See, Ramus was a brilliant and very well rounded scholar, and somewhere in the middle of his career as a schoolmaster and master academic, he took up studying rhetoric. Through his influence with the French Court, the discipline of rhetoric took a strong turn towards style, to the exclusion of all other topics in rhetoric.
Before Ramus (and for a while after him) rhetoric consisted of five broad areas of study, or what are sometimes called “canons” (not to be confused with “cannons”).
Those canons (that had been around since Aristotle) are invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery. They’re all the things you have to do right to have a good speech, piece of writing, or opinion.
First, you have to come up with good ideas (invention).
Then, you have to say stuff in the right order (arrangement).
Third, you have to make it sound cool (style).
Fourth, you have to remember what the hell you’re talking about (memory).
And finally, you have do it all in a clear and coherent way (delivery).
So that was that.
But Ramus thought you could throw out everything but style. He was about making shit sound cool without satisfying the rest of the canons.
Really stupid idea.
It became the death-knell of rhetoric, and it’s why, today, rhetoric is understood most commonly to mean something like “mere words,” bloviating political talk, or some other form of insincere speech.
For the two-thousand years prior to Ramus, rhetoric was an exquisite art mastered by only the best and brightest (Socrates, Aristotle, Aspasia, Cicero, Quintilian, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, Thomas Hobbes, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Chaïm Perelman, etc.).
Following Ramus, rhetoric has become a giant hack-shop of Johnny-come-lately bullshitters, advertisers, and propagandists.
Now, here’s what all of that has to do with rollerblading.
Since the mid 2000s, rollerblading has become significantly dependent on the Internet.
In some ways, it has been a very democratizing kind of media influence in which anybody with a camera, a computer, and a pair of skates can gain a few moments of visibility.
On the other hand, it forces a reduction in the scale of skating we’re used to seeing.
Pros, AMs, and even flow riders are now required to constantly put out video content. That forces them to have to make certain choices.
For instance, a lot of guys (and gals) out there just can’t keep up making stunt section after stunt section. Let’s face it, stunts account for a huge number of the injuries skaters fall victim to. And so everybody has to choose carefully when they can go big, how big they can go, and how often.
So in the meantime, what you get is a bunch of (very talented) rollerbladers putting out sections dedicated almost exclusively to style. You know, the easy stuff—cruising around a tiny skatepark linking (and lacing) small-scale grinds, traverses, and airs.
The goal, then, becomes to make tiny stuff looks as good as possible so it “counts.”
Doing a soul on a tiny curb would be a wholesale regression back to 1993—unless you make it look good.
If you make it look good, it counts for the people for whom it needs to count, but it also influences a lot of people.
Now, what we’re starting to see is a lot of rollerbladers coming up with the attitude that style is everything.
To be fair, why hurl your ass off something dangerous if you don’t have to? Why risk it?
On the other hand, I would ask “What does that do to rollerblading?”
What does it do?
Personally, I think it overemphasizes style.
I believe that rollerblading is a big tent. I think there’s lots of room for all kinds of skating to exist, and think all of it can happen concurrently.
I think huge rails are dope.
I think Mushroom Blading is dope.
I think Powerblading is, and rollerhockey is, and stair riding is, and park skating is.
All of it.
I think rollerblading is badass and I don’t care about what form it takes. I like to see people do huge stunts, I like to see people doing smooth lines and alley-oop fishbrains on square rails. I like rollerblading. But it needs to be a lot more open than to just one measly thing (style).
Right now, I’m trying to crowbar something like “academic blading” into the tent. I realize it’s not for everybody. But I would also say that it’s no different than stunts, mushroom blading, powerblading, or whatever. It’s a niche.
See, to me, we’re a big-tent sport. And I think we’ve got plenty of room for all kinds of blading.
Honestly, I think among all the chatter about “how best to save rollerblading,” the best idea (and antidote) yet is very simple: more rollerblading.
If rollerblading goes the route of rhetoric and adopts a “style only” attitude, it will only be a matter of time before it’s nothing more than a chop-shop of crappy advertising and misunderstanding—just like rhetoric.
If it goes that way, I don’t know who our Peter Ramus will be, and I can’t say for certain that I’d like to see his ass thrown out of a window, but I can be sure there will be no turning back.
To put it all in one phrase, I’d say that singularity could be our downfall. If that’s the case, I say we best avoid it.
As always, thanks for reading.
-fs
Frank, spot-on with stylistic mimicry being confused for good skating in hipstertatpants2012. We were doing this 10+ years ago, but as you point out, copying alone was not confused for badass skating: it was clearly jocking. Petty clones were teased (not praised) for arm cocking. Does Bourdieu’s taste fit into this observation? Is it ironic that older, maybe wiser, more socially and economically mobile participants trend away from what’s now tasteful?
Good analysis laced with useful bits of theory explained for the unaware blader as usual.
Wow, thanks Billy! I really appreciate you taking the time to both read and comment. It’s nice to get feedback and it’s nice to keep the conversation going. So thanks for both!
Imitation is definitely a topic I’d like to take up at greater length, and like style, it has a parallel in rhetoric too. For ages (and I mean AGES) imitation was the primary mode of rhetoric education. They would literally make you copy texts word for word (and imitate the handwriting too!) until you could imitate or impersonate the style of the person you’d been copying.
Rollerbladers don’t necessarily practice it in the same exact way, though I’ve definitely played a game of S.K.A.T.E. where the game was to do a topsoul “like Jon Julio” or a fishbrain “like Eric Schrijn”. There’s clearly a lot of jocking going on as well, sometimes on purpose, sometimes a little bit more subconsciously.
As far as Bourdieu, I would think that the teasing has more to do with symbolic power, where the person doing the teasing would be putting down the imitator as a means to show him that he’s “faaar away from being at the top” as someone like Petty was back in the day.
As far as the older guys “nowadays” not following the same trends as the younger guys, my bet would be simply that they’re following earlier trends or they’re trying to fit in with a slightly different group of peers. People tend to become more moderated and less extreme as they get older, so the kinds of clothes they wear, for instance, would predictably be somewhere in between the crazy JNCO’s some guys used to wear and the “painted on” look that’s fashionable at the moment.
When it comes to economics and taste, I think it would be safe to say that the “older guy’s” values are changing quite a bit, too, so that the respect they’re looking for has to do with getting a professional job, or getting a bank loan, or car loan, or whatever. It’s the same behavior, just a different set of people they have to mesh with or gain approval from.
Thanks again for your great thoughts and comments!
with the act of imitation in the present day and past of rollerblading personally it serves as a means of teaching the “noob” the mechanics/movement required to learn a trick and execute it… and then perfect it , and as time passes and progression is achieved , you would with understanding steer away from imitating a favourite pro.. to develop personal unique style and as you have written stener , an umberella filled with variety of types sustains every type of viewer and the skater enthusiast in keeping interest stable and strengthened… , i like what colin and sean kelso have to offer but it isnt the standard , then theres chris Haffey , D. George who are some of the BIG stunt linked with smooth linked tricks and Richie Eisler with his great use of obsticles with smoothness… lets consider he is mmm in his 30.? , in any situation within industry and image and the rawness that is rollerblading we want variety , innovation and combination and tweaking of what we do.. is sustainability from every which way…. another subject id like to see views on is public advertisement and united initiative to promote in a constructive way… i see some of that being done within NASS , NL , Nokia Fiss …. but i mean creating more deliberate ways of involving the public as not just viewer.. as well as having a great competition going to give a taste of the best.. winterclash definatly showed effort in bringing the outsider eye into our world… what would the brands and teams need to do next to step up the promotion of the sport? thoughts.. as well as US..
Hey Jack, thanks for your comments, man. I think you raise some very interesting points. The last idea you touched on is a very good one and it’s something that I plan to address on this blog sometime in the next few weeks or so. As far as promotion of the sport, I think that something needs to be said to a number of the companies out there who sponsor “flow” and “am” riders largely at the rider’s expense. The skaters get some free product and the occasional trip somewhere (or tour), but I’m not totally sure how sustainable it is to have the “lower level” riders paying their own way. What’s more important, is that behind every up-and-coming skater is a best friend, roommate, or homie who absorbs a huge amount of cost buying and securing all the fancy camera equipment necessary to keep filming and making edits for the flow (or AM) rider getting his 5 free pairs of skates per year. I think we should all take more seriously the nature of this disparity, and also look at who is gaining access and respect as a result. It seems to me that a better model would be to have something like “mini-teams” or two-person rider situations where some effort is made to acquire things necessary for the promotion (and continuation) of skating media. Personally, I think the guy filming the flow rider’s sections deserves a free pair of skates here and there too, and I also think more should be done by the companies to help secure camera- and editing-related resources for the people doing all the legwork. They are, in a certain way, PAYING for the possibility of rollerblading’s continued existence.
Thanks so much for your comment, I’ll be sure to revisit your remarks when I draft the post about this topic.
Yo Frank, sadly I think you’re right about style being reducible to a top down reification of power, and it’s a passive process, because it’s just fashion. Only, blading hasn’t been around long enough to solidify a very nuanced or lasting style.
The same issue exists in figure skating, which has a much longer-lived history, where style is referred to as “artistry”. A specific body type, the right outfit, and the right music often puts one skater above another at competitions and in general. I think it’s no coincidence that rollerblading is looking more and more like figure skating.
Hey Billy!
I think you’re right on the money about style often being a reification of power, but I would add that there have been, historically, a number of rollerbladers well known for outstanding style who chose not to make a power grab of it. Erik Burke comes to mind. Back in the day his style was legendary, but he just wasn’t the sort of guy to demand a lot of limelight and enforce his influence—which in a way, is a certain kind of style in itself. I’d be inclined to call Burke’s behavior “with grace.”
Your second point is very well taken too, and, to me, it points back to something in rhetoric known as the “form/content split.” The form/content split is an age-old debate about whether style exists independently of “substance.” People have staked their careers (or lives on it, as was the case with Ramus) on it, and it’s a debate that has been going on in the field of rhetoric for more than two thousand years.
In rollerblading, I would argue that much of what might fall under the umbrella of “style” is overlooked. For instance, “grinding” still accounts for more than half of what we do (and see in videos) and that’s a certain kind of choice that is, in itself, a branch of style—“style” as CHOICE, and in your words, Style as Fashion (I’m assuming, there, that you aren’t just using “fashion” to mean “clothes”).
To that point, I would say that we 1) still spend most of our time grinding and 2) (concerning clothes) still wear jeans and t-shirts—just slightly different ones that we used to.
To get back to “fashion” as something other than “mere dress,” I would say that “fashion” usually means something more like “custom” or “way of doing things.” In that sense, we have a lot of style that hasn’t really changed at all and is very much a part of our constitution. Certain etiquette (like inside handshakes), certain language (like words for “excellent”: sick, dope, rad, etc.) and certain choices (skating on staircases, rails, skateparks, etc.) are all very well established and long-lived norms in rollerblading, so I can’t necessarily agree about rollerblading not being around long enough to have those things.
I do, however, agree very much that more talk is going on relating to figure skating, and more and more people seem to be snooping around the periphery of that sport for some guidance and (at least prospective) influence.
As a kind of personal anecdote, I would say that I—and only a few others that I know of—still ride on rockered skates, because I came to rollerblading through ice hockey. My wheel set up is 54,56,56, 54 (or sometimes 54,57,57,54) which comes directly from ice skating. So your last point is very certainly NOT lost on me!
