APG5200 · Sports events and cities: Discourses, practices and power

Overview

Sports events are commonplace in urban centres and serve as destination cultural experiences for sporting fans and wider audiences. For example, Melbourne hosts annually the Australian Open, the Melbourne F1 Grand Prix, and the Boxing Day Cricket Match. These so-called ‘marquee’ events are complemented by a number of other smaller events, bolstered by government support and funding, and are integral to Melbourne’s aspiration as a global sporting capital. In this unit, you will critically examine the discourses, practices, and social agents involved in crafting an economic and cultural ecosystem centred on sports events that shape the cosmopolitan identity of urban cities. You will map the flows of government investment, policy and infrastructure that contribute to the development of a sporting city while exploring the cultural and creative narratives mobilised to justify these events. A key component of the unit is for you to attend one of these events, and supported by event ethnography, to analyse the global, economic, social, and cultural dimensions that intersect to make sports events central to urban life. You will also engage with theoretical ideas and concepts drawn from critical event studies, tourism, leisure studies, creative and cultural industries, cultural studies, and the sociology of sport. Through this interdisciplinary approach, you will explore the power dynamics shaping these sports events, assess their contested nature across various social spheres, and evaluate whether the benefits they claim to create for the diverse communities that constitute contemporary urban centres stand to scrutiny.

Offerings

Assessment

The Handbook does not list a final examination among the assessment items. That is not a guarantee there is none.

Within semester assessment: 100%

Assessment details may change. Please refer to the assessment information in Moodle closer to the start of the teaching period.

Requisites

The Handbook lists no prerequisite, corequisite or prohibition for this unit.

Learning outcomes

1. critically analyse the discourses mobilised by different institutional and social actors to legitimise and/or contest sports events within urban centres;
2. evaluate the global, social, economic, and cultural dimensions that shape sports events in contemporary urban centres;
3. compare and contrast different interdisciplinary approaches to the study of sport events in contemporary urban centres;
4. investigate, through event ethnography, how participants experience sports events, and connect this to key conceptual ideas from an interdisciplinary perspective;
5. communicate effectively research ethnographic findings of sport events academically and professionally.

Workload

Minimum total expected workload to achieve the learning outcomes for this unit is 144 hours per semester typically comprising a mixture of scheduled learning activities and independent study. Scheduled activities may include a combination of teacher directed learning, peer directed learning and online engagement.

Student experience, not official rules. Nothing here changes what the Handbook says.