Amateur stayer running through the prism of transcendentalism and pragmatism

• Published in: Философия и культура no. 7; pp. 57 - 72
• Main Author: Kannykin, Stanislav Vladimirovich
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.07.2025
• ISSN: 2454-0757; 2454-0757
• DOI: 10.7256/2454-0757.2025.7.71960

Philosophical understanding of the importance of amateur stayer practices for the comprehensive development of a person and the promotion of this kind of physical activity is an urgent task, given the generally small number of people who regularly practice this type of physical activity. The center of the formation and spread of amateur running movement in the world is the United States, which allows us to make an assumption about the stimulation of running activity by the peculiarities of their national culture. The subject of consideration is the cultural content and humanistic potential of the running practices of amateur stayers, explicated through the worldview and categorical apparatus of the main directions of classical American philosophy – transcendentalism and pragmatism, the choice of which is due to their ideological features, most suitable for the study of the being of a "running man" ‒ democracy, holism, meliorism and focus on the experience of everyday life in everything its diversity. The methodology of the subject area of the study used the historical method, the method of categorization, the descriptive method, the method of analysis. The first part of the article is devoted to the study of the influence of the ideological heritage of the transcendentalists R. W. Emerson and G. D. Thoreau on the conceptualization of the humanizing aspects of running movement, which is seen in their activities to "transcend" the oppositions "body‒consciousness" and "culture‒nature", which meant a positive assessment of our physicality and the natural environment, the unification of which occurs during classes physical culture in a natural environment. This ensures not only physical development, but also familiarization with the "virtue and holiness" of nature as a "plantation of God." The aesthetic effect of the natural environment on the runner is clarified through the categories of "beautiful" and "sublime". "Beautiful" correlates with the activities of joggers (joggers) who practice running in "ennobled" nature (parks, embankments, etc.) practically without discomfort, tension and risk, for the sake of well-being and "external" goals (beauty, cheerfulness, following current trends, etc.). Elevated states are mainly inherent in semi-professional runners, practicing long and difficult races in terms of the characteristics of the landscapes to be overcome, the experience of which combines perceptions of the beauty of wild nature, real risk to life and seemingly unbearable suffering in terms of strength and duration, which is done for the sake of improving both personal growth, giving meaning to life and heroic dimension, discovering and expanding existential boundaries.