USING THE SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION TO DEVELOP A CULTURAL SPORT PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH AGENDA. Aaron Goodson March 4, 2017

Transcription

1 USING THE SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION TO DEVELOP A CULTURAL SPORT PSYCHOLOGY RESEARCH AGENDA Aaron Goodson March 4, 2017

2 ABOUT ME Former tennis player Mental toughness? What is that? Body type? Body image? Game style? Black athlete, white sport, white environment at least in the US Interest in sport psychology, but sociology major Groups, not individuals Norms Values Culture Structural

3 WHAT IS CULTURAL SPORT PSYCHOLOGY?

4 CULTURAL SPORT PSYCHOLOGY Cultural Sport Psychology (CSP) is a broad term that can include a focus on the following: Marginalized cultures and ethnicities using quantitative or qualitative research tools Culturally sensitive strategies in applied work including workshops and specialized courses for work with marginalized athletes. Experiences of athletes, consultants, and coaches using a critical cultural studies approach that focuses on social difference, distribution of power, and social justice as interrelated concerns. *Endorsing a single method is the antithesis of a cultural studies approach*

5 THE IDEAL CULTURAL SPORT PSYCHOLOGY APPLIED RESEARCH An emphasis on seeing the developing athlete in a web of power dynamics and relationships that advantage some selves while disadvantaging others. A critical examination of the politics of race, gender, and class and how they affect athletes and consultants. A focus on athlete identities as multiple, fragmented, and dependent upon location rather than fixed or unchangeable. A choice of academic methods and theories based on an intellectual sensibility revolving around a certain theoretical orientation or critical stance versus strict interdisciplinary boundaries. Sport Sociology Sport Psychology Counseling Kinesiology Education and Pedagogy

6 WHAT IS THE SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION?

7 SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION (C. WRIGHT MILLS, 1959) It is unavoidable that individual circumstances are linked to the structure of society. Moving away from thinking as an individual about your own problems rather focusing on social, economic, and historical circumstances. e.g., shift from homeless family to the lack of housing, or from a racist coach to institutional racism Detachment from assumptions about social life and the establishment MUST BE WILLING TO QUESTION! Start to see the solutions not in terms of changing people but in terms of changing the structure of society

8 TROUBLES VS. ISSUES TROUBLES Troubles occur within the character of the individual and within the range of his immediate relations with others; they have to do with his self and with those limited areas of social life of which he is directly and personally aware. ISSUES Issues have to do with matters that transcend these local environments of the individual and the range of his inner life. They have to do with the organization of many such milieux [environment] into the institutions of an historical society as a whole, with the ways in which various milieux [environments] overlap and interpenetrate to form the larger structure of social and historical life.

9 WHERE DO I FIT IN?

10 RESEARCH JOURNEY The Issues Around Academic Clustering Clustering By Academic Major at HBCUs: A Big-Time Problem or a Widespread Issue? Factors That Influence a Student-Athlete s Decision to Pursue an Academic Major The Intersection of Athletic and Academic Identity, Locus of Control, and Academic Self-Efficacy in Collegiate Student-Athletes

11 CONCLUSION HOW DO I DO THIS? Individual circumstances linked to structure of society. Zoom in and out. When do troubles become issues? Trends? Historical significance?

12 REFERENCES Mills, C. W. (1959). The sociological imagination. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Schinke, R. J., & Hanrahan, S. J. (2009). Cultural Sport Psychology. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics