Sport, Identity Politics, and Globalization: Diminishing Contrasts and Increasing Varieties

Abstract

Attention is given to a series of conceptual issues associated with understanding global sport development. Several weaknesses are identified. The figurational approach to the study of sportization and globalization is then outlined. Associations between sport, habitus, identity politics, “willful nostalgia,” and globalization are examined, and a case study of nostalgia and male sporting and political disaster discourse in the British media over the past 2 years is used to highlight some of the issues involved in global sport development.