Reflections on Process Sociology and Sport

'Walking the Line'

Joseph Maguire

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415598033
• eBook ISBN: 9781135725112
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

The book focuses on the distinctive contribution that Joseph Maguire has made to process sociology and the study of sport. Maguire's work over the past three decades highlights how process sociology has a unique perspective on the relationship between sport, culture and society, and to the body, globalisation and civilisational analysis.

Reflecting on this body of work and the use of process sociology, Maguire captures the research dynamic of 'walking the line' between involvement and detachment, theory and observation, and engagement and critique. The book is structured around four broad sections: Theory, Sport and Society; The Meaning of Sport, Body and Society; Case Studies in Sport and Process Sociology; Globalisation, Sport and Civilisational Analysis.

Providing an introduction to, and key examples of, a process sociology approach to the study of sport, the body, civilising processes and globalisation, this book will appeal to undergraduates, postgraduates and researchers in sport studies / sports science degrees, sociology, cultural studies and to those studying migration, globalisation and cross cultural civilisation relations.

This book was previously published as a Special Issue of Sport in Society.

Introduction

This collection of work, spanning more than two decades, allows me the opportunity to reflect – both on my own experiences and on the development of the sociology of sport. I begin with a more sombre and some might feel bleak tone, and conclude by restating the importance of the subject area, which has sustained my interest in – and determination to safeguard the status of – the sociocultural study of sport. In fact, my interest goes much further back than the two decades covered by this collection. It was in 1975 that I first read books on the sociocultural study of sport. Two books stood out and captured my imagination. Locating them in the library, Paul Hoch’s Rip off the Big Game: The Exploitation of Sports By the Power Elite and Eric Dunning’s edited work Sociology of Sport made me stand stock still. I simply could not put them down: the polemical style of Hoch’s work engaged me and Dunning’s collection of papers provided me with my first taste of the sub-discipline.¹

I use the phrase ‘walking the line’ to capture aspects of this experience and development. The term captures both the marginality of the subject area and the somewhat precarious experience this has engendered. Issues of relevance to, involvement in and detachment from sociology and from sport are part of what I have in mind. In my case, these issues, and the dynamics associated with the marginality of the sub-discipline, have been compounded by an adherence to a sociological perspective, process sociology, which has also had to contend with a marginal status. While process sociology has helped me make sense of how people cope with the problems of interdependence and offered insights into the possibility of making social processes less wasteful of lives and resources, established groups have not shared this view. Thus, and despite what I see as the richness of this perspective, the dynamics of marginality and outsider status – in sociology and in sport – have been exacerbated by the use of this approach.

That said, this experience is part of a general problem facing the sociological study of sport. Pierre Bourdieu was familiar with this situation. In 1983, in his Programme for the Sociology of Sport he wrote:

A number of obstacles to a scientific sociology of sport stem from the fact that the sociologists of sport are, so to speak, doubly dominated, both in the universe of sociologists and in the universe of sport… one could perhaps find here the basis of the particular difficulties encountered by the sociology of sport: it is disdained by sociologists, and despised by sportspeople.²

These observations still ring true today, in Bourdieu’s France, and more globally. For example, it is rare to see in an introductory textbook to sociology more than a passing reference to sport, and in the sports world it is knowledge concerning either improving performance or justifying the hosting of mega-events that counts. In critically reflecting on my own experiences and considering the future prospects of sociology of sport it is important therefore to consider how the present has emerged out of the past.

The sociocultural study of sport in the UK can arguably be traced back to 1801 and the work of Joseph Strutt (though he focused on the English, rather then the British more widely). Strutt’s work, Sports and Pastimes of the English People, was neglected for many decades.³ Indeed, and notwithstanding the critique of athleticism and professional sport in the work of the proto-sociologist Herbert Spencer and the references to sport in the works of Max Weber and Emile Durkheim, this is the story of the sociocultural study of sport more generally.⁴ Despite the early work by Norbert Elias and Eric Dunning in the UK, this position had not changed significantly by the mid-1960s. Writing in 1964, a young Anthony Giddens, later to be a world-renowned sociologist, observed: ‘The study of leisure in modern society is one of the neglected fields of sociology…. Values which have stressed the central importance of work in life, have, of course, gone hand in hand with a comparative lack of interest in the analysis of leisure in general’.⁵ Although the past 40 years have seen the global spread of a cultural studies perspective out from its UK origins, this neglect remains. Giddens never returned to the subject of sport, although he remains an ardent Tottenham Hotspur fan. Thus, sociologists have failed to emancipate themselves from the dominant value system: sport is taken passionately (personally), but not seriously (professionally).

My concerns for the future of sociology of sport in the UK have intensified of late. Governments of different colours have kept sociologists at arm’s length – academic knowledge is geared to the sport community, the identification of talent and the production of medals as part of what I have described as the sports–industrial complex. The sport science community is increasingly bioscientific in orientation or geared to business through sport management/policy modules. Despite the wealth of sociological work that has been produced over the past four decades since Giddens wrote the observations noted above, the sociological mainstream continues to either neglect the study of sport or, when exponents of specific mainstream fields or specialisms ‘discover’ sport, they appear blissfully ignorant of the sociological work so far conducted. The wheel is thus reinvented and folk jump on the latest bandwagon such as sport and social capital. Yet, and despite the pessimistic note I have struck, I want to remake the case for the sociological study of sport and show why sport matters.

Why sport matters

Sport is a separate world and a suspension of everyday life, yet is also highly symbolic of the society in which it exists. In the context of sport, we can both experience a form of exciting significance that we rarely, if ever, encounter in our daily lives, and also conduct a symbolic dialogue with fellow participants and spectators that reveals things about ourselves and others. We are laid bare in sport in ways which we cover up in everyday life. Sport is a modern morality play that reveals fundamental truths about us as individuals, our societies and our relations with others. Sport, then, moves us emotionally and matters to us socially.⁶

One of the principal features of sport is the arousal of pleasurable forms of excitement.⁷ In increasingly rule-governed and risk-averse societies people have a need to experience various kinds of spontaneous, elementary, unreflective yet pleasurable excitement. In sport, whether as participant or spectator, people quest for this controlled decontrolling of emotions. Sports, then, are mimetic activities that provide ‘make-believe’ separate settings that allow emotions to flow more freely and in a manner that elicits or imitates the excitement generated in real-life situations. This excitement is elicited by the creation of tensions that can involve imaginary or controlled ‘real’ danger, mimetic fear and/or pleasure, sadness and/or joy. This controlled decontrolling of excitement allows for different moods to be evoked in this make-believe setting that are the siblings of those aroused in real-life situations.

Only when sports are associated with matters of deep cultural and personal significance do they become important to fans.⁸ Major sporting events are thus mythic spectacles where fans are provided the opportunity for collective participation and identification, serving as a means of celebrating and reinforcing shared cultural meanings. It is precisely because sports are a ‘separate’ world that suspends the everyday world that shared cultural meanings can be expressed through and embodied by sportsmen and women. The symbolism of sport is even deeper than nationalism and patriotism. That is, if social life can be conceived of as a game through which identities are established, tested and developed, then sports can be viewed as idealized forms of social life.

Sport is thus a symbolic dialogue: it symbolizes the strict requirements of how a dialogue should be conducted and involves a dramatic representation of who we are and who we would like to be. The stadium is a theatre in which we experience a range of pleasurable emotional forms of significance: the excitement of the played-game, uncertain as to its outcome but its significance lying in what we have invested in it emotionally, morally, socially. Our heroes express both the myths and revered social values of a society, and the sports ethic that Jay Coakley identifies as underpinning involvement in sport. They have to take risks, to exhibit the hallmarks of bravery and courage and show integrity. That is why people remember and value sport heroes and why perhaps they are adverse to having their heroes debunked. As Bourdieu noted, the sport community would not wish for others to probe the processes underpinning their construction as part of the sports– industrial complex. Perhaps that is also one of the reasons why the sociological study of sport remains at the margins of sociology in the UK and why its future in sports, exercise and health science departments is somewhat bleak.

Some thoughts on ‘walking the line’

The organization of this collection into four sections could convey that a ‘master plan’ underpinned the work conducted over the past two decades. This is not the case! The research unfolded in ways that I neither planned nor foresaw. and had many unintended outcomes. While I have focused on work conducted by myself in the selection of the 16 articles for the collection, I have had the opportunity to work with and share ideas with many colleagues and former students over the years. I benefitted enormously from this experience and though many names are not cited here, their influence has been felt in the selection of this body of work.⁹ And, as the choice of articles selected reflect my judgement, the errors in the original work and current versions are mine too.

The collection is divided into four parts. Section One, Theory, Sport and Society brings together four articles that make the case for a theoretically informed and empirically grounded sociocultural study of sport. Some of the key features of a sociology of sport are outlined in the first article. The arguments made in articles two and three advocate an engagement both with sociological theory and historical enquiry. With the final article of this section I return to one of my earliest publications, on football hooliganism. I do so to illustrate the common ground between history and sociology. These articles also reflect the influence of Eric Dunning on my sociological imagination: not only did Eric demand – still does – that I think hard about such issues; he also sought to sensitize my thinking to more processual ways. In addition, by his practice he exemplifies the idea both that sport is worthy of sociological study and that academic practice is a vocation. Similarly, through her work, and her actions, Jennifer Hargreaves exemplifies the idea that sociologists should try to make a difference. While drawing on a different theoretical frame, and, at times, not always in full agreement, I have been inspired by her to also help try to make a difference.

Section Two, The Meaning of Sport, Body and Society contains articles that explore the meaning of sport. Taken together, the articles focus on sport and embodied emotions and how the quest for exciting significance is contoured and shaped both by the experiential aspects of sport and by what I term the sports–industrial complex.¹⁰ Here, then, questions of agency and structure come to the fore. Looking back, one of the most significant writers who influenced my thinking in this regard was Richard Gruneau, and his classic work Class, Sport and Social Development. His chapter on the limits and possibilities of modern sport should be compulsory reading for all students.

Section Three, Sport and Process Sociology highlights a series of case studies that I conducted in the 1990s. Each article explores questions of migration, national identity, identity politics and globalization. Reflecting on this body of work made me realize that such work was not only an attempt to explore sport worlds, but also my world. ‘Walking the line’ has also entailed making sense of my Irish identity, of the tensions and problems associated with being one of the diaspora while living in the UK and in the context of a rapidly changing world. Only some of the work on national identity and migration conducted over the past two decades is included here. I benefitted from working with colleagues such as Emma Poulton, Jason Tuck, David Stead and Mark Falcous, mostly exploring the British. I regret not having done a more sustained analysis of Irish identity and sport and, especially prior to my mother’s recent death, to have included her reminiscences regarding playing Camogie in her youth. That work hopefully lies in the future.

The case studies in Section Three therefore explore identity and the reconfiguring but not disappearance of the nation and nationalism in the context of globalization. Whatever its merits, reflecting on this work highlights, for me, that I should have better heeded the advice and followed the exemplary anthropological practice of Alan Klein, who has also explored this terrain. His work has both informed my thinking and inspired me to ‘stick at it’ and to keep going back to empirical terra firma. I hope, one day, that I can come close to matching the richness of his anthropological forays into sport, identity and culture.

Section Four, Globalization, Sport and Civilizational Analysis draws together strands of my work that reflect how the wider concerns of process sociology informed my thinking over the past two decades. Here, crucial concepts include civilizing/decivilizing processes; established and outsider relations; diminishing contrasts and increasing varieties; and embodied emotions/habitus at the level of the individual...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Citation Information
• Series page
• Dedication and Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• Theory, sport and society
• The meaning of sport, body and society
• Case studies in sport and process sociology
• Globalisation, sport and civilisational analysis
• Index