Seeing Style

Based on a rich ethnographic study of the visual practices of the German-speaking freeskiing subculture, this work develops a sociological theory of social practices centered on the situational accomplishment of intelligibility and social order. Extending contemporary Wittgensteinian practice theory, it develops the thought of Garfinkel and Schatzki with recent insights from science and technology studies and the neuroscience of human vision. Each chapter discusses and develops foundational theoretical concepts such as time, space, action, or perception based on an analysis of freeskiing practices such as planning a route in the backcountry, checking out a new ski model on a trade-fair, or judging freestyle contests. The book's central argument is that cultural styles of conduct are not only symbolic structures, but a functional resource which organizes situational intelligibility and thus enables social order based on aligned and managed embodied routines. Because the stabilization, dissemination, and evolution of such styles happens via different media, their dynamic is primarily influenced by said media rather than symbolic, rational, or functional needs or ends.