The republic of consumption at the Olympic Games: globalization, Americanization, and Californization*

Mark Dyreson

Journal of Global History, 2013, vol. 8, issue 2, 256-278

Abstract: Action sports such as beach volleyball and snowboarding have recently become popular commodities at the Olympics. While some observers view these new sports as global phenomena with transnational origins, they were incubated in California and are linked to the promotion of American visions of affluence. The encroachment of these sports onto global stages at the Olympics signals the continuing historical power of Californization, a particular brand of Americanization. The efforts to Californize the world through Olympic sports is considerably older than the debut of action sports, dating to the 1920s and 1930s when a coalition of US government agents, sports promoters, and corporate entrepreneurs began to articulate a strategy to mask Americanization campaigns in the world's leading sporting event under the veneer of California style. In the process they ‘dis’-invented historical traditions, in particular Olympic sports, in order to amplify their prospects in global markets.

Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/ ... type/journal_article link to article abstract page (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cup:jglhis:v:8:y:2013:i:02:p:256-278_00

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Global History from Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press, UPH, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 8BS UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kirk Stebbing ().