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Overview
Sport is the most universal feature of popular culture. It crosses language barriers and slices through national boundaries, attracting both spectators and participants, to a common lingua franca of passions, obsessions and desires.
This book brings to light the connections between sport and culture. It argues that although sport is obviously a source of pleasure, it is also part of the government of everyday life. The creation of a sporting calendar, movements of rational recreation and the development of physical education in the public sector, are read as ways of disciplining and shaping urban-industrial populations.
In addition, sport is examined as a principal front of globalization. The sports process draws together dispersed communities and generates economic wealth. The book demonstrates how commodification, bureaucratization and ideology are fundamental to the organization of sporting cultures.
Although the book utilizes methods and traditions from sociology, political science and communication studies, it is the first text to argue that culture is the focal point for understanding sport. Authoritative and accessible, it will be required reading for students of sport studies, sociology and cultural studies.