University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Doctoral Dissertations Graduate School 5-2008 Imagining the Fields: A Sociology of Sport Management and Sociology of Sport Adam Love University of Tennessee - Knoxville Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss Part of the Education Commons Recommended Citation Love, Adam, "Imagining the Fields: A Sociology of Sport Management and Sociology of Sport. " PhD diss., University of Tennessee, 2008. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_graddiss/468 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Adam Love entitled "Imagining the Fields: A Sociology of Sport Management and Sociology of Sport." I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, with a major in Education. Joy T. DeSensi, Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: Damon P. S. Andrew, Lars Dzikus, Ronald E. Taylor Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a dissertation written by Adam Love entitled “Imagining the Fields: A Sociology of Sport Management and Sociology of Sport.” I have examined the final electronic copy of this dissertation for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy with a major in Education. Joy T. DeSensi Major Professor We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: Damon P. S. Andrew Lars Dzikus Ronald E. Taylor Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official student records.) Imagining the Fields: A Sociology of Sport Management and Sociology of Sport A Dissertation Presented for the Doctor of Philosophy Degree University of Tennessee, Knoxville Adam Love May 2008 Copyright © 2008 by Adam Love All rights reserved ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There is a long list of individuals who deserve my gratitude for the help and support they have provided during my time in graduate school. While each of them deserve more than the words written in this section, I will do my best to convey my appreciation to some of those who have most directly contributed to my dissertation. I want to begin by saying thank you to my family. While I cannot take the space to thank each of my family members individually, I want them all to know that their love and caring have had an important impact on my life. Most importantly, I want to thank my wife, Lauren, who is an unbelievable inspiration. In addition to the support and love she shares with me each day, she has had an important role in discussing and providing feedback on many of the ideas I have written about in this dissertation. I also owe a great amount of thanks to my committee chairperson and advisor, Dr. Joy DeSensi. She has put a tremendous amount of energy and time into guiding me throughout my graduate studies. Dr. DeSensi is as good of a mentor as any student could hope for, and I will always be grateful for her leadership. The other members of my committee, Dr. Damon Andrew, Dr. Lars Dzikus, and Dr. Ron Taylor, have also served invaluable roles in helping to create this dissertation. While I am grateful to each of them for many reasons, I want to particularly thank Dr. Andrew for sharing his extensive knowledge of the field of sport management, Dr. Dzikus for his innovative thinking about sociological and historical concepts, and Dr. Taylor for helping me expand my ideas by considering this topic in a broader context. All three have been important mentors during my graduate career. iii ABSTRACT The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the relationship between sport management and sociology of sport, with a specific focus on connections between the fields. To accomplish this purpose, I completed three distinct “projects”: (a) a historical project aimed at exploring key influences on the development of the fields, (b) a social network project aimed at exploring the structure of the coauthorship network in the fields, and (c) an interpretive project aimed at considering the qualities that define research in sport management and sociology of sport. Ultimately, it seems that scholars have a significant amount of flexibility in terms of how they present their research to the field of sport management, to the field of sociology of sport, and/or to both fields. However, a relatively small number of scholars appear to consistently produce research in both fields and seek connections between the two fields. I suggest that there are a number of issues facing each field, such as a lack of diversity in sport management research and concerns with relevance and applicability in sociology of sport, as well as common interests between the fields, such as advancing the study of sport as a valuable area of academic inquiry, that might be addressed by considering and building upon the connections that exist between sport management and sociology of sport. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE Chapter I.............................................................................................................................. 1 Introduction......................................................................................................................... 1 Introduction to the Problem and Rationale for the Study ............................................... 7 Calls for Paradigmatic Plurality and Interdisciplinary Perspectives in Sport Management................................................................................................................ 7 Issues of Relevance and Applicability in the Sociology of Sport............................. 10 Research Questions and Purpose of the Study.............................................................. 15 Significance of the Study.............................................................................................. 16 Scope of the Study ........................................................................................................ 18 Organization of the Study ............................................................................................. 18 Chapter II .......................................................................................................................... 20 Review of Literature ......................................................................................................... 20 The Sociology of Science ............................................................................................. 21 Structural-Functionalist (Mertonian) Sociology of Science ..................................... 23 Kuhn’s “Normal Science” and “Scientific Revolutions”.......................................... 26 The “Strong Program” and Laboratory Studies........................................................ 28 Pierre Bourdieu: Habitus, Capital, and Field............................................................ 31 Michel Foucault and Archaeology............................................................................ 34 History, Philosophy, and Sociology.............................................................................. 37 Social Network Analysis and the Sociology of Science............................................... 39 The Sociology of Sociology of Sport?.......................................................................... 42 v The Sociology of Sport Management? ......................................................................... 50 Chapter III......................................................................................................................... 56 Methodology..................................................................................................................... 56 A Historical Project....................................................................................................... 57 Foucault’s Savoir and Connaissance ........................................................................ 58 General Critical Considerations in the Research Process............................................. 59 A Social Network Project ............................................................................................. 60 Background on Social Network Analysis................................................................. 64 Notes on Data Collection.......................................................................................... 66 Bourdieu, Capital, and Social Network Analysis ..................................................... 70 An Interpretive Project.................................................................................................. 71 Chapter IV......................................................................................................................... 73 Results..............................................................................................................................