From Classical Antiquity to Online Sports Forums
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Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 11-13-2020 11:45 AM Religion in Modern Sports Fanaticism: From Classical Antiquity to Online Sports Forums Matthew Prokopiw, The University of Western Ontario Supervisor: Dr. Michael Gardiner, The University of Western Ontario A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Theory and Criticism © Matthew Prokopiw 2020 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Critical and Cultural Studies Commons, Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons, Sociology of Religion Commons, and the Sports Studies Commons Recommended Citation Prokopiw, Matthew, "Religion in Modern Sports Fanaticism: From Classical Antiquity to Online Sports Forums" (2020). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 7427. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/7427 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ii Abstract In tracing the concept of religion to its theorization and study by French sociologist Émile Durkheim this dissertation presents concrete and abstract support for a commonly forwarded proposition: fanaticism of the modern spectacle of sports amounts to religiosity, characterized by a social logic of vitality and totemism, notably present as well in the ancient Roman spectacle and Greek agōn. Based in the contemporary theory of French sociologist Michel Maffesoli, following Durkheim and the study of the sacred by Le Collège de Sociologie, this dissertation contributes an immersive and critical investigation into the nascent but encompassing online dimension of fanaticism of the spectacle of sports, including the phenomenon of the ‘Game Thread’ in online sports forums, ultimately relating a prodigious affectual and discursive scope of influence to forms of religiosity concomitant with myth and ritual. Keywords: sports, religion, fanaticism, religiosity, sports fans, sacred, online, sociology, sacred sociology, Michel Maffesoli, Émile Durkheim iii Acknowledgments An enormous amount of gratitude is owed to my supervisor Dr. Michael Gardiner for his professional inspiration, guidance and support, without which this project simply would not have been possible. Many thanks as well to Dr. Charles Stocking for his classical expertise in the athletics of antiquity. I am also very grateful to the Center for the Study of Theory and Criticism for enabling this dissertation to receive the necessary support, including its intellectually diverse and driven faculty, and the diligent and personable office staff. iv Table of Contents Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………..ii Acknowledgments……………………………………………………………………………….iii Table of Contents………………………………………………………………...........................iv Introduction..…………………………………………………......................................................1 Chapter One – Religion in Sports Fanaticism…………………………..…………………..........6 Fanum and Fanaticism: Greek Agon, Roman Spectacle, Olympism and Modern Sports..…11 Agonistic Theories of the Sacred, Fanaticism and Religion..…………………………...…..28 Community and Vitality in the Modern Spectacle of Sports ……………………………….57 Chapter Two – Storytellers and Sentiments in the Modern Spectacle of Sports...………….......68 The Online Fanum of Sports Fanaticism: Collective Aesthetics in a 'Game Thread'…….....71 Priests and Prophets of the Spectacle of Sports: Authoring Religion in the Media................88 Everyday and Tactical Sports Discourses in Modern Sports Mythology….……………….102 Resentment, Power and Vitality in the Spectacular Agon……..…………………………...118 Hope in the Religion of the Modern Spectacle of Sports……..……………………………126 Chapter Three – Power and Mythology in the Modern Spectacle of Sports…………………...140 Economics and Politics in the Modern Spectacle of Sports………………………………..148 Vitality in the Spectacle of Sports: the Wasp, the Orchid and the Social Commons………183 Conclusion: On the Immersive Investigation of Sports Fanaticism…,………………………...193 Appendix A……………………………………………………………………………………..200 Works Cited…………………………………………………………………………………….217 Curriculum Vitae……………………………………………………………………………….230 1 Introduction In tracing the sociology of the sacred from Émile Durkheim through Michel Maffesoli, this dissertation presents a concept of religiosity that underlies spectacular athletic contests, including the ancient Roman and Greek period and ultimately contemporary sports fans, whose concrete and phenomenal presence has garnered a vibrant scholarly field of study, such that this dissertation also contributes a vitally immersive and novel investigation into the nascent and pervasive digital dimension of sports fanaticism. As Durkheim’s investigations into the common and fundamental elements of religion uncovered a distinctive presence of a collective force of vitality whose conceptual prescription (mythos) and ritualization became understood as sacred, a sociological tradition subsequently developed therefrom that further elaborated on the rudimentary forms of the sacred found by Durkheim, as in Le Collège de Sociologie, composed in part by Georges Bataille, Roger Caillois and Michel Leiris, who were decidedly mystical in their sociological treatises and drawn to the forms by which the sacred was collectively and individually empowering in practice, forming a bridge to a conception of the sacred in the work of Michel Maffesoli that recognizes and theorizes a broader spectrum of religiosity that is spellbound by and legitimizing of social phenomena such as sports fanaticism, which are often sociologically reduced (under a hyper- rational lens) in order to successfully categorize, leaving out significant elements of its established position within the social fabric, such as the aesthetics of its appeal, its everyday qualities, its dialectical ambiguities and the forms which engender reciprocal sacred (social) bonds. In effect, this dissertation presents support (concrete and abstract) for a commonly forwarded axiom: sports (fanaticism) is a religion. While this notion is haphazardly proposed 2 from within the sports community, it has been duly addressed by theorists and sociologists accounting for a general phenomenon of ‘fandom’, often invoking Durkheim’s discovery of the role of (collective) effervescence as characteristic of religiosity, though ultimately dismissive of the theoretical and material validities of the analogy, as Paul Booth suggests in the Companion to Media Fandom and Fan Studies, in which he writes that “to engage in this narrative diminishes the fan and trivializes the object of fandom” (154).1 At issue here, however, is not fandom as a whole (such that fandom becomes a mode of religion, as Matthew Hills labours to contest), but rather sports fanaticism in particular as a mode of religiosity – a practical collective conception of a supernatural force, encompassed by the logic of the tribe and totemism.2 The first chapter addresses a working definition of religiosity based on the sociological tradition stemming from Émile Durkheim and historical intersections with fanaticism and spectacular athletic contests, in which the concept of the sacred emerges as a distinguishing mark of the religious category – the recognition and collective symbolization of an immanent force of vitality that territorializes the extraordinary and the everyday. The materialization of collective effervescence ritualized through the concept of the sacred reflects a form of power characteristic of vitalism, producing what is commonly understood as an incorrigible social bond and logic of fanaticism or religion, duly found in the communion of fanatics formed within the stadiums of spectacular athletic contests. The visceral and cerebral enthusiasms, the sense of belonging to a collective, and the territorialization of the supernatural emanating from the spectacle of sports come to exemplify the fundamental role of the sacred in religiosity, as outlined by Durkheim and 1 For example, see: Fandom, edited by J. Gray, C. Sandvoss and C. Harrington; A Companion to Media Fandom and Fan Studies, edited by Paul Booth; Understanding Fandom, by Mark Duffett. 2 See: Hills, Matt. 2000. “Media Fandom, Neoreligiosity, and Cult(ural) Studies.” The Velvet Light Trap, 46: 73–84; Hills, Matt. 2013. “Sacralising Fandom? From the ‘Loss Hypothesis’ to Fans’ Media Rituals.” Kinephanos, 4, no. 1: 8–16. 3 further elaborated by the French sociological tradition which followed, culminating in the concept of neo-tribalism by Michel Maffesoli, which takes account of the broad spectrum of communion and community, whereby “in contrast to the stability induced by classical tribalism, neo-tribalism is characterized by fluidity, occasional gatherings and dispersal” (The Time of the Tribes 76).3 Ultimately, as spectacular athletic contests and fanaticism emerge congruently from the history of religion, this marks a departure point in terms of an academic evaluation of sports fans and the spectacle of sports, in which elements such as the athletics stadium and team name/logo are shown to perform critical and historically significant functions in sustaining sacred social bonds, as in their formal aspects, which are highly conducive to fulfilling the sacred’s basis in vitalism – in part a matter of conflict, power or life and death. Having established a firm link between