Totalitarian sport: towards an understanding of its logic, practice and legacy
Literature on totalitarianism has systematically ignored the development of sport as an essential aspect of the ideology and practices of totalitarian regimes. This void is addressed by considering the conceptual grounding, politics, cultural form and legacy of totalitarian sport. Three different co...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2004
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| In: |
Totalitarian movements and political religions
Year: 2004, Volume: 5, Issue: 1, Pages: 25-58 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Literature on totalitarianism has systematically ignored the development of sport as an essential aspect of the ideology and practices of totalitarian regimes. This void is addressed by considering the conceptual grounding, politics, cultural form and legacy of totalitarian sport. Three different conceptions of totalitarianism are employed to analyse various aspects of sport. The historical‐generic version examines the role of sport as a promise and solution to the problems faced by totalitarian states. The political science‐structural version reveals that a key variable in fascist and communist sport policy was the metaphor of the human body and its transformation in to a public organ - the body as a politicum. The socio‐religious version exposes the capacity of totalitarian sport to mobilise mass support from the population in order to deliver its promises. Finally, the totalitarian project is discussed as manifesting itself in sport as a cognitive process responsible for creating a system of knowledge which persists in any post‐totalitarian reality. |
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| ISSN: | 1743-9647 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Totalitarian movements and political religions
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/1469076042000223392 |