What is SOCIOLOGICAL
IMAGINATION?
Sociological imagination refers to the ability to “go beyond personal issues and to make connections to social structures, history and broader power relations” (p. 21)
Institutionalization
Institutionalization— “a process whereby one particular set of patterns and rules of conduct has gradually emerged to define and regulate our contemporary sense of what sport is and how it should be legitimately played”
(Gruneau cited in Adams, 2019, p. 57)
Three factors that contributed to the
modernization of Canadian sport
- Improvements in transportation
- Improvements in communication
- Technological advances in sport equipment and facilities
- Together, these advances lead to the “organizational sophistication in sport, sporting practices and the availability of sport to wider society”
- IMPROVEMENTS IN
TRANSPORTATION
- Travel in Canada in the first half of the 19th century was incredibly time intensive
- As industrialization progressed transportation modes improved to meet commercial needs (i.e., increased use of steam engines in boats and rail), and travel times plummeted.
- Transportation improvements aided the formation of regional leagues, which required standardized rules, governing bodies, and highly sophisticated organizational structures
- IMPROVEMENTS IN
COMMUNICATION
- Advances in communications meant that the ‘hometown’ team or hero could be followed in regional, national and even international competition
- Telegraph (1850 invented; trans-Atlantic
1866) - Communications intensified with radio,
television and internet - 1902 Toronto Wellington challenged
the Winnipeg Victorias for the Stanley Cup - Communication improvements opened up new markets and played a pivotal role in the development of the ‘modern’ fan
- ADVANCES IN SPORTING
EQUIPMENT AND FACILITIES
Equipment Technologies:
* Quality—safer and more accessible
* Reduced cost—more affordable
* Standardized—aided organization of
leagues and inter-regional, national, international competitions
Facilities:
* Indoor facilities with gas lighting meant
could play sport at night, which made it
more accessible for working class
* Stadium seating aided evolution of
spectator sport
DOES MODERNIZATION =
DEMOCRATIZATION OF SPORT?
- Urban, English-speaking, male elite were the primary drivers in the push to organize sport.
- Best facilities, coaching and competitions, tended to be located in the urban, English- Canadian businessmen’s clubs, universities, and YMCA’s.
- Montreal was the “commercial hub” of Canada
What is an Amateur?
An amateur is one who has never competed in any open competition or for public money, or with professionals for a prize, public money or admission money, nor has ever, at any point of his life taught or assisted in the pursuit of Athletic exercises as a means of livelihood or as a labourer or an Indian”
MONTREAL AMATEUR ATHLETIC
ASSOCIATION (MAAA
- MAAA (1881) was the principal governing sporting organization in Canada in the late 19th century
- Although the stated mission of the MAAA was humble, it’s impact on Canadian sport was anything but…
- “…the promotion of physical and mental culture among, and the providing of rational amusements and recreation for, its members” (cited in Morrow, 2015, p. 54)
- MAAA was an organization by which the gender, racial and social class values of a relatively small group of white, business-class men shaped sport for the entire country.
