Sport, Communication, and the Culture of Consumption: On Language and Identity

Abstract

This article provides an editorial introduction to the second of two special issues of American Behavioral Scientist on “Sport, Communication, and the Culture of Consumption.” This second issue focuses on “Language and Identity” and brings together American, Canadian, and British scholars from communication, media studies, rhetoric, philosophy, sport, and cultural studies. The language of sport is featured in analyses of bullshit in mediated sports discourse, in themes of justice as articulated in a blogosphere defense of doping in cycling, and rhetorical strategies that surround our thinking of poker as sport. The intersection of consumption with social and cultural formations of identity is examined in studies of the post-Michael Jordan NBA’s “ghettocentric logic,” in racialized commentary by commentators in broadcasts of NCAA men’s and women’s Final Four basketball games, and the role that media play in formations of hegemonic masculinities for high school youth.