Contemporary issues:


  1. Self-determination through leisure and sport

  2. Increased opportunities for traditional and contemporary leisure

  3. The Double Helix

  4. The relationship between all-Aboriginal and mainstream sport systems
• Leisure in French Canada

  • Inside Québec vs. outside
  • Charter of the French Language makes French the official provincial language and aims to maintain French culture
  • Children speak French at school
  • Broadcasting Act – Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
  • Leisure provision through volunteering
• Leisure in French Canada (outside of Quebec)

  • Francophones live institutional incompleteness
  • French is typically used in areas of leisure, education, religion and family
  • Leisure is a way of maintaining one's cultural heritage
  • Formal groups/organizations or informal activities
  • Volunteering
  • Community centres and sporting organizations
• Conspicuous consumption


  Conspicuous leisure
• Poverty


  Absence of access to something essential (e.g. clothing, shelter, food, money, education)
• Causes of poverty


  • Individual or "pathological"
  • Familial causes
  • Agency causes
  • Structural causes
• Results of poverty on leisure

  • Social exclusion and marginalization
  • Reduced or no participation due to time &/or finances
  • Social stigma
  • Child development
• Types of shelters for the homeless

  • Private-sector permanent housing
  • Government subsidized housing
  • Temporary & emergency shelters
  • The streets
• Benefits gained from leisure services/opportunities for the homeless

  • Enhanced quality of life
  • Reintegration into society
  • Enhance self-esteem
  • Enhance social functioning
• Equity in leisure


  • Inclusion
  • Celebrating diversity
  • Gender
  • Individuals who identify with 2 cultures tend to experience recreation activities of both societies
  • Aboriginal and Francophone cultures are shared through leisure
• Community


  • An association or grouping of two or more people
  • A group of people who have something in common
• 4 ways of understanding community

  • Psychological sense of community
  • Community as a spatial or geographical concept
  • Community as social networks
  • Associational perspectives of community
• Leisure communities


  • Intimacy and Anonymity
  • Obligation and Freedom
  • Attachment and Ephemerality
• Leisure communities


  • Leisure fosters intimacy & closeness
  • Depend on each other for leisure
  • Can separate from others
  • Temporal elements to leisure
• Functions of community recreation

  • Enriching the quality of life
  • Contributing to personal development
  • Making the community more attractive place for living and visiting
• Functions of community recreation

  • Providing positive opportunities for youth development
  • Educating & uniting community members
  • Strengthening neighborhood & community ties