Sociology of Sport (SOC 94-07)

Course: Sociology of Sports/Sociology 94-07

Department of Sociology, Tufts University       

Class Meeting Time: Mon & Wed, 9am-10:15

Spring 2015

Course Description: Sports is more than a game. It is a cultural, economic, physical, and social phenomenon that reflects and affects society.  Whether a casual player, a professional, a fan, or even antagonistic towards sports, the institution of touches most people’s lives. This course examines sports as a significant part of a society, and attends to topics of culture, groups, gender, race, economics, body, fandom, media, and more. 

I will use this blog as a space to share writing and reading on the intersectionality of race, class, gender, power, and politics manifested in the institution of sports.  Over the semester, I will invite you to read, respond, and write in this online forum as well.  In the meantime, feel free to contact me with any questions, comments.  I look forward to our first class on Wednesday, January 14. 

Dr. Alex M. Gurn    

gurn@bc.edu

 

Scort

Scort is a NGO that organises socially orientated sport activities for youth by co-operating with football clubs and social organisations, offering them a platform for exchange and communication. They use soccer as a tool for development and peace-building projects with children.

Their Project Sudan just started, with coaches of the FC Basel (Willi Schmid), Bayer 04 Leverkusen (Peter Quast and Jürgen Haagmans) and Liverpool FC (Bill Bygroves) who travelled to Khartoum to educate young women and men as football coaches and to lead football trainings with up to 100 teenagers every day.

Football Confidential

I just cracked a copy of Football Confidential (2000), an investigative documentary book from the BBC... "a journey through the underbelly of our (the UK's) national game covering the period when it transmuted from a mere spectator sport into an entertainment industry" (p6).

This is gonna be good. Here's a bit from chapter 10:
Soccer Slaves
The young players dumped on the streets by ruthless agents

Living in an abandoned bus, cold and hungry, wasn't exactly Timi had in mind when he was promised a glittering career in European football.

An engaging and articulate young man, he showed talent from the time he first kicked a ball as a seven-year-old on the streets of Lagos, the Nigerian capital. 'When I was young I always ed I'd play in Europe, especially in Germany or England," he says. "My father loved football. He encouraged me to play and, when I had the opportunity to go to Europe to further my career, he gave me the finance to go there.'

Timi (his full name is Adewusi Olurotimi) was 17 when a footballing friend put him in touch with an agent. 'The agent made me a lot of promises before I left Nigeria; and because I was a teenager I had to sign lots of papers for my parents saying that he was going to take care of me and find me a club. He said that if I came to Europe I would live better than in Nigeria, play football, be happy, gain a lot of money and play in a big club. I believed him.'

What happened next was just one example of a football scandal that is now being investigated at the highest levels of the United Nations. It is a story that stretches from the slums of Rio to the shanty towns of Soweto; a seedy, frightening saga of human trafficking and exploitation that borders on slavery. How could it happen at the dawn of the twenty-first century is testimony to the greed and opportunism of much of the modern game.

The Power of the Game

I just came across a reference to a recent Michael Apted documentary, The Power of the Game, where he follows six stories that track the futbol phenomenon, leading up to the 2006 World Cup. One chapter deals with the "slave trade" of young African players, another addresses the entrenched racism around football in Europe, another is about the repression facing Iranian women in football... Gotta put this on my imminent film list.

Apted's done a bunch of Hollywood feature films as well, but he's probably best known for his 7 Up documentary series, an episodic film that explored the contours of social class and began in 1963 while Apted was working as a researcher for Granada Television. He helped recruit a group of 14 seven-year-old British school children to discuss their lives and dreams. Every 7 years, Apted follows up with the original group, or those that agree to continue on. The most recent production, "49 Up," was released in 2005.

Kenyans Debate JMJ Football Academy

This short story from kenyafootball.com is about about Jean Pierre, a Belgian who was (still is?) running a football academy at the Kenya Science Teachers College grounds, named JMJ Academy. The comments about the story are probably more interesting to me...some contentious words.

Bikey of Reading FC talks about slave trade

One of the few players in European pro leagues that I've even heard talking publicly about the football slave trade, Andrey Bikey of Reading FC, originally Cameroon, is quoted in the Modern Ghana News, March 5, 2008:

“I never went to a football academy; I started playing at school and near my home. I played for a third-division team and it was only when I was selected for the Cameroon under-17 team that I started to take football seriously. During a tournament in Italy the Espanyol manager invited me to a trial; now I've played in Spain, Portugal, Moscow and England.

“Many European teams go to Africa to watch boys with a view to bringing them to their clubs. It used to be only a few players, but now, every year in Cameroon, many children are brought to Europe for trials. A lot of young players in Paris have nothing; they have come from Africa and if their trial doesn't go well they are left on the streets. Some agent will pick up the kid and take them to Europe, and if it doesn't work out they abandon them.

Young players in Africa do need more help and more attention.”

Not the most critical sentiment against the practice, but the only I've located from a star player.

Is the football slave trade "sticky"?

In continuing to think about whether the football slave trade controversy has a real public consciousness among football fans, I decided to start digging around on my current-favorite social networking site: Facebook! This morning, I joined a handful of facebook groups having to do with soccer in some way (e.g. some FIFA groups, team fansites for ManU, Arsenal, and Barca, and a smattering of others). Here's more or less what I've posted on the discussion boards:

Hi everyone, I have been doing research into what's been called the 'football slave trade' and I'm hoping people can help inform me. (see these links for some news stories on the issue... http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/02/09/1202234232502.html... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tv_and_radio/world_football/1695869.stm).

So here's my questions: do many football fans know about this controversy? How aware are you of it? Where did you hear or read about it? If you are aware of it, do you think it matters? Do you care? Do you feel anything could or should be done about it?

If you are willing to respond honestly--in any way you'd like--I'd be grateful.

Not sure if I'll get responses or what sort, but this might just help me understand whether or not this controversy is "sticky"?

Patricia Hill Collins on social theory

One of my readings the last several days is Collins' (1998) Fighting Words. Each page has been filled with points of connection for me, particularly questions around the relationship between knowledge and power. Throughout the book, Collins places a lens over her positionality [and that of African-American women and subordinated groups more generally] within a "complex of organized practices, including government, law, business and financial mangement, professional organizations, and educational institutions, as well as the discourses in texts that interpret the multiple sites of power" (Smith, 1987, 3, cited in Collins).

I'm intrigued by the ways that she shows how "theory cuts both ways," working "to reproduce existing power relations or to foster social and economic justice," and how it can even serve both ends. In Collins view, "doing social theory involves analyzing the changing aspects of social organization of social organization that affect people's everyday lives. Social theory is a body of knowledge and a set of institutional practices that actively grapple with the central questions facing a group of people in a specific political, social, and historical context. Instead of circulating exclusively as a body of decontextualized ideas among privileged intellectuals, social theory emerges from, is legitimated by, and reflects the concerns of actual groups of people in particular institutional settings. This definition creates a space for all types of groups to participate in theorizing about social issues. Moreover, it suggests that differences in perspective about social issues will reflect differences in the power of those who theorize" (xii).

To read some more, download Fighting Word's intro chapter.

problems with blogger

fyi, i have been having difficulties posting comments on the blog. A couple people have left comments and the site is not letting me respond to those for some reason.

A few thoughts in response to Kara, you remind me to keep prevailing Discourses in mind as I go through these enquiries. I am struck by how ideologies of meritocracy, extreme individualism, and a-historical thinking intersect and produce interesting effects... how, as you note, star players know just what they should say when the camera is rolling -- anyone can do what I do -- when 'we' know this not to be true... how society often attributes athletes' success to sheer talent, hard work ethic, determination, etc, but fails to pinpoint the systems of support, privilege, and power that also makes people what they are.

What makes a controversy stick?

Leigh got me thinking about this question yesterday...

So from the news that I've collected around the football slave trade (some of which I've posted to the blog), this story had some legs back in the early 2000's. Since then, the problem has evolved, becoming more entrenched and legitimatized. News stories continue to surface now and again, and more academics have investigated (but who reads academics anyway?), but is the 'slave trade' a controversy with broad public consciousness among football fans? Are people aware? Do they care? Do people simply feel impotent to do anything?

What does make a controversy stick -- or slip quietly into the background? What makes a social issue publicly salient, and gives it weight in the media-sphere?

Is Mikel's story a slave trade saga?

Interesting to me how this Irish Independent article framed Mikel John Obi within the contentious contract negotiations that took place between himself, Manchester United, & Chelsea FC back in 2005. Mikel, a major prospect from Nigeria, who supposedly made a deal to play with with Man U, later reneged and signed with Chelsea (Mikel's agent had close ties to Chelsea FC... wink wink, nudge nudge).

Sue Mott writes: "This is like the slave trade in reverse. Still imperialists invading Africa, and trafficking in human life, only the rewards are different. Slaves were ridiculously poor, footballers are ridiculously rich. But there is one similarity: loss of freedom."

Mott's distinction only holds up if you look at footballers who 'make it' at the top peofessional level. "Ridiculously rich" does not represent all footballers, not even a simple majority. Most do not make it, and do not have the social capital to negotiate ridiculously profitable contracts. But let's not get bogged down with attention to the little guy. We're talking about the stars here.

Inquiry into 'slave trade' in African footballers

Nov 7, 2000 ©independent.co.uk

"New evidence of the football world's exploitation of African players has emerged in Belgium - of young men lured with promises of lucrative contracts then dumped or mistreated. New evidence of the football world's exploitation of African players has emerged in Belgium - of young men lured with promises of..."

By Stephen Castle in Brussels, Alex Duval Smith in Johannesburg and Lloyd Rundle

exploring the trade

In response to critics of the so-called football slave trade -- and to European football clubs' history of accessing (and exploiting) cheap African talent -- one could say, Look, Europe is the world’s epicenter of pro football. It's where the most competitive play occurs, where the most profitable leagues flourish, where players receive the most lucrative contracts. It should come as no surprise to anyone that young athletes around the world dream of growing up and playing for Barça, Arsenal, Manchester United, Marseille... or that many of them would go to extreme means for the opportunity to make it. This point I concede freely. But what is deeply troubling is the route by which most African boys must travel in hopes of making it in the European leagues.

Pro teams go scouring for potential talent that can be signed on the super-cheap. Pro agents prowl the streets of Accra and Abijan, hoping to “poach” the next star player. Community football coaches and managers, and even parents, hoping to get rich off children. As Dan McDougall (2008) has put it:

European, Arab and increasingly West African middlemen are effectively buying the best young players from their families in tightly binding contracts, often backed up by threats of violence against families with the hope of making a small fortune selling the boys onto the West or extorting their families for the cost of passage.

As young as 10 years old, these young boys are sold into lop-sided contractual obligations, shipped off to Europe, and set on course in football training programs. Tens of thousands of players have passed through this gauntlet. For the majority of these young men, their chances do not materialize into professional contracts and are shown the door, frequently left on the streets of European cities, as undocumented, “illegal” immigrants. In the worst-case scenarios, these kids have entered into child prostitution to survive (Donnelly & Petherick, 2004). In 2001, FIFA responded with new regulations, preventing clubs from signing players under 18 years, and creating policies whereby clubs outside of Europe that manage the football training and formation of players under 18 receive compensation from any European club that signs one of its player (FIFA, cited in Darby, 2007). Yet at the same time that regulations were being constructed, this transnational, peculiar institution was already in motion, constructing a new system to circumvent the regulations, and thus, continue the flow of cheap labor from Africa to Europe. The establishment of African football academies has boomed since that time, legal and illegal "schools" that even can capitalize on FIFA regulations.

So, in what ways do 'football academies' provide the legal cover for the maintenance of this modern-day slave trade? How does race, ethnicity, and class operate within this complex? Who benefits? Who suffers? What social theories (do/can) emerge from this complex "from or on behalf of historically oppressed groups (to) invest ways to escape from, survive in, and/or oppose prevailing social and economic injuststice?" (Hills Collins, 1998, xiii) This last question in particular will be critical to my inquiries...
more as it comes.

Sport Industrial Complex

The notion of the sport-industrial complex was born out of a warning issued in President Eisenhower’s Farewell Address. In this well-known speech, Eisenhower introduced the idea of the military-industrial complex to the public... a term many people recognize but few have deeply considered. He cautioning against "the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex," which had been established during World War II and swelled throughout the Cold War, with the potential to stretch indefinitely. "This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience," Eisenhower explained. "The total influence—economic, political, even spiritual—is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government."

Where are we now, almost 50 years since Eisenhower's warning? How has it changed and grown over time? What aspects have been hidden from public oversight by Congress or active citizens? How does it impact us and how are we implicated (complicit) in its structure?

And what, if anything, does this really have to do with what I want to study?

Tainted Dreams

Sydney Morning Herald, February 10, 2008

They dream of glory, but too often Africa's football hopefuls end up on the streets of Europe. Dan McDougall's investigative report.