Ideological and accumulation functions of the sports/media complex in advanced capitalism
Date
1980
Authors
Jhally, Sut
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Abstract
The increase in the amount of sports shown on television suggests that they are an important part of the contemporary reality of American society. As such the function of the sports/media complex is analyzed in relation to the developing conditions of the American capitalist mode of production. After an examination of the existing dominant approaches to the study of sport, it is concluded that positivism, functionalism and neo-Weberianism give an inadequate account of the place of sports within contemporary society, and the case is made for dialectical materialism as a method of analysis that furnishes the most adequate explanation of the role of sports in American society. The historical development of sports, their role in aiding and smoothing the processes of urbanization and immigration, and the establishment of the symbiotic relationship between professional sports and the mass media is shown. It is argued that the main function of this sports/media complex is to produce audiences for sale to advertisers. This is examined in relation to the development of the mass communication technologies of press, radio and television. The role of television in providing marketing structures is analyzed around the central and concrete focus of the media's use of sports. As such the effect of television on sports and the monopolistic nature of professional sports that makes it so valuable to television are discussed, as is the integration of professional sports within the wider framework of corporate control. The second major argument of the paper is that the sports/media complex also acts to provide ideological legitimation for an exploitative system of production by presenting an idealized and dramatic life world where contradictions engendered in the wider society are mediated, and the present conditions of existence presented as just, natural and eternal. Here the function of the sports media complex is seen as revolving around the dialectic of escape and socialization. This is examined historically by tracing the changing importance of baseball and football to the development of capitalist conditions of accumulation and legitimation. In addition it is argued that historically sports heroes have, and do, perform a legitimating function. The role o~ sports on TV is examined as it relates to the production of the sportscast as a commodity, and the manner in which the sportscast inculcates special notions of competition, passivity and masculinity. The function of the sportscast in legitimating the existing division of labour, the racial division of labour, and processes of quantification and reification is also analyzed. Lastly the twin function of the media, of marketing and ideological accumulation, are seen as being united in the use of sports ideology in advertising.