Gender and edgework paradoxes in tree-planting in Canada

Abstract

Edgework refers to the experience of adventure and transcendence achieved through perseverance in risky situations. We draw from interviews with 26 tree-planters in Canada to show how tree-planting, a type of edgework, reveals elements of the edgework paradox. The paradox is that edgework provides escape from the late-modern urban world through control of the body under conditions of risk, but also involves laborious monotony that preserves structural conditions of alienation from which escape is sought. We argue that the edgework paradox is doubled for women in tree-planting: the performance of gruelling female masculinities in planting camps challenges gender norms (as tree-planting provides a context and space for the embodiment of masculinities for both women and men). The analysis of women in our study of tree-planting addresses the tendency in edgework literature to disproportionately focus on the experiences of men. We also reveal that the camp’s persistent culture of hegemonic masculinity maintains a hierarchy of appropriate gender performances, which consequently perpetuates gender inequality.