Study Guide for Exam 1 5 key characteristics of sports McPherson Structured Rules and codes of conduct spatial and temporal constraints highly bureaucratized Commonly defined objectives allowing clear identification of winners and losers Goal Oriented Competitive Essentially contest based either between competitors or clock Necessarily indeterminate activities involving excitement generated from uncertainty of outcomes Ludic Physical Involving elements of freedom of expression and playful creativity Involving the use of the body in an instrumental and vigorous fashion Sports 3 universal attributes Utilitarian relates to a material social purpose or utility Expressive expresses understandings of self and collective identity Pleasurable source of visceral and or sensual enjoyment Contested Terrain Gramsci s notion of culture as a CONTESTED TERRAIN Dominant cultural practices and meanings constantly struggle for their position of ascendancy against residual and or emergent practices and meanings Sport Culture as a Contested Terrain Dominant sport practices Residual sport practices and emergent sporting practices Ex is extreme ironing a sport What does context mean Context is everything and everything is context when it comes to understanding the social significance of sport Wright Mills Developing a sporting sociological imagination demands that we think about the relationship between sport culture and the societal context out of which it emerged and which it simultaneously helps to constitute Definition of politics what is refers to Politics Marco influence governing of state system and olitics Micro influence governing small scale interaction helps recognize where and how power operates in society Politics refers to the structures processes and practices of governance the mechanisms whereby people s lives are controlled shaped and regulated by external forces forces external to the individual Political power refers to the ability to shape control regulate people s lives Know what Hegemony is This is a classic example of Antonio Gramsci s notion of HEGEMONY which speaks to the subtly coercive operations workings of political power HEGEMONY refers to the situation in which a DOMINANT GROUP that holding political power is able to WIN the SUPPORT of the MASSES for its position of POWER AUTHORITY Hegemony is a process of MANIPULATING PUBLIC OPINION in order that the people ACTIVELY CONSENT agree to a POLITICAL ORDER SYSTEM OF RULE Going from social welfare system government help to neo liberal private system What has that done in terms of funding Post War Social Welfare Consensus 1962 Increase involvement in state in addressing social problems 1980 federal state funding for sports and physical activity Emergent Neo liberal order 1980 Retrenchment of State involvement in social life focus on individual private and corporate freedoms 2011 A Neoliberal Democracy is a political order one in which primacy is given to corporate business interests based on the philosophy that a free market encourages economic growth and development through all levels of society It is a CORPORATE BUSINESS ORIENTED POLITICAL ORDER This has lead to the DEMISE of the role of the STATE in SERVING the public and its replacement by the FORCES and INSTITUTIONS of the COMMERCIAL MARKETPLACE Within the neo liberal context public provision State or Federal for physical activity health or wellness has all but disappeared Thus the PUBLIC HEALTH of AMERICA has become a PRIVATISED COMMERCIAL CONCERN Sports are now private and corporate funding athletes no direct state funding Know external and internal aims of the Chinese government in staging the Beijing Olympics The Chinese state in the guise of the Communist Party closely control all aspects of society but have allowed a degree of economic reform leading to increased levels of private ownership Two China s 1 Authoritarian Politics 2 Consumerist Culture The Olympic games were a propaganda exercise confirming china s status as the 21st century superpower 1 Spectacular and monumental staging of the games 2 The athlete s success Externally To the watching world Internally To the Chinese masses The core tenants of neoliberal democracy The Core Tenets of Neoliberal Democracy 1 Don t waste public money on social welfare social engineering programs 2 Provide more money to individuals through lessening the tax burden 3 Develop corporate business friendly anti union climate to stimulate economic growth through trickle down economics 4 Encourage the commercial privatization of all aspects of society 5 Let the free market become the regulator of economic and social development Definition of corporate sport rollerball slides Rollerball society is governed by a group of global corporate monopolies The polity and economy are indivisible All aspects of society controlled by the Majors The Majors Transport Food Communication Housing Luxury Energy Global Corporate Autocracy 1 Cathartic release and narcotic conformity 2 Advancement of group ethic and suppression of individualism 3 Legitimates the authority of the majors the political order You know how the game serves us it has a definite social purpose Nation s are bankrupt gone none of that tribal warfare any more Even the corporate wars are a thing of the past So now we have the Majors and their executives transport food communication housing luxury energy A few of us making decisions on a global basis for the common good Now everyone has all the comforts you know that no poverty no sickness no needs and many luxuries which you enjoy just as if you were in the executive class Corporate society takes care of everything All it asks of anyone all it has ever asked of anyone ever is not to interfere with management decisions How was Michael Phelps used as a particular type of spectacle Individual Spectacle mass mediated personas celebrity The Commercially Manufactured INTERTEXTUALITY of Michael Phelps as Sport Celebrity television coverage print media coverage Biographical texts tools of the trade endorsements non tool endorsements promotional appearances Meanings emerge precisely from the representational practices of the media and not simply from the inherent characteristics of the star represented 3 inter related forces that bring celebrity age used Michael Jordan 1 POLITICAL The dominance of a neo liberal political system and ideology focused on INDIVIDUALISM 2 ECONOMY The influence of a consumer economy and culture through which one