How Can One be a Boxer? : Pain and Pleasure in a Manila's Boxing Camp

Abstract

AbstractThis paper is an ethnographic account of daily life at a boxing gym in Manila in the Philippines. My book, Rokaru Boxer to Hinkon Sekai conducts a social analysis of three different topics in order to grasp the lives of Manilan boxers on both theoretical and empirical grounds—namely, daily life at a boxing gym, an international boxing market structure in which Filipino boxers are consumed as underdog roles, and the daily life in Manila's squatter areas to which the boxers are closely tied. The current study limits its examination to daily life in a boxing gym. Most of the unique characteristics that influence Filipino boxing can be found in the live‐in residencies of its gyms. The gym is a place for training and living. It is not only by training but also as a result of various aspects of their life here that young men are able to become boxers. Unlike the gym in the African American ghetto described by Loïc Wacquant, participating youths in Filipino boxing come from the absolute lowest tiers of society. The youths live in boxing camps where every aspect of their daily live is strictly regulated, and thus are they inscribed with the rules that must be observed in this sport. This study is an examination of the pains and pleasures of life at one such boxing camp.