Title: “Connecting generations: sports as a conduit for intergenerational community – limits and possibilities.” Sports, and in particular, professional sports, provide a cultural vehicle for bridging generational subcultures, though “publicly marketed” athletes tend toward iconographic representations of the current popular culture as these are manifested within the dominant populations from which the athletes are drawn for that particular sport. Tensions between generational interpretations of athletic style manifest distinct areas of cultural conflict, though these conflicts tend toward contentious abstractions less significant than those they mask. This paper seeks to understand these tensions and contradictions, particularly focusing on the intersection of the athlete’s commodification, the observers attempt to bridge the gap separating athlete and viewer, and those gaps that remain among viewers. Is alienation resolved, or reaffirmed?
About the presenterEric Lichten
Professor and Chair, Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Long Island University Post.