I am my sport: Sport and Social

Identity

what is the most important thing to remember about defining sport?

Today’s 1 minute paper: what symbolic meanings have your

family or friends given to sport?

What is social identity?Symbolic interactionism

Sporting Meanings

Rookie mistakes and sporting (sub)cultures

Sporting CareersBecoming entangled/detangled

from sport

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IdentityThe things you have in

common with othersbelonging

The things that differentiate you from others

A sense of personal location

But it is not stableIdentities are plural

and changeableSocial identities: the

meanings attached to social roles, memberships, social categories

Self is formed in interaction with society

Charles Cooley: “looking glass self”

Erving Goffman: social life a theatrical performance - need backstage area to prepare for next performance

Self-presentation contrived for audience even if not physically present

Alan Klein: socialisation of Dominican baseball players in baseball academies for US

“It’s very prestigious playing in the the States. Everybody knows you now. They follow you. But unfortunately, in the Dominican Republic when a player gets released, you wouldn’t believe the shame. You’re worthless. You’re a failure. If you don’t make it, it’s like you broke the dream”

Symbolic Interaction TheoryLife is a process of ongoing

activity - definition or interpretation

To pursue plans, humans construct a meaningful definition of their situation and act on the basis of this definition

“In order to understand the actions of people it is necessary to identify their world of objects” Herbert Blumer

Objects of the world not brute facts but mental constructions

Is a bus an object or a mental construction?

status” (178)

Crossett, T. (1999)“Fans, status and the gift of golf” In J. Coakley & P. Donnelly (eds.) Inside sports, Routledge: London“By asking for an autograph, the fan pays tribute to the athlete. The athlete repays with an autograph, material evidence that the fan was in the presence of the athlete - a gift of status” (178)

Symbols of sport social groups

Symbols part of shared stock of meanings specific to every social group

We are part-time citizens in a variety of “small life worlds” in which we feel “at home”

Sporting groups provide “at homeness”“Outside world” perceived dimly

Significance of others constructed through the use of symbols

Behaviour becomes symbolic when people ascribe meaning to it

Meaning becomes basis of their actions

Actors must interpret other people and their actions

Importance of language – e.g. words for waves in surfer slang

Are there specific words associated with the sport worlds you belong to?

Rookie mistakes

“It was quite obvious that they weren’t climbers because they had a complete rack [of equipment] each and all of the chocks were threaded upside down! I watched them for a while and they just walked up and down, stopped and had a drink, and every now and again they would put the rope down and chalk up [their hands] as if they were going to do a climb. Then they would pick up their gear and move on. Unbelievable!”

Rock climbing and rugby sporting subculturesImpression management - rookies need to learn to control expressions of fearBoastful or precocious novices often given “the treatment” - taken on frightening climbs

I.D.

How does the film suggest that the central figure develops an identity of

a football hooligan?Can we apply the concept of a “looking

glass self” to explain the characters in the film?I.D. Film Trailer

in the wapping home end

Tiger Woods child prodigy on the Mike Douglas show

How do young athletes develop a sporting identity?

Taylor Phinney racing cylist - son of professional racing Davis Phinney and Olympic racing cyclist and speed skater Connie Carpenter-Phinney

How do young athletes stay in sport?

Ten years on are English Schools Amateur Athletics finalists still involved in sport? From “Bridging the Gap” (England Athletics, 2011)

A sporting career

Process of interpretation inherent in all interactions

Stevenson, C. (1999) “"Becoming an international athlete: making decisions about identity.

Careers of international athletes - introductions to sports a process of “sponsored recruitment” by parents, siblings, friends, coaches

Become entangled in role as consequence of personal relationships, commitments and obligations, reputations and identities

Sponsored recruitment

The process of becoming an elite athlete

‘Coerced’ recruitment

• Importance of family/friends…• Value sponsor placed on

sporting identity• Gender

Key features of sponsorship

– Possibilities for success– Role identity recognised by self and

other as desirable

Choosing a sport

EntanglementsRelationshipsCommitments and obligationsReputations and identities

Commitment entails conscious, self-reflexive work to develop desirable identities.

Commitment

Sporting identity as process: becoming an athlete

Did your involvement in sport follow Stephenson’s account of entanglements, commitments and identities? Did you make any rookie mistakes? Did you have your own subcultural values, language, clothing, behaviours?

Could this also account for why some young people are turned off sport?

Are all meanings equal?

Are we asked to prefer some meanings over others?

Who controls meaning-making?Do we make our own meanings, or are

they thrust upon us?Classic sociological debate: social

structure Vs individual agency

Ideologies are sets of beliefs that are taken for granted in society

They appear to be true but actually serve to support the interests of a dominant group, e.g. the privileged classes

Discourses are ways of talking about issues that constrain the limits of what can be thought or said

Ideology

and

Discourse

Louis Althusser (1918-1990)

Ideological State ApparatusesFamily, media,

education … sports?Interpellate or “hail”

individualsLike a policeman

shouting “Hey you!”When you turn in

recognition you become subject to his meanings and definitions

1 minute paper

what symbolic meanings have your family or friends given to sport?

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Considered the relationship between sport and social identity

Used concepts from symbolic interactionism to illuminate

sport

Identified language and rookie mistakes as a way of thinking about meanings in sporting

cultures

Begun to analyse personal sporting biographies in the light of

Stevenson’s ideas about the social construction of the

sporting career