Norbert Elías's contributions to a sociology of sport and physical culture: notes for a reflection on its validity

Abstract

A review of the main definitions of the concept of sport involves, to begin with, reviewing the texts of Huizinga ([1972] 2007), Mandell (1988), García Ferrando (1990), Elías and Dunning (1992), Brohm (1993) and Bourdieu (1993), among others. Which is equivalent to placing a wide range of postures covered: differences between conceptions historical and ahistorical; visions ranging from sport understood as formal institutionalized codification
of old popular games, even those who conceive it as the restitution of violent impulses, passing through those that consider it as a field and the that define it from a Marxist perspective. It is about, we add, of a polysemic concept that involves realities and diverse practices. That is to say: according to the point of When you look at it, sport can be synonymous competition, aesthetic phenomenon, training ethics, pedagogy of life, arbitrary waste, and so on. TO in turn, as is known, there are amateurs and professionals, individual and collective, massive and minority.