5th ISA Forum of Sociology (6-11 July 2025)

During the COVID-19 pandemic, each person has forged unique strategies of resilience and adaptability to deal with their physical, mental, and social well-being. For some, exercise practices have become a powerful tool in coping with such adversity. For others, in contrast, movement and exercise have decreased due to adopting more sedentary lifestyles imposed by the same conditions. This shows the influence of motion shaping human senses, bodies, and practices and its potential to mediate and manage some of the health risks and uncertainties we all face.

This session aims to gather relevant proposals that explore the role of physical activity in health and well-being and its potential for individual empowerment: health strategies, mechanisms, abilities, and agency to deal with bodily issues under unusual individual and social conditions. We invite contributions on a range of topics related to this theme:

• The tools, methods, and symbolic guiding principles of the corporeal behaviours (exercise, sports, overall physical activities) associated with individuals’ reflexive strategies to cope with social constraints or difficulties (like the pandemic or critical health problems).
• The impacts of physical activity, sports, and exercise on life histories. For instance, stories of athletes during the pandemic, facing the reverse of their usual trajectories, being forced to stop instead of keep moving. How did they cope with that mentally, and how did the break affect their physical performances, the senses, or the body?
• Stories where the start of physical activities/practices represent life-changing moments/turning points in biographies and their impacts on identity, sociability, and health.