Disorder, Difference and Marginality within a Publicly-Accessible Pool: Multimodal Considerations

Haynes Collins, School of Languages, Cultures and Societies, University of Leeds

The environment of a publicly-accessible swimming pool has rich potential for exploring the fluidity of space and how cultural practices coalesce around the performance of swimming.   This study highlights the underlying disorder within one pool (‘The Edge’) at the University of Leeds and identifies how swimmers are managed through the use of swimming categories and via a continuous reorganisation of space to suit the swimmers’ needs.  On the surface this system creates an appearance of order, but a deeper investigation reveals tension between swimmers, issues of power and accessibility, conflicting swimming approaches and culturally specific non-verbal communication which does not easily translate from one group of swimmers to another. The study has also found that the pool is uncomfortably positioned between a consumerist model of customer satisfaction and a ‘commons’ model.    While multimodality was not at the heart of the study, this presentation will consider how a multimodal reading of the pool might provide further insights into this environment.  It is hoped that those more experienced with multimodality may also make suggestions.

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