The blue Un/Commons: Tracing new directions in research on outdoor swimming, health and place

This discussion provides an introduction to our special issue, The Blue Un/Commons: Tracing new directions in research on outdoor swimming, health and place. This introduction provides a rationale and overview of the social and research contexts the special issue is immersed in, including the growing multi-disciplinary literature on the established health and wellbeing swimming benefits of swimming. Our aim is to extend this 'health and wellbeing' focus and develop a new research agenda that reflects positive connections, while simultaneously considering critical dimensions of feminist, anticolonial, environmental, posthuman, and inclusionary research. The main sections examine the literature around four core themes; access, risk, the blue commons, and more-than-human water. Access is considered as both a material and affectual component that is shaped by varied permissions/allowances. Risk is considered in terms of relational immersions between bodies and waters that have personal, societal, environmental and cultural dimensions. The idea of a blue (un)commons is critically described in relation to key inclusions and exclusions, recognising wider existential threats around ownership and sustainability. The final theme considers the more-than-human water itself, in terms of nature and mood, cultural and practical knowledges and ecological allyship. The final section of the article identifies significant potential for research about outdoor swimming, health and wellbeing and specifically engages with the potential of future work on diverse swimming bodies, relational swimming spaces, swimming practices, cultures and knowledges, innovative methodological possibilities and swimming as a lifelong health-promoting practice. Uncovering new immersive connections with water promotes the idea of a blue spatial justice as a productive co-collaboration that supports not just human but also planetary wellbeing.