ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the quickly growing scholarly community inquiring into the media and sport nexus has welcomed the agenda set by mediatisation scholars, but also regards the concept and approach with a certain amount of reservation or even indifference. The chapter explores the intricate background to this mixed response. First, it traces the ontologies, conceptualisations and research communities which have shaped the field historically, and it argues that emerging new dispositions in the field reflect how mediatisation evolves in sport, but also seem to draw research interests in a different direction. Second, the chapter takes a look at existing mediatisation research, which is clearly dominated by a continued focus on big (male) professional sports and sports events and therefore leaves a lot of significant gaps. Finally, the chapter discusses some of the challenges in using the concept in a field which historically and currently is much dominated by interests in empirical studies. A particular challenge in implementing mediatisation theory in empirical analysis is the strong presence of commercialisation and globalisation, which complicates the analysis and makes it difficult to clarify how media understood as both organisations and technologies affect sport in a wider, long-term perspective.
