The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of Health and Human Development SPORTS AND MORAL EXCELLENCE: THE INTERSECTIONS OF SPORTS AND AUTHENTICITY A Dissertation in Kinesiology by Jarrod Jonsrud Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philsophy May 2018 The dissertation of Jarrod Jonsrud was reviewed and approved* by the following: R. Scott Kretchmar Professor of Kinesiology Pennsylvania State University Dissertation Advisor Chair of Committee Mark Dyreson Professor of Kinesiology Pennsylvania State University Javier Friaz-Lopez Associate Professor of Kinesiology Pennsylvania State University Peter Allison Associate Professor - Values and Experiential Learning Pennsylvania State University Steven Piazza Professor of Kinesiology Graduate Program Director *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School ii ABSTRACT This dissertation investigates sport’s role in the ongoing struggle to live the good life – it is about gaining a better understanding of the relationship between sports, morality, and human culture. The current ethos surrounding sports is one of individualism, instrumentalism, and market efficiency. This perspective led to a morally troublesome hyper-competitive orientation toward sports. Characterized by a win-at-all-costs, individualistically motivated attitude, our instrumental perspective of sports caused their morally educative potential (if indeed any exists at all) to be inadequately realized. This study constitutes a reassessment of sport’s potential to act as a resource for promoting moral education employing perspectives provided by virtue ethics in general and ‘existential’ authenticity and civic virtue specifically. Following an introductory chapter outlining the sequence of my overall argument, the second chapter will provide a snapshot of moral life for modern Americans, effectively substantiating the need for my research. Relying on the work of prominent social theorists and commentators, chapter two will be a brief analysis of American morality, noting the rise, entrenchment, and consequences of our individualistic commitment to private gain and personal success. Chapter two will conclude with a discussion of the previous efforts in American history to appropriate sports as a technology to help articulate and institute a shared moral philosophy. Although never fully realizing their aim, these previous attempts to utilize sports as a form of social and moral development show the necessity, and provide a precedent, for investigations into the intersections between American moral and sporting lives. However, my efforts to review the historical practice of using sports as a vehicle for teaching core moral values, such as hard-work, determination, and perseverance, represents only the beginning of the discussion. Thus in chapter three I will identify and review three foundational theoretical approaches relating to the ‘sports as a moral laboratory’ metaphor that have been developed within the philosophy of sports literature, namely: (1) Sports as Equality and Justice, (2) Sports as a Domain of Play, and (3) Sports as the Mutual Quest for Excellence. Taken together, these opening three chapters will form the theoretical framework within which I will situate my own approach. iii Chapter four will outline the ethical theory I used to substantiate my claim that sports promote the development of authenticity and civic virtue as I have described them. I will begin by showing the utility of virtue ethics in general, and finish the chapter by examining the cogency of a specifically ‘existential’ virtue ethics, where existential authenticity is considered the primary virtue, and civic virtue the primary mode of expression in practice. Assuming an existential understanding of the human condition – as being intersubjectively constituted – I will explain how existential authenticity can be considered the cardinal virtue in an existential virtue theory, and why the practice of civic virtue, or engagement, should be considered its fullest expression. Chapter five comprises perhaps the most important contribution in this discussion: my analysis of sports and MacIntyrean virtue ethics, and their convergence with existential authenticity and civic virtue. Following an evaluation of how MacIntyrean virtue ethics inform the quest for morally educative experiences in sporting situations, the first half of the chapter will conclude with a sketch of certain characteristics, attributes and dispositions displayed by the MacIntyrean athlete, in direct reference to the characteristic of virtue ethics outlined in chapter four. The second half of chapter five begins with a description of the convergence of sports and the existential principles introduced in chapter four, laying the groundwork for the argument that sports represent a valuable social practice in the promotion and development of an athlete’s moral excellence. In order for sports to promote the choice of authenticity, and demonstration of civic virtue, caution and precision must be exercised in the way these concepts are presented, taught, learned and played. In order to provide interested participants of sporting practices with a sense of how the arguments might be used in practical applications I will complete my analysis in this final chapter with a brief sketch of the characteristics and attributes that a virtuous existential athlete would exhibit in their ongoing development of their existential virtues. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS PROLOGUE ........................................................................................................................................... vi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................. 1 CHAPTER TWO: THE DECLINE OF AMERICAN MORAL IDENTITY AND HOW SPORTS HAVE BEEN USED IN ITS RECOVERY .......................................................... 15 CHAPTER THREE: SPORTS AS A RESOURCE FOR MORAL EDUCATION: SETTING THE STAGE ................................................................................................................................ 66 CHAPTER FOUR: MODERN MORAL PHILOSOPHY: NEO-ARISTOTELIAN AND ‘EXISTENTIAL’ VIRTUE ETHICS ........................................................................................... 115 CHAPTER FIVE: APPLYING THE THEORY: THE CONVERGENCE OF SPORTS, VIRTUES, AND EXISTENTIAL AUTHENTICITY .................................................................................... 159 Bibliography ........................................................................................................................................... 224 PROLOGUE The seeds of this project were planted while conducting research for my undergraduate thesis. My thesis focused on the problems generated by what I considered to be an over- emphasis on the value of winning – and, perhaps more importantly, not losing – within the world of sports, particularly in youth athletics leagues. Rather than the wholesale elimination of competition that some scholars argue is necessary in order to avoid the ills of a win-at-all-costs attitude within sports, I argued for a model of cooperative-competition that emphasized the power and potential of non-zero-sum outcomes in zero-sum, competitive activities. Alongside my intuitions about the meaningful experiences these non-zero-sum outcomes could provide, I found myself drawn to the raw honesty of ‘existentially’-oriented philosophical insights. The notion of creating meaning for and within one’s self and in concert with other similarly situated human beings, rather than looking for meaning wholly from external sources, resonated with my own prior experiences. This seemed to fit with my own intuitions about the human experience. In ‘existentialist’ terms, individuals and their experiences take center stage, though only as a way to eventually reconnect that individual with other members of their community. According to well-known philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre, the most fundamental aspects of the human condition include freedom of choice, the concomitant responsibility to create meaning for oneself, and ultimately the importance of intersubjective relations to others.1 Despite my ardent search for ways to incorporate these ontological principles into a normative ethical model, I continually hit roadblocks. Many philosophers argue there is a radical divide between ethics and existentialism. They argue that the fundamental subjectivism and vi individualism inherent in existential philosophy renders the development of a normative ‘existential’ ethics impossible. However, a more careful (and perhaps more charitable) examination reveals this general skepticism toward an existentialist ethics to be unsubstantiated, or at least partially unwarranted. When arguing against existentialism’s capacity to support a normative ethics, some critics appear to rely mainly on superficial and stereotypical understandings of existentialism, often caricaturizing it as a systematic philosophy irrevocably bound by radical free choice, inherent meaninglessness, and the inevitable slip into nihilism, anxiety, and despair – an anti-ethics, one might argue. In fact, as I dug deeper into various works of ‘existential’ philosophy I became convinced of quite the opposite. A more rigorous and honest investigation of some of the leading ‘existential’ thinkers discloses a quite suitable foundation upon which a normative ethics can be built. It has been my intuition for a number of