Without a doubt Tony Hawk is one of the most famous skaters in the world. Nowadays he has foundations, video games, countless videos online and more than thirty major appearances in movies and TV. For Hawk, “skateboarding is as much of a sport as a lifestyle, and an art form, so there’s so much that transcends in terms of music, fashion, and entertainment.” Skateboarding or Skate is a social phenomenon more than a sport, and for Rubén Díez, PhD, sociology professor of Universidad Carlos III of Madrid and author of articles related to common practices among young people and analyzing them as social phenomena, it is the best example to depict cultural changes that the post-industrial society is facing in its interrelation with its social structure.

Skate was born around the 50’s and it is essentially an American invention. Unlike other sports, the objective of skate is to practice the sport itself, the sensation that it creates but not the competence or discipline. In the beginning, skate represented the protesting subculture that claimed urban spaces for their use. According to Díez people that practice skateboarding find in this sport a way to reassure their gratification and self-esteem values. Skating can be understood as a way to freely express the exploration of the sport itself. A skateboarder  or skater practices it because he loves the sense of freedom that it provides, as well as it does to rollers, surfers, snowboarders or longboarders. According to José Mantilla, a skater from Quito, skateboarding is an activity that introduces an idea of freedom and personal expression in a culture group. Is a way of living in the sense of “doing what you like the most or what makes you happy without caring about what people say or if they are bothered by the sound of the skateboard.” For him, skating is an opportunity to break social paradigms and finding an expression of their dreams, hopes, and search for freedom.

Rubén agrees with Jose and considers skate as the center of the construction of a distinctive and unique community of those who practice it. Skate is a tool to create a cultural identity that reassures the separated position that the skaters represent in interrelation with other social groups.

On contemporary complex societies, information and knowledge production and distribution, as well as autonomy, self-expression and satisfaction values, acquire a prioritarian role in comparison with past times. For example, two aspects that give space to contradiction are the fact that people are expected to be highly productive and, at the same time, to take high advantage of other activities enjoyment. There is where the contradiction lies: enjoyment vs. productivity and how people are expected to succeed at both.

As a social group, skaters have practices, agreements and exclusive and own behaviors that go beyond geographic, generational and gender factors. These factors used to make them a subculture. However, with the popularization of their practice and the generalization of areas like skateparks, areas that were built to provide a controlled space for skaters; skate became more popular, turned into a daily activity and now became a part of juvenyl mainstream culture.

The commercialization of tools and cultural practices related to skating like music and fashion also contributed to the expansion and normalization of the sport. The mass production of elements related to this sport allows it to be known and practiced by a much broader audience. Magno Solórzano, a Yachay Tech student who used to skate, thinks that s a cultural practice, skating contributes to losing the objectives of the sport: the individual practice and the enjoyment.

Rubén Díez and José Mantilla agree on something interesting related to the expansion of this sport: the inclusion of different social groups. José Mantilla states that the skateboarding industry is beneficial since it generates employment, the inclusion of different social stakeholders and the normalization of the sport. However, he regrets that according to some economic policies; skateboarding remains a sport that is not for all the social sectors. On the other hand, Ruben Díez adds that the normalization, industrialization and expansion of skate are not necessarily bad since they do not break their initial objectives: enjoyment, personal satisfaction and individual and collective self-expression. Díez did a more in-depth analysis of his conference called: Skateboarding: Cultural change and technological innovation in the post-industrial society, held at Yachay Tech last week. He also treated the subject on a recently published article on Revista Empírica with Israel Marquez, You can watch the complete conference by clicking here.