The Allure Of Sports In Western Culture

Sports are the most popular spectator events in the history of the world. This volume demonstrates how sports shape societies and individuals. The essays offer critical new insights and historical case studies from historians, theorists, literature scholars, and athletes.

In “The Idea of Sport in Western Culture from Antiquity to the Contemporary Era,” Dr Saverio Battente examines the concept of sport as an element of Western culture. Sport has aided in structuring the collective identities that underpin individual civilisations in the West, and, far from being a merely marginal phenomenon, it has in fact been an essential feature of Western civilisation and culture from antiquity, in its various forms. The starting point of the book is the idea that there is a certain number of universal traits—unchanged across time and different cultures—underlying all sports, even if there are a series of entirely original elements with which sport has been linked over the centuries in specific civilizations. This volume thus makes a comparative analysis of the ancient, modern, and contemporary worlds and various national contexts; longues durées (whose presence transcends anthropological and cultural barriers), divergences, and discontinuities pertaining to the concept of sport are identified and explored. The book also looks at the link between the rise of civilisation and the educational and training function of sport, as well as the connection between a culture’s decline and a growing emphasis on sport as an element of entertainment and spectacle in and of itself.

The Routledge Handbook of Sport History is a new and innovative survey of the discipline of sport history. Global in scope, it examines the key contemporary issues in sports historiography, sheds light on previously ignored topics, and sets an intellectual agenda for the future development of the discipline. The book explores both traditional and non-traditional methodologies in sport history, and traces the interface between sport history and other fields of research, such as literature, material culture and the digital humanities. It considers the importance of key issues such as gender, race, sexuality and politics to our understanding of sport history, and focuses on innovative ways that the scholarship around these issues is challenging accepted discourses. This is the first handbook to include a full section on Indigenous sport history, a topic that has often been ignored in sport history surveys despite its powerful upstream influence on contemporary sport. The book also reflects carefully on the central importance of sport history journals in shaping the development of the discipline. This book is an essential reference for any student, researcher or scholar with an interest in sport history or the relationship between sport and society. It will also be fascinating reading for any historians looking for fresh perspectives on contemporary historiography or social and cultural history.

The sounds of spectators at football (soccer) are often highlighted – by spectators, tourists, commentators, journalists, scholars, media producers, etc. – as crucial for the experience of football. These sounds are often said to contribute significantly to the production (at the stadium) and conveyance (in televised broadcast) of 'atmosphere.' This book addresses why and how spectator sounds contribute to the experience of watching in these environments and what characterizes spectator sounds in terms of their structure, distribution and significance. Based on an examination of empirical materials – including the sounds of football matches from the English Premier League as they emerge both at the stadium and in the televised broadcast – this book systematically dissects the sounds of football watching.

This important new study examines the changing place and meaning of lifestyle sports – parkour, surfing, skateboarding, kite-surfing and others – and asks whether they continue to pose a challenge to the dominant meanings and experience of ‘sport’ and physical culture. Drawing on a series of in-depth, empirical case-studies, the book offers a re-evaluation of theoretical frameworks with which lifestyle sports have been understood, and focuses on aspects of their cultural politics that have received little attention, particularly the racialization of lifestyle sporting spaces. Centrally, it re-assess the political potential of lifestyle sports, considering if lifestyle sports cultures present alternative identities and spaces that challenge the dominant ideologies of sport, and the broader politics of identity, in the 21st century. It explores a range of key contemporary themes in lifestyle sport, including: identity and the politics of difference commercialization and globalization sportscapes, media discourse and lived reality risk and responsibility governance and regulation the racialization of lifestyle sports spaces lifestyle sports outside of the Global North the use of lifestyle sport to engage non-privileged youth Casting new light on the significance of sport and sporting subcultures within contemporary society, this book is essential reading for students or researcher working in the sociology of sport, leisure studies or cultural studies.

In Win or Else, Larry E. Holmes shows us how Soviet football culture regularly disregarded official ideological and political imperatives and skirted the boundaries between socialism and capitalism. In the early 1920s, the Soviet press denounced football as a bourgeois sport that was injurious to both mind and body. Within that same decade, however, it blew up, becoming the most popular spectator sport in the USSR and growing into a fiercely competitive business with complex regional and national bureaucracies, a strong international presence, and a conviction that victory on the field was also a victory of Soviet supremacy. Writing as both historian and fan, Holmes focuses his study on the provincial Kirov team Dinamo from 1979 to 1985, when the club played at both its worst and its best. Spurred by a dismal 1979 season, the team's administrators and regional authorities had two options: obey Moscow's edict to reduce expenditures on professional sports or seek out new—and often illicit—funding sources to fill out a team of champions. Drawing on rich archival materials as well as newspapers and interviews with former players, Win or Else reveals the foundations of Soviet sports culture—and the hazards that teams faced both in victory and in loss.

What impact does sport have on the lives of ordinary people? How does sport help to perpetuate inequalities in society? What can social theory tell us about the role of sport in society?? At their origin competitive sports were institutionalized in Western cultures for the privilege of white, heterosexual men. Over time sport has become more open to categories of people traditionally marginalized in society: women; those from lower social classes; gay men; people of colour; and those differently abled. However, focusing solely on increased social inclusion in sport masks significant problems with both the culture and structure of sport. This critical textbook examines social exclusion in sport and analyzes the socio-negative attributes associated with competitive, institutionalized sport, for all who play. Focusing on sport at non-elite levels, this book explores the lives of everyday citizens who play and examines how inequality and social deviance are structured into the social and sporting system. Each chapter uses a key social theory to address a particular social problem in sport, such as learned obedience to authority; the acceptance of pain and injury; the adoption of hyper-masculine, homophobic and sexist attitudes; the teaching of in-group/out-group; and the use of sport as a false mechanism for social mobility. By concentrating on real sport, and through the use of startling vignettes illustrating the experiences of real people, this textbook develops the critical senses, social conscience and theoretical understanding of all students of sport and anybody for whom sport is part of their everyday life.

Blending historical grounding and philosophical insights regarding sport and physical activity, History and Philosophy of Sport and Physical Activity covers the historical and philosophical dimensions of the study of human movement. This cross-disciplinary text shows how theory in the humanities can affect professional practice. The author team, R. Scott Kretchmar, Mark Dyreson, Matthew P. Llewellyn, and John Gleaves, offers philosophical and ethical analyses alongside explorations of changes in culture. The text follows a chronology of human movement from our origins as hunter-gatherers to the present. The authors blend their specific areas of expertise to present a thorough integration of philosophy and history, capitalizing on the strengths of both disciplines. History and Philosophy of Sport and Physical Activity examines sport and physical activity as a social force. Each chapter provides a historical scaffolding that leads into philosophical discussions about the issues raised. The content is compelling, effective, and accessible for readers. Student exercise sidebars allow students to explore questions as they go, especially in relating philosophical inquiry to historical events. Historical profile sidebars throughout the chapters allow students to gain greater insight into historical figures and events. Ancillaries include an instructor guide, a presentation package, and a test package to help instructors make the most of the historical, philosophical, anthropological, and sociological issues presented in the book. History and Philosophy of Sport and Physical Activity is designed to reduce any gap that might exist between good ideas and sound professional behavior. Historical lessons and philosophical analyses are seamlessly integrated. Readers will understand the intersection of history, culture, ideals, ethics, and professional practice from sport’s leading philosophers and historians.