Recalled Poverty

Constitutive Mechanism of a Boxing Gym in Metro Manila

Abstract

 The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the meaning of poverty which appears in the everyday life of Filipino boxers. Current sociological studies on pugilism have demonstrated the tie between boxing and poverty. However these discussions seem to reflect the prefabricated exoticism of the publicized images. To prevent this kind of spontaneous sociology, this paper uses the analytical schema of ‘poverty in boxing’ instead of ‘poverty and boxing’. From this schema, we reconstruct the practical logic of Filipino youth who are immersed in a pugilistic universe. ‘Recalled poverty’ is a concept related to making deep inroads into the boxer’s sense. For the boxers, poverty is not (only) the conditions of their socio-economic backgrounds but (also) the constitutive elements of daily life, which is related to their routine training. In other words, the boxing gym experience is worked out through boxers’ recalled images of poverty. This paper captures the ontological mode of poverty through the lived experience of Filipino boxers, instead of through conventional descriptions about the experience from a socio-economic perspective.