Abstract

Risk has always been part of sports and physical activities (e.g., in tauromachy). However, it has become a constitutive aspect of some disciplines introduced in the United States and Europe from the 1960es and 1970es. These activities (among them, surfing, base jumping, etc.) have become for participants fields to test themselves – out of every institutional framework – and overcoming their own «limits», while simultaneously recovering a space of creative and free bodily expression. In the background, a new conception of the Self – and subjectivity – and of the relationship with nature. In a social context in which self-realization (intended as the affirmation of one’s own uniqueness) is viewed as the main responsibility of the subject, risk-taking in sports is the prove participants have the courage to be themselves, expressing their own inclinations and desires. Sociological tool for the allocation of prestige and definition of masculinity, risk-taking in sports also corresponds to the implicit participation of practitioners to the system of meanings and values shared in the specific activity they practice. Building on existing literature on risk sports, the article offers a relatively original perspective that also focuses on the relational dimension of the concept of risk in sports, viewed not only as a system of self-realization, but also as a source to strengthen reciprocity and trust among participants