Decades of previous research has addressed the need for changes in physical education where embodied experiences and learning are emphasized (Wrench and Garrett 2015; Wright 2000). Accordingly, we align with the ongoing call for a ‘corporeal turn’ (Smith 2007, 66) in physical education, towards a more holistic understanding of learning and experience as embodied and emplaced (Pink 2011).

The concept of embodiment has roots in phenomenological philosophy. As such, understanding the body as the ground of subjective experiences (Standal 2020) deconstructs the notion of a mind/body divide. We come to know ‘in relation to the other elements of the environment’ (Pink 2011, 348, italics in orginal). Viewing learning as embodied and emplaced means that learning is a social activity, situated in the relationships between persons and with the environment around us, and that learning has tacit dimensions (Polanyi 1983) which cannot easily be put into words.

Physical education is a social arena where most experiences are characterized by the social aspect of collaboration and group activities. Relationships with peers form an integral part of pupils’ experiences in physical education (Wellard 2013). Previous research has shown the importance of friendship and social support in school physical activity, e.g., greater enjoyment when participating with friends (Owen et al. 2019), and feelings of a sense of belonging and a positive affective climate made pupils enjoy and value the physical activity more (Wright and Li 2009). In this study, I expand these existing contributions by exploring friendships in physical education by making use of data from a sensory ethnographic fieldwork. The research question for this presentation is “How do social relationships influence pupils’ embodied and emplaced experiences in physical education?”

Theories of embodied affect will be used to interpret the findings. Embodied affectivity can be described as the bodily resonance (sensations, postures, expressive movements, or movement tendencies) to affective qualities or affordances in the environment (Fuchs and Koch, 2014). Building on phenomenological theories of embodiment, emplacement and intersubjectivity, where the body is both subject and object at the same time (Merleau-Ponty 2010), and we constantly interact with our environment, we can talk about interaffectivity, where we continuously move and are being moved by others (Fuchs and Koch 2014). A greater focus on the affective perspectives in educational research have resulted in a call for an ‘affective turn’ when it comes to how we understand teaching and learning (Garrett 2022; Dernikos et al. 2020) and thus development of pedagogies of affect (e.g., (Kirk 2020; Ingulfsvann, Moe, and Engelsrud 2020).

Sensory ethnography is a way of doing ethnography ‘that takes as its starting point the multisensoriality of experience, perception, knowing and practice’ (Pink 2015, xi). Sensory ethnography is not a study of the senses, rather what we get access to through studying how and what the participants see, hear, smell, feel and taste. The study occurred in one 10th grade class, for a 5month semester in an urban school in Oslo, Norway. 23 pupils (15 female, 8 males; 14-16 years) participated in the study. I was a participant observer in all physical education lessons (36 lessons, 54 hours) and collected data via fieldnotes (100 pages) and semi-structured interviews (17 pupils, average 23 minutes per interview). Observation focused on recording the pupils’ action (and inaction), body language, engagement, reactions to sensory perceptions, responses to other’s sensory perceptions, what they seemed to like and dislike. The interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim by me and a research assistant. The interviews revolved around the participants’ experiences from the activities that I had participated in. Interviews therefore involved an opportunity to validate the observations and preliminary findings. I chose to be an active participant observer and to take on the role of a pupil (as best as I could) as an attempt to be as close as possible to the pupils’ embodied and emplaced experiences. To minimize the impact on the research, I always let pupils take the lead and be the initiators of activity. I focused on asking open, descriptive questions so that the pupils could decide what they wanted to share. Still, I acknowledge and highlight that no researcher is ever neutral, and the presence is noticed and felt by the participants. During the interpretation process, I have followed what Pink (2021) calls the ethnographic hunch. This can be described as the moments in research when we encounter something ‘that deepens what I think I know, sparks an ethnographic-theoretical dialogue, turns around my thinking, and creates a stand of investigation through my research, analysis, or both’ (Pink 2021, 30). I have combined the meaning making of my ethnographic hunch with an abductive approach to data analysis (Tavory and Timmermans 2014). I have alternated between inductively coded the data and deductively coding the data based on the theoretical concepts previously presented.

Preliminary findings and expected outcomes The preliminary findings indicate that the participants in this study highlight the importance of group activities and being physically active together with friends. They describe how they experience positive bodily affects during group activities: - Group activities are more interesting and fun than individual activities - They are excited to be part of the team and get a “kick” in competitive settings - They are curious and expect fun things to happen, they look forward to being surprised - They feel safer, more protected from the external gaze, more comfortable and relaxed when being part of a group, especially if they have friends in their group/team. The preliminary findings also show how participants describe experiences of negative bodily affects in physical education. What seems to be the worst experience and/or their fear is the thought of failing or look stupid in front of others. It could be as part of a group/team or in individual activities. They seem to fear the social consequences of being humiliated, disgusted or for others to be angry with them. None of the participants describe the social environment as poor or unsafe, so I interpret that this fear as hypothetical, not necessarily based on previous experiences (in this class). Other negative bodily affects described is frustration or anger when the levels of effort or skills vary within the group, or when something is unfair. The findings will be discussed using phenomenological theories regarding embodied affectivity. First, I will discuss how shared affective experiences may contribute to building relationships and a sense of belonging. Second, I will discuss how social support can be important for creating a safe space characterized by a positive affective climate to facilitate pupils’ movement exploration in physical education. Hopefully, this study can suggest implications that may inform pedagogies of affect.

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