ABSTRACT
The first four chapters have discussed the broad social and historical context within which sport has developed and the structural influences on current participation patterns. Structural analysis can sometimes be accused of ‘reification' – ignoring the processes involved, the people or agents who attach meanings to, and have specific motivations for, their actions. Structural models – for example, Marxists using concepts like ‘social reproduction' – suggest that the concept of socialisation is an overly functionalist and even out-dated notion. Yet as is clear from the work of Bourdieu (introduced in Chapter 4) who uses the concept of ‘habitus' rather than ‘socialisation' but refers to essentially the same phenomenon, structural social scientists recognise the need to be able to explain how and why people become involved, or not, in sport.
