Hayden Larsewn, & Dr. Rachel Olsthoorn
My research is on the rock climbing culture and what makes this culture unique from other subcultures. This research is important since there is little existing information suggesting that the climbing community has been analyzed from an anthropological perspective. Additionally I am looking at the psychological factors that apply to rock climbing. I am writing this as an autoethnography comparing my experiences as a rock climber and the details of my acculturation experience to the existing literature on the climbing community. My methods include a literature review, participant observation, and comparing my personal experiences to existing literature on climbing culture. I expect to find through my research that climbing is a unique culture that even has subcultures within itself. These subcultures would be climbers who specify in specific disciplines of climbing (e.g bouldering, traditional climbing, sport climbing). For theory I will be analyzing the ‘communitas’ theory and comparing that to the climbing community.