Trend sport

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Trend sport is a term for new sports that can be distinguished from traditional sports and are not classified as popular sports . There is no exact definition of this term, it is difficult to distinguish it from fun sports and extreme sports . In contrast to a “fashion sport”, a trend sport has already established itself, but has not yet become an “established” sport.

Limitation of the term

Originally one spoke of youth sports from the 1970s , when a young generation began to turn away from the established sports.

The sports scientist Jürgen Schwier uses the term trend sport “to identify those change tendencies in sport that (explicitly or implicitly) go hand in hand with renewal and innovation in the culture of movement. [...] Trends in the field of sport are also characterized by the fact that they exceed our accustomed ideas about sport and move previously unknown or neglected interpretations of human movement into our horizon. ”According to his understanding, trend sport can be divided into the three areas of fitness activities and fun sport and risk sports.

In general one can say:

  • "Established" sports are those for which an infrastructure has developed, both in the organizational sense (such as sports associations, championships, regulations in competition) and in the economic sense (such as facilities for exercising, distribution channels for specific sports products, tourism and leisure Marketing, media presence as an advertising medium)
  • Fun sports are called those for which there is (yet) no recognized competitive or economic infrastructure, to put it bluntly, in which you cannot win anything and with which you cannot earn any money
  • Trend sports are those that are currently developing: The term has relevance to current issues, sports such as snowboarding , skateboarding , roller skating , free climbing or mountain biking all began in the 1970s as youth, fun and trend sports, but are now established (in competition as with the Sports facility operators, sporting goods manufacturers and the entire sports and leisure secondary industry)

Trendy and fun sports often disappear from the public as quickly as they appeared, or they become serious sports. Conversely, established sports can also disappear again. And also sports like skiing, which today have created an enormous tourist infrastructure, began at the turn of the last century as “fun” and then as a “trend”.

features

According to Schwier, an essential characteristic of trend sports is that they not only have a meaning as a sporting activity, but also represent “cultural forms of expression whose code cannot be completely deciphered by outsiders”. As part of a trend sport, an associated scene is developing, including special clothing, branded products and its own vocabulary.

Another feature is the high speed at which movements are carried out in trend sports. "Compared to traditional sports disciplines, many trend sports are downright hyperactive". He also noted a “trend towards extremization”. This trend is being promoted by the constant development of new sports equipment. Events that are about a trend sport are often staged in the form of a happening . "In the area of ​​inline skating, streetball, snowboarding, windsurfing and kite surfing, beach volleyball or street soccer, the event is already the dominant type of event preferred by sponsors ."

Trend sports are often limited in time, like in principle every trend. “Stunt skating” or “street skating” experienced a boom in the 1990s . In 1996, as many inline skates were sold as cars were registered (approx. 4 million). Inline skating, however, failed to maintain its popularity at the high level. According to Lamprecht and Stamm (2002), a trend sport is initially only practiced informally and in an unorganized manner and is only widespread locally. As participation in sports increases, there is an opportunity for commercialization and possibly a growth phase in the introductory phase (otherwise it is not a trend, but a fashion and soon disappears again). This is followed by a maturity phase with institutionalization (in Germany mostly via the German Olympic Sports Confederation ) as well as a saturation phase in which the typical subcultural characteristics of the beginning are no longer present.

In his Göttingen dissertation (with Arnd Krüger ), Patrick Stumm compared the development of trend sports in Germany, Spain and Italy. He made it clear that the successful trend sports all have their origins in California , but that they have different successes depending on the national degree of distinction of the adjacent established sports. Since it is z. For example, there is a long and successful tradition of roller skating and roller hockey in Spain (rectangular arrangement of the wheels), whereas inline skating has hardly established itself there in contrast to Germany.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Jürgen Schwier: What is trend sport? In: Christoph Breuer, Harald Michels (Ed.): Trendsport - Models, Orientations and Consequences . Verlag Meyer & Meyer, Aachen 2002, ISBN 3-89124-850-4 , pp. 18–32.
  2. ↑ Markus Lamprecht, Hanspeter Stamm: Sport between culture, cult and commerce. Seismo, Zurich 2002, ISBN 3-908239-80-X .
  3. ↑ Patrick Stumm: Sport and Globalization: Trend Sports in Germany, Italy and Spain. Stumm, Wiesbaden 2004, ISBN 3-9808392-1-4 .