Geography and Sport. The Origins of Modern Sport

According to polls of school children, a geography major from Wilmington, North Carolina, is one of the two or three most recognizable celebrities in the world (Figure 6-9). He is Michael Jordan, recently retired star of the National Basketball Association's Chicago Bulls, and the products he endorses generate millions of dollars in revenues for their manufacturers.

Sports occupy a central place in contemporary cultures. Major international competitions like the Olympic Games and the World Cup soccer championship draw enormous audiences from countries throughout the world. Super Bowl XXVII boasted over 100 million viewers. Twenty-eight minutes of commercial air time had been sold out more than two weeks before this spectacle, at a list price of $1.7 million a minute. Modern popular sports also influence many other aspects of society.

The Origins of Modern Sport. Recreation played an important role even in ancient cultures. Indeed, most modern sports are based on folk pastimes that originated centuries ago. The medieval Scottishfolk pastime of hitting rocks into holes with sticksevolved into the modern sport of golf. Games in whichanimal bladders were kicked into goals have been documented in England and western Europe since the eleventhcentury. During the Middle Ages, villages would competeto see which one could kick a ball into the other. Thispractice eventually evolved into the modern games ofsoccer and football.

From Folk Game to Modern Spectator Sport. The transition between leisure activities associated withfolk culture, or folk games, and leisure activities associated with popular culture, or popular sports, is typical of the transition between folk culture and popular culture. Folk games are organized informally. Rules are simple and unwritten. On the other hand, modern sports are highly organized. Games are played according to written rules, and each game is a means to an end rather than an end in itself.

Each player or team competes over a full season in an attempt to win a local, regional, national, or international championship. National and international associations review rules on a periodic basis, set standards for equipment and field dimensions, and provide the basis for written history of the sport by which past, present, and future performances of teams and individual performers can be compared.

Several steps are involved in the transition from folk game to modern spectator sport. These include formalizing rules and standards of play, professionalizing competition, and developing interregional and international contests.

The formalization of sport occurs as standard, written rules and regulations are developed and diffused. In many cases, the preparation and enforcement of written rules is the first step in the transition of a folk game to a popular sport. Once written and codified, these rules form not only the basis of determining the winner of an individual competition, but also the winner of a championship, tournament, or other series of games or matches. Competition in most of today's popular sports focuses on regularly scheduled national or international championships. The Olympic Games, soccer's World Cup, the World Series of baseball, and the Super Bowl in professional football are examples.

Once rules and procedures are formalized, amateur games give way to professional competition. Strong players are paid for their services to make the sport their fulltime occupation. Professionalism extends from player to spectator as well. By the late nineteenth century, the practice of charging admission to sporting events was well established in the United States and in Europe. Today, of course, tickets to major sporting events are often "scalped" at prices far in excess of their face value.

As professional sports become more and more popular, they tend to diffuse over wide areas. Soccer, basketball, tennis, and track are now popular around the world. As sports diffuse to more and more countries, players and fans focus increasingly on international competition.

In order to set standards for international competition, international associations have been established for most popular sports. By 1892 international organizations for horse racing, yachting, gymnastics, rugby, rowing, ice skating, and cycling had been established. Some of these are among the largest international organizations in the world. Only the United Nations has more members than the International Olympic Committee; the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), which controls international soccer competition; and the Federation Internationale d'Echecs which governs international chess competition.

National prestige is enhanced by success in international athletic competition. In soccer. FIFA sponsors the World Cup every four years. Teams representing the countries of the world compete for the World Cup, although many World Cup soccer players are under contract to foreign teams when not participating directly in World Cup activities. In other cases, such as the Olympic Games, national affiliation plays an indirect but nevertheless important role in athletic competition. A tally of the medals won by each country is a measure of national prestige.