Trabalhador, ídolo, sobrevivente, casca-grossa e humano: um estudo sobre versões de atletas de Mixed Martial Arts

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to identify the versions of MMA athletes who circulated in spaces where this mode is performaned. Our guiding athletes were considered professionals in the sport, linked to national and international events. In order to do so, we elected two MMA gyms located in the city of São Paulo where we lived during 2014. To support this research, we adopted a theoretical and methodological approach to the actor-network theory in dialogue with the Social Psychology. The methodology followed the assumptions of ethnography, with interactions in different practices in which athletes were involved: training, group meetings, various procedures for weight loss, activity on the day of the fight and subsequent conversations with the struggle. The descriptions of the two researched academies suggested that in one of them (gym B), an athlete deserve protection, support and care, and performing as an employee and in the second (gym A), as an idol, having importance while offering the opportunity to act in such way in different situations. Whereas at the camp, we accompanied a gym B fighter, it was possible to identify the fighter versions: a) worker who is precarious (training); b) idol (week of fighting); c) survivor (weighing); d) "tough guy" (day of the fight) and; e) "human" (post-fight). The thesis is that there is a specific type of fighter, or different perspectives on it, but it's multiple. These athletes are made in different practices, yet somehow related to each other. The complexity presented here opens up the possibility of other modes of operation, less essentialits human fighting MMA, claiming the weakening totalizing versions, exploring only one version of these fighters