Missing Perspectives and Cultural - CiteSeerX

Sport in Society, Sociology and Journals:Missing Perspectives and CulturalIdiosyncrasies in an International SocialInstitution

KURT WEIS

Institute of Social Sciences, Technical University of Munich, Lothstrassc 17, D-8000Muenchen 2, Fed. Rep. of Germany

Abstract

The multi-levelled division of this topic brings out the fact that sport appears in differentguises on these different levels. Sociology presents an important but one-sided perspectiveof sport as a national and international social institution. This is highlighted by recentdevelopments in the Olympics. The author, former editor of the International Review forthe Sociology of Sport, submits that sport in journals is hiding behind words which inform usirrefutably about the style and the cultural background of the authors, and somewhat morerefutably and one-sidedly about sport. Sport actually concerns the culture of body andmind. overlooked by today’s mainstream sociology.

The Topic and What it Means to Us

The organization of this paper arises out of the topic. ( 1 ) Sport is primarilyconcerned with the body. (2) Society is everything in which we live. Manydisciplines seek to comment on this from their respective perspectives. (3)Sociology is and has a particular perspective. The perspectives of other humanand social sciences are different. Biology, economics, medicine, pedagogy,philosophy, political science, psychology, social psychology, theology - they allhave a different image of man and, in our case, of the athlete and how to treat andanalyze him and his behavior. Precisely these perspectives are not emphasized orconsidered from our sociological view. But it is among the tasks of sociology toanalyze the perspectives and distortions of its own and other disciplines, and itdoes this from its own viewpoint. (4) By journals is meant here printed, boundpaper in booklet form whose content is dependent on the editor, editorial policy,the reputation of the journal, and the authors, their styles and their culturalbackgrounds.

Sport means many different things to many different people. Sport can bepursued by normal people. Somewhat differently, sociologists engage in, view,describe and analyze sport (these are four different activities, the results of whichcan become increasingly distorted when seen through the sociological lens).Sociologists emphasize only one particular perspective. From this perspectivethey see more than other people, but also overlook much that is obvious to others.This limitation therefore simultaneously brings gain and loss, advance in

knowledge and clouding of the mind.

at PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIV on May 12, 2016irs.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://irs.sagepub.com/

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In comprehensive sociological textbooks sport is presented differently than inscholarly sociological journals. In the various contributions particular problemsand particular aspects are described, to the extent that the overall picture andrelationships are sometimes lost from view.

International journals are different again. In general they attract contributionsdifferent from those submitted to national journals: (a) Sometimes the quality ofthe papers in international journals is simply lower than that in national journalsof higher reputation; (b) sometimes, if there is no market for a national or

regional journal of high standing, better articles are submitted for publication atthe international level; (c) sometimes, as used to happen in sport sociology, thebest papers are submitted to the national journals of general sociology, and therest to sport sociology journals, national or international; (d) sometimes, in anew, minor discipline, an international group of experts from many countries mayarise which proceeds to behave like a family. The in-group meets frequently atinternational conferences, they have their own journal, they communicate andpublish in English, although their command of their science is much better thantheir command of the English language unless they are of Anglo-Americanorigin. This, of course, has both advantages and severe drawbacks. Then theirjournal may not only remain alone in its field, but may also become the leadinginternational source of information in its particular field, and new authors, notpart of the family, will become increasingly interested in seeing their paperspublished in such a journal.The INTERNATIONAL REVIEW FOR THE SOCIOLOGY OF SPORT

has met with all the aspects from (a) to (d). Prior to and following my editorship,but especially during my years as editor of the IRSS, I experienced cases anddevelopments of all four types described. I am inclined to believe that I was

witnessing a slow but definite overall trend from (a) toward (d).In the analysis of a text, the sequence of the incontestable data that it contains

should not be overlooked:

a) First of all, the text informs us that it exists, that it was, in a particular place,spoken, written, and, in our case, printed. Interesting and informative is the

appearance of precisely this text by this author, with these formulations, on thistopic and with this information.This fact is irrefutable. It can be really interestingand informative that editors and publishers accept and print such material.

b) Then, the text informs us about its producer - how the author thinks, writes,argues. It is equally irrefutable that the text delivers much information about itsauthor. It informs us about the writer, his or her style, the preciseness orvagueness of the concepts and the language employed in the article, and about theauthor’s social environment which led to this style of writing and allows him towrite in scientific journals. If his society had not trained him, supported him andrespected him, he would not have come so far as to have a position which allowshim to submit his contributions in sport sociology to our IRSS.

It is also interesting for me when authors from a geographically, culturally and/or politically different world do not write on topics and questions which I find veryinteresting in my area. Perhaps they don’t find my questions challenging, or theyare not able to obtain information on them, or they don’t want to express theirviews, or they are not allowed to write about them for political reasons. These



21

&dquo;political reasons&dquo; can refer to the political system in the respective countries aswell as to &dquo;academic politics&dquo;. The latter, too, can make it seem clever or perhapsnot clever to write about a particular topic.c) Finally - and this is the actual official view - the printed text informs us on thestated topic. The information provided can be interesting and instructive andadvance scientific knowledge. It can, however, be one-sided, distorted, or simplydumb or wrong. You can’t always judge this in the reading of it. (Of course, thereis also the underground market of apocryphic scientific fun literature which iswritten according to the rituals of scholarship but in which everything includingbibliography, quotations, citations, tables, figures, correlations, is invented.Such papers are hard to write but definitely fun to read. They sometimes give usdeeper insights into the scientific reality of our world and its sciences thanscientific papers that pretend to be closer to reality than to the world of myths.).From this we see: all printed information informs us about something. But anarticle in an International Review for the Sociology of Sport is informative aboutmuch more than sport. (Thus this article, should it be published, not only informsyou of the fact that the new editors are willing to publish such things by the oldeditor, but is especially informative about me and my way, as a sociologist, ofpursuing, seeing, describing, and analyzing sport and - most important here - myway of reading articles in an international review.)

Being able to read does not mean that what is printed should be accepted astruth and followed as an example. This is a significant sentence for sport scientistsnot only from the Third World or any other world, who think they should imitatethe analyses of sport as described in this journal and follow its development, butfor all of us.

Sport in Society: Body and Mind

Sport is physical activity. It is primarily concerned with the body, but actually withbody and mind. For me the sociology of sport and physical culture is part of abroader sociology of culture. Other patterns of physical behavior, includingrituals of greeting, of cleanliness, of eating, of love and tenderness, styles ofclothing, i.e.every kind of physical movement including sport and dance, areinfluenced by culture, time, area, class, gender, age and situation. They havesymbolic meaning and are culturally formed. All this varies from place to place.An international journal of sport sociology should deal with these differentdevelopments, should describe and analyze them. Culture is influenced byreligious and philosophical thought and social developments. Religion is dynamichuman intercourse with the sacred. Use and treatment of our bodies are sociallydeveloped. The body is a social entity and, likewise, bearer of our individualselves.

Different concepts of the human body and the goal of life are the result ofdifferent preferred pictures and images of man in East and West, and of theathlete from the different perspectives of the various above-mentioned humanand social sciences. In Western culture prior to the Enlightenment, as well as inthe wisdom of the Far East, which has recently been having a growing impact onthe West, both body and mind as parts of a whole in the relationship betweenbody and mind were always taken for granted.



22

The beginning of modern times in the West and the ensuing Enlightenmentresulted in a one-sided emphasis upon reason. The new processes of thinking,marked and highlighted by Descartes at the beginning of the 17th century, alongwith his separation of body and soul, later on led to technical developments,increasing instrumentalization of the body, increasing control of bodilyexpression and the continuing process of suppression of the physical. Theadoration of efficiency in many branches of life in general as well as of sport inparticular became the driving force.

Although it is something of an oversimplification, I like to summarize this

process of instrumentalization and suppression of the physical in both Westernculture and sport in six points. Our civilizational development has led to anestrangement from the body, to a loss of the physical, which can be observedeverywhere and which is, depending on one’s image of man, to be regretted or tobe encouraged: (1) the decline which has taken place in the significance ofphysical dexterity and fitness for the individual identity and for the functioning ofsocial systems; (2) a decline in the significance of and capacity for sensualperception; (3) a general development from concrete experience to abstractprocesses and concepts; (4) increasing control over all emotions and physicalprocesses; (5) the technicalization and concealment of birth and death; (6) thereduction or devaluation of the body to a soulless motor apparatus, as in medicineand sport.

’

I cannot outline the first five items here. The last one reminds us that, as inconventional medicine with its skill in making repairs, today’s sport within thesocial institution sport also reduces the body for the purpose of the best possibleperformance to a backgroundless, desubjectivized apparatus.

This is underscored by recent developments and scandals in doping. The moresport becomes professionalized, the more winning, as opposed to the means bywhich it is achieved, is emphasized as the goal of sports aspirations and, finally,the more significant the economic or other consequences of victory are, thegreater is the probability that the human being inside the prize-winning athlete islost from sight and that the high-minded and often-quoted &dquo;rules of sport&dquo; will beviolated in favor of other interests.

This Western ideology with its emphasis upon progress by all means and newrecords has had its impact on the Olympic idea and is now being copied in thesport arenas of non-Western peoples. However, at present, in the West, outsideof the Olympics, a slowly growing countermovement is taking place, rooted innon-European cultures and emphasizing a holistic picture of man as theunification of body and mind. Also, conventional medicine, which only repairedthe body, has become supplemented by psychosomatics and psychotherapy.

East and West are approaching each other. Again with a certain amount ofoversimplification, it could be argued that, while the West is destroying thecultural roots of the East, eastern influence is revitalizing cultural roots in theWest. This can be illustrated by examples from different areas of sport and humanmovement.

In the West, altering one’s state of consciousness became a characteristic of thecounterculture. One or two decades ago, this meant drugs, sex and rock music.Later, the use of drugs to this end declined, promiscuity became a health threat,



23

and rock music was replaced. Meditation and running became accepted ways ofachieving this new experience.The cultural legacy of this new development is the practical knowledge that a

greater richness of conscious experience goes hand in hand with a greaterdiversity of bodily activities. The culture of this new generation is explicitlysomatic. The theoretical separation of mind and body has changed to anexistential recognition of their somatic unity.

This can be seen in new sport trends, where the search for new states ofconsciousness in the newly discovered body-mind unity is successful in manyareas. They range from adventure-seeking in risky sports to marathon running.Impending cultural changes, as is sometimes suggested, may manifest themselvesin altered physical behavior and new sport activities long before they show theirimpact on the social structure. This, I submit, is a very important observation.International journals of sport should direct our attention to such new

developments. But they don’t. Cultural connections are hard to realize and evenharder to measure. The social and cultural dependence of body and mind,although the basis of our lives, and the changing concepts of body and mind insport and culture, are no topics in the mainstream sociology of today. In a leafletto promote this INTERNATIONAL REVIEW I wrote in 1984 that the IRSS&dquo;crosses the borders between the political East and the West, the developedNorth and the developing South.&dquo; But this referred to the promotion of

knowledge on sport as a social institution. The Far East, its different culture andits cultural impact, was neither mentioned nor even thought of.

Sport in Sociology: National and International Social Institutions

In sociological analysis, at least in my view, sport is increasingly treated as a socialinstitution. This, I think, is justified and correct. Since the 1970s this trend hasbeen openly admitted in the textbooks and sport has been termed a socialinstitution. Since Durkheim (1894) sociology has been defined as &dquo;the sciene of

institutions, of their genesis and of their functioning&dquo;. Besides the so-called basicinstitutions in the areas of family, religion, economics and government, furthersocial institutions have developed, including sport. Six essential elements ofsocial institutions are listed below. Sport in our society is easily subsumed underthese elements of definition. - A lack of space prevents a more detailed

commentary.

(1) An institution serves to satisfy important human needs in a society. Amongothers sport satisfies the need for movement, play and competition, pitting one’sabilities against those of others, and recreation and entertainment. The needs ofparticipants and spectators are satisfied.

(2) For this satisfaction certain patterns of behavior are prescribed. Thisregulation is especially clearly seen in organized sport. A time and place for thesports event are set. There are standardized rules of competition and for gradingof accomplishments. In place of elemental drive, or regional or native sports, onlycertain types of sport are permitted in the Olympic Games or at school or bycolonial masters.



24

(3) In social institutions, behavior is organized in social roles. The role playersregard this as &dquo;duty&dquo; or &dquo;office&dquo;. Sport recognizes innumerable types of roles,such as athlete, coach, manager, volunteer and international functionary andpresident etc.

(4) Institutions as regulatory as sport~an fulfill a stabilizing function in societyas a whole and thus play a significant role in social control.

(5) The institutions in a society act together to a certain degree and also providemutual support. When important functions of one institution are transferred toanother, this is a sign of social change and a certain restructuring of the society.The usual topics of sport sociology (the interplay between sport and economics,politics, religion, the mass media, the educational system ...) underline theincreasingly important role of sport in these areas, as well as an increasingly denseweb of interrelations and dependencies.

(6) Institutions satisfy important individual and group needs, but their

particular character is determined by the society as a whole. This last element ismerely an extension of the previous one: sport as an institution is shaped by othersocial institutions as well. In short: Society leaves its stamp on sport.Here we also find ourselves at the core of the contents of this

INTERNATIONAL REVIEW FOR THE SOCIOLOGY OF SPORT. Two ofthe first special topical issues of the IRSS were dedicated to the relations betweensport and the mass media (vol. 21, 1986, No. 2/3), and sport and economics (vol.22,1987, No. 3).The questions of the extent to which sport as a social institution influences the

persons in its sphere and to what extent it reflects society, pervade every issue ofthe IRSS. This applies to marriage chances for top athletes and the status and lifestyle of former Olympians (cf. IRSS 1984, 47, 169; 1987, 295) as well as to maledominance in the power structure of sport organizations in democratic countries,where at least 50% of the population is female (cf. IRSS 1985, 95, 109, 117). Thegender issue is, of course, an eternal problem, in the IRSS as elsewhere.The questions of the extent to which sport as a social institution unites or

divides people, athletes as well as spectators, and how far competitions promotemutual understanding, consciousness of cultural identity and/or class and racestruggle and division are leading topics of sport and will always concern its friendsand theorists. This INTERNATIONAL REVIEW reported on racial problemsin sport in South Africa (1984, 129) and in the USA (1986, 35), acceptanceproblems of foreign athletes and workers in Finland (1984, 273) and WestGermany ( 1985, 75), as well as identity problems among American Indians (1987,99), to name but a few areas and topics. All these inter-cultural issues of the socialinstitution of sport are, to some extent, also applicable to intra-cultural issues.A special editorial in this journal (IRSS 22, 1987/4, 229) actually enumerated

contributions on sociological approaches that did not follow the mainstreamperspective and were not concerned with sport as a social institution. However, Iadmittedly pursued (cf. IRSS 21, 1986/4, 269 and 22, 1987/2, 143) an especiallystrong interest in showing that the Olympic Games and their development are theculmination of our western type of sport and the international consequence of thegrowing significance of sport as an important institution.



25

There was a series of controversial contributions of present developments inthe reality and ideology of modern Olympic Games. Riordan (1986, 287)described official functions of sport in developing nations and enlarged thenumber of case studies showing how sport is being saddled with functions thatwere originally related to other social institutions. Earlier, Eichberg (1984, 97)had criticized Olympic sport as a case of neocolonization. We published majorcontributions on the Olympics by Seppdnen (The Olympics: A SociologicalPerspective, 1984, 113), Seifart (The Commercialization of Olympic Sport by theMedia ( 1984, 305), Riordan (Some Comparisons of Women’s Sport in East andWest, 1985, 117), Alaszkiewicz and McPhail (Olympic Television Rights, 1986,211).The Olympic Games are, as an event, the highpoint of sport, which has

become, through its own dynamic, an institution on an international level as well- with all its athletes and functionaries, the national Olympic Committees and theIOC, foreign policy implications and dependency on the goodwill of high-levelpolitics, with its extremes from boycotts to glamorous shows with popular appeal,entanglement with and the dependency on the sport industry, the ballyhoo ofpublic relations management and finally, the now indispensible financial supportfrom and the inescapable dependency on media organizations, especially thegiants of the television industry.The Olympic Games have become a nomadic institution existing throughout

the world and manifesting itself in a given land at a particular time. This is thepowerful and impressive concretization of sport as an institution. At the sametime, the Olympic Games exert a manifold influence on sport as a socialinstitution in each particular national and cultural context.

&dquo;International social institution&dquo;, the last words of the heading of this paper, ofcourse, were meant to refer to the first word sport. However, I’m fully aware thata different interpretation is logically possible: If after 25 years of this journalreaders consider the IRSS an international sociological institution and read theheading of this paper accordingly, I will not dissuade them. The concept of socialinstitutions in sociology is vague and enjoys many definitions, narrow and broad.

Sport in Journals: Words bearing (inadvertent) Information

Sport in journals is, first of all, text in journals. All written and printedinformation has been selected. It is biased. The selection is informative in itself.

Authors, through their choice of topics and questions and their approaches - inother words, through the inclusion and omission of questions, through the givingand withholding of information - show what interests them personally. At thesame time, they inform us - sometimes certainly unawaredly - by way of theinformation given or withheld, about the scientific level, the cultural background,the political and intellectual climate in their countries, and what is currently beingthought about, and what is not permitted to be thought or written about. All thesethings are quite different in different parts of the world. They are clearly reflectedin an international review on the sociology of sport - and often have very little todo with sport.



26

One editorial (1987, 230) poked fun at the fact that there is a certain obviouslypolitically unproblematic tradition in eastern countries of engaging in and

reporting on studies of students’ attitudes and physical activities, and it listed

reports of this kind from the Soviet Union, China, the GDR und Hungary. This ismerely an observation. Perhaps, hopefully, it is only of historical value - for weare experiencing at present that some culturally important European countries inthe East Bloc, with the Soviet Union in the lcad, are suddenly having a sense ofliberation under the banners of Glasnost and Perestroika and are writing aboutproblems which have worried them for some time, but which they can only nowair publicly. In other East European countries, as I see it from my perspective, thepolitical establishment feels threatened by this development, and their academicsilence on obvious problems shows that they must have still worse ones.

Texts in an international social institution - whether it be sport or this journal -inform us about the cultural background of their authors, about intcllcctual stylesand cultural and national idiosyncrasies. To realize this helps to understand whatis said or written on the international level. It helps us to see what is really meantby what we see in print, and just that which it is not meant to reveal. We begin tounderstand why products of a foreign academic pen or typewriter sometimesseem strange or, at best, comical. The cultural and national academic

idiosyncrasies of intellectual styles have become somewhat obscured in the lingeeafi~ancn of our scientific exchange, English. But they are still there and rise up togreet us, almost unadulterated, if the contribution was originally written in theauthor’s mother tongue and then translated into English by a fellow countrymanor -woman.

In our INTERNATIONAL REVIEW we had papers by authors from manyparts of the world. I do not want to comment on individual authors and particularstyles. Instead, to make them better understood, I would like to introduce ourreaders to Johan Galtung’s paper on &dquo;Structure, culture and intellectual style: Anessay comparing saxonic, teutonic, gallic and nipponic approaches&dquo; (SocialScience Information 20, 1981/6, pp. 817-856). Galtung is an international politicaland social scientist, a peace researcher who has worked and lectured in all theareas mentioned above. I agree with his analysis, would like to look over hisshoulder and to draw heavily from his paper whenever quotations and citationsremind me of people whom I know and of papers that have crossed my dcsk andappeared in this journal.

Galtung’s three occidental and one oriental sub-civilizations, Saxonic,Teutonic and Nipponic, are not to be identified with their respective countriesmentioned (p. 819). This again may have been more obvious in the past than it isat present or will be in the future. Galtung was interested in drawing a &dquo;world mapof intellectual styles&dquo; (p. 819). On this map, he submits that &dquo;the gallic influencestretches far beyond la COml1llilwuté française: It covers the whole Latin range ofcountries&dquo; (p. 820).

He goes on to write that &dquo;Eastern Europe, including the Soviet Union, can beregarded as under the sway of teutonic intellectual style, partly because of generalcultural influence through centuries, partly because of the influence of a keyteutonic thinker: Karl Marx&dquo; (p. 820). I omit his comments on Hindu, Buddhist,Daoist approaches, postpone his remarks on the Nordic countries and mention



27

only in passing his idea that programs of decolonization did not include liberationfrom intellectual style (p. 820). Thus, he tries to cover the whole globe.According to Galtung, all intellectuals are &dquo;rather good at commenting on

other intellectuals&dquo; (p. 823). He is fascinated by the fact that &dquo;all intellectuals arefascinated by other intellectuals and in fact devote much of their time to doingresearch on what others do&dquo; (p. 821 ). In short, it is texts about texts, words aboutwords. Many of these intellectuals receive from these texts their majorimpressions and then, like all of us, &dquo;process impressions into expressions&dquo; (pp.823, 818). In one of his attempts to find out what conditions this process, hesummarizes (p. 838) &dquo;in the shortest possible form the typical question put in thefour intellectual styles when somebody is faced with a proposition:- saxonic style: how do you operationalize it? (US version)

how do you ducumcnt it? (UK version)- teutonic style: wic k-6nicn Sie das zurückführcn - ablciten?

(how can you trace this back - deduce it from basic

principles?)- gallic style: peut-on dire cela en bon franqais’l

(is it possible to say this in good French?)- nipponic stylc: donatano monka desuka’?

(who is your mastcr’?)&dquo; &dquo;

For another explanatory scheme he had tried to use the

&dquo;three variables characterizing social structures: verticality/horizontality, collectivism/individualism and polarization/integration. Thus. a scientific community that is vertical,individualist and polarized should produce an intcllcctual style like the tcutonic one; if it ismore horizontal but individualist and polarized it should come out more like the gallicintellectual style; if it is horizontal, individualist but much less polarized something like thesaxonic culture would be expected, emphasizing the aspects of intellectual activity thatwould facilitate regulated participatory discussion among equals. And finally if the structureis vertical, collectivist and nonpolarizcd like the Japanese one should expect the nipponicstyle to emerge: due respect for authority, but no undue emphasis on thc contentious issucsbrought into the discourse through theories with sharp edges. If. however, the intellectual

community is vertical, collectivist and polarized then something more similar to the teutonicstyle could emerge: each school producing its deductive pyramid,...&dquo; (p. 843)

Of the Japanese, Galtung wrote they &dquo;are not very skilful at debating, they arenot really trained in that direction&dquo; (p. 825). For them, the &dquo;debate is a social actrather than an intellectual one. The classification into schools preempts thedebate and makes for less disruption of social relations&dquo; (p. 8?6). Their first rulebeing &dquo;not to harm pre-established social relations&dquo; (p. 825), &dquo;they prefervagueness even about trivial matters..., because clear statements have a ring ofimmodesty, of being judgements of reality&dquo; (p. 833). This, in other words, is thepart of the world where harmony and face-saving belong to thc cstablishcd arts.

Very different in this aspect is, of course, the Teutonic (German, Central andEast European) style: &dquo;In the teutonic case one aims for rigour, if necessary at theexpense of elegance&dquo; (p. 832). Galtung loves the comparison with our French andLatin neighbors: &dquo;In the gallic case the goal is elegance, perhaps at the expense ofrigour in the teutonic case...Neither is right nor wrong: they are simply twodifferent approaches to the intellectual enterprise&dquo; (p. 832). He thinks the Gallicapproach lives more on élégallce, but is not necessarily deductive. &dquo;Behind the



28

élégance is not only the mastery of good style as opposed to the dryness of Germansocial-science prose, often bordering on drabness, but also the use of bons mots,double entendres, alliterations and various types of semantic and even

typographical tricks&dquo; (p. 830).The Teutons are described as masters in deductive theory-formation and in

building corresponding pyramids of theories (p. 829). But they may enjoy theiracademic life &dquo;relatively detached from too strong confrontations from empiricalreality. Paradigm analysis and theorizing are as omnipresent in the teutonic andgallic exercises, as they are mostly absent from saxonic (particular US) andnipponic intellectual activity&dquo; (p. 837). The &dquo;teutonic or gallic intellectual mightnot even realize that he is somewhat short on documentation to back up what he is

saying....The function of data would be to illustrate rather than to demonstrate&dquo;(p. 828). Galtung distinguishes between empirical and potential reality, the latterbeing understood as &dquo;a more real reality, reality free from the noise andimpurities of empirical reality&dquo; (p. 828).While the disciples of the Saxonic intellectual style may not be &dquo;very strong on

theory formation, and not that strong on paradigm awareness&dquo; (p. 828), they are,like the Nipponics, fact-oriented and masters of empirics. Their work is rich indocumentation (p. 839, 849). &dquo;The British penchant for documentation is

proverbial, as is the US love of statistics&dquo; (p. 827). From this often quotedcommonplace Galtung goes one interesting step further and suggests: &dquo;Data

unite, theories divide&dquo; (p. 827). For &dquo;one can be for or against a theory; one maylike or dislike a fact, but one cannot be for or against it in the same way&dquo; (p. 827).This, of course, truly has to do with style, with the manner in which we treat ourfellow intellectual beings, tolerate and comment on their work.

Elsewhere, Galtung makes this very clear: &dquo;The teutonic style is tolerable whenit is encased in a pluralistic setting; take away that setting and it becomesintolerable.&dquo; (p. 844) - (I love this quote because it reminds me of friends whom Iknow and papers that have crossed my desk.) .

Galtung, Norwegian in origin, proudly realizes that the Nordic countries, ofwhich he particularly mentions Norway, Sweden and Finland, &dquo;have been underboth saxonic and teutonic influence, and this may have led to both a respect forsaxonic data gathering and documentation and for teutonic speculation andtheory formation, and has produced attempts to put the two together into a viablemethodology&dquo; (p. 846). Although Galtung continues, &dquo;no one could possiblyaccuse Nordic social scientists of levels of elegance approximating the mostbrilliant of the French! On the contrary&dquo; (p. 846), it is good for readers of thisinternational review to know that so many Scandinavians are engaged in thesociology of sport and write for us. They also, I would like to add, cultivate someof the better, above-mentioned Nipponic arts.

Talking about styles, I have to return to Galtung’s desription of my own socialsurroundings. He writes: &dquo;it is my contention that the teutonic intellectual simplybelieves what he says, something his gallic counterpart would never really do&dquo; (p.840). This reminds me of jokes I have heard in Eastern Europe on East Germanpublications in sport sociology: &dquo;They even believe what they write.&dquo; - Butshould we not all believe what we write?

Possibly later developments have overtaken Galtung’s experiences andclassifications. Umberto Eco, Italian author of the worldwide best-selling book,



29

&dquo;The Name of the Rose&dquo;, recently told the German news magazine Der Spiegel(No. 40/1988, p. 253), &dquo;I see a great revolution in the world: the French speak as ifthey were Germans, the Germans speak as if they were Anglo-Saxons and theAnglo-Saxons speak as if they were French.&dquo; If we accept Galtung’s analysis, thisdevelopment must be good for all concerned.Now, at a time of global exchange of students and teachers and worldwide

English publications, when many of us were trained in foreign cultures, in

English-speaking countries and Saxonic schools, these cultural distinctions maydisappear. But underneath the surface the different styles will live on. As Galtungconcluded: &dquo;the teutons will continue to be irritated when the gauls become toolyrical... and the gauls will continue to be bored by teutonic pedantry...and thesaxons will continue to get restless when the teutons and the gauls speed off intoouter space, leaving a thin trail of data behind...by and large what is the virtue ofone will continue to be the vice of the other&dquo; (p. 849).

This cultural variety will live on. I share Galtung’s hope that we are not&dquo;heading for a world intellectual style&dquo; (p. 848) and I trust that this InternationalReview will continue to provide us with the cultural idiosyncrasies andintellectual variety our world has to offer.

Future Prospects

What the sociology of sport in an international review needs is naturally not acultural analysis of intellectual writing styles. What is needed to betterunderstand both sport and our writings about sport is an analysis of the image ofthe athlete in different cultures (cultures of both sport and writing). This willdepend in each case on the predominant image of man (&dquo;Menschenbild&dquo;). Ideasand images give wings to and motivate our thinking. They influence our actionsand are real in their consequences. Different scientific disciplines and culturesfollow different paradigms and perspectives and differ accordingly in their imageof man. To understand these respective images we have to look at the intellectualclimate and cultural background and trace the roots back to the traditions ofreligious and philosophical thinking and social developments. Perhaps one daywe will have a paper (or a special topical issue) in this International Review on&dquo;Different Images of Man in Sport and Their Present-Day Consequences&dquo;. I

hope to see that day and that paper (if only to enjoy its style, background,perspectives and imagery).



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References

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Le Sport Dans la Societe, la Sociologie et les Revues: Perspectives l4lanyuantes etIdiosyncrasies Dans une Institution Sociale International

Réslllllé

La division sur des niveaux multiples de ce sujet fait ressortir le fait que le sport se manifcstesous des apparences differentes a ces diff6rents niveaux. La sociologie pr6sente uneperspective importante mais partiale du sport en tant qu’ institution sociale nationale etinternationale. L’ auteur, ancien éditeur de la Revue Internationale pour la Sociologic duSport, avance la these que le sport tel qu’ il est presente dans lcs revues se dissimulc derrièredes mots qui nous informent de maniere irrefutable au sujet du style et de 1’ acquis culturcldes auteurs, et de manicre queique pcu plus rcfutahle et partiale. au sujet du sport. Enr6alit6, le sport concerne la culture du corps et de 1’ eaprit, ndglig6c par IC courant principalde la sociologic d’ aujourd’ hui.

Sport in der Gesellschaft, der Soziologie und in Zeitschriften: Vergessene Perspektiven undkulturelle Eigentumlichkeiten in einer internationalen sozialen Institution

Zilsiiilillleiij*tissilligDie mehrstufige Einteilung des Themas verdeutlicht, dafi Sport auf den genannten Ebenenin ganz unterschiedticher Vcrklcidung auftritt. Die Soziologic liefert cine wichtige. zithereinseitige Perspektive vom Sport als einer nationalcn und internationaten sozialen Institu-tion. Letzeres wird durch dic Entwicktung und BeBB’ertung dcr Otympischen Spiele verdeut-licht. Der Autor, fruhercr Herausgeber der International Review for thc Sociology ofSport, mcint. Sport in Journalen verberge sich hinter Worten. die unwider)egbar nur iiberStil und kulturcllen Hintergrund der Autoren, schon eher widerlegbar und einseitig auchuber Sport informieren. Sport wird cigentlich durch die Kultur von K6rper und Seele be-wegt, nicht aber clie heutige Soziologie.

El deporte en la sociedad, la sociologia y los peri6dicos: perspectivas ocultas eidiosincracias culturales en una instituci6n social internacional

R(,sttiiieii

La division en muttipies niveles de este tcma mucstra que el deporte sc manifesta de modoscliversos en cada uno de ellos. La Sociologia analiza una parte importante, aunqueunilateral, del deporte en tanto que institucion social nacional e internacional. El autor,anterior director de la International Review for the Sociology of Sport, sugiere quc la ideade deporte transmitida por la prensa nos informa de modo irrefutable sobre el estilo v elbagaje culturol de los autores y sobre algo, mas refutablc y uniclireccional rclativo zit

deporte. En renlidaci, el deportc concierne la cultura del cuerpo y de la ments. dominadasactualmente por las principalcs tendencias de la sociologia.



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