Learning to labour in the gym: Training to fight to reimagine the self and work under neoliberalism

Abstract This paper explores the motivations of those who train to fight at a Muay Thai and Kickboxing gym in East London, who view fighting (and training in the gym) as a means of coping with the harshness of work, as a financial supplement to work, and as an alternative form of work. It explores how the repetitive regimes of the body employed by fighters, such as dieting, twice‐daily training sessions and sparring, as both individual and collective bodily work, contrasts with their experiences of social life under capitalism, which is seen as unfair and unmeritocratic. This, it argues, leads people to seek refuge within the meritocratic sphere of the gym, which offers new opportunities, possibilities and a unique ability to master the self. It subsequently argues that we can understand training to fight as a response to class exclusion, stigmatisation, and helplessness under neoliberalism.