Amateurs et professionnels dans le basket français (1944-1975) : querelles de définition

Abstract

Amateurs and Professionals in French - Basketball (1944-1975): Quarrels over Definition A commonplace reading of the history of sports would have us believe that professionalism, which at first was marginal and later took over the field, has replaced pure amateurism. Yet, it is important to grasp the malleability of the categories of perception and action affecting ч these nominal realities, by relating it to the area of national athletics. When applied to basketball over a wide postwar period (1944-1975), a close examination of the rules, their interpretation at a given moment and the practices they cover reveals the symbolic game involving players and leaders and governs the way "scandals" are handled. The recurring denunciation of dange- rous, immoral professionals, asserted in . turn on the occasion of a suspicious player trade, the discovery of remuneration or soliciting by the "big clubs", effectively overshadows the perpetuation of an arbitrariness which takes varied, or even contradictory, forms to preserve itself. The symbolic case of "the professional amateur" Robert Busnel testifies to this in a remarkable way.