The Modern Olympic Games–A Globalised Cultural and Sporting Event

Abstract

Abstract The Olympic Games are a major global sporting event, which attracts huge worldwide interest, from people of all races, ages, and social positions, transforming them in absolute global and democratic happenings. Last year over 4.8 billions of TV- viewers were connected to this major sportive and cultural feast (7.1 billion is the entire world population). From the beginning, the modern Olympic Games were part of world culture and modern history, reflecting political tensions, economic crises, cultural flowering, and technological development. The purpose of this study is to reveal the interconnection between culture and modern Olympic Games in a global historic context. The documentation for this study includes a large range of data about the 20th and the down of 21st century history, statistics, art history, anthropological studies, biographical sites and economics In the Olympic history I find a paradoxical moment: if the Olympic ideal is about celebrate the peace and a healthy mind in a healthy body, the Paralympics idea arose after the Second World War to honor the people who have got permanent disabilities on the battle fields. The social rituals performed in Olympic ceremonies evolved from a sacred place and have a religious dimension, which finds a profane expression in public arenas, but the values and the symbols they promote still attract large crowds. Conclusions. The widening of the Olympics movement around the world, as well as the connection between large numbers of countries makes the IOC a model structure that operates successfully on a global scale. The impact of the most important sporting event on the host city's community for more than three weeks represents a paradigm of urban anthropology.