ABSTRACT
While understanding ‘deviance’ in the sociology of sport remains largely focused within the confines of the social theories that once served as watchwords for a whole generation of criminologists and sociologists (and which we discussed in Chapters 2 and 3), the sociology of deviance itself has in the main moved its focus away from ideology, theory and abstract thought. Indeed, despite arguments emerging in the field that have been contrary to Sumner’s (1994) eschatological position, there has emerged in the main a reticence to theorise ‘deviance’ anew (Downes and Rock, 1998). Those who have continued to try to theorise ‘deviance’ in more imaginative ways in an effort to take into account recent societal changes have suffered from a neglect of the epistemological, ontological and methodological problems posed by Sumner’s critique (see, for example, Ferrell, 1995).
