This article considers the role of 'active' video games — specifically the Nintendo 'Wii' — as technologies that foster control over corporeality. New media scholars have examined the politics of embodiment and hybridity as they relate to video games, yet have paid limited attention to the ways in which new gaming technologies might contribute to contemporary systems of 'government', or what Foucault calls the 'conduct of conduct'. Borrowing from influential social theorists, the article argues that, by undergoing what Latour labels 'translation' (by merging with the body), the Wii invokes and reinscribes governmental and post-disciplinary rationalities. The analysis concludes by contending that the Wii might be a particularly influential innovation in risk-based post-disciplinary societies: rather than connecting 'at-risk' subjects to human experts, the Wii functions as an active and autonomous quasi-object risk expert, able to diagnose 'problematic' tendencies and prescribe basic behavioural remedies.
This article examines the golf industry's evolving responses to environment-related problems since the mid-1960s. Drawing from an analysis of golf superintendent trade publications, the article shows how golf industry members initially denied that their work could have negative impacts, but eventually acknowledged potential golf-related environmental problems-and ultimately positioned themselves as environmental leaders through various forms of professionalization. The analysis also reveals contradictions in superintendents' messaging about their environmental expertise and about the safety of turfgrass chemicals. The article concludes with reflections on why these contradictions should inspire concerns about golf's nascent environmental leadership, and on corporate environmentalism generally.Since the late 1980s, it has become commonplace for organizations-especially those accused of threatening the environment with their products or practices-to promote themselves as participants in a "corporate environmentalist" movement. Although researchers have, in turn, debated the merits and limitations of corporate environmentalism (e.g., Lyon and Maxwell 2004), the body of literature on this topic is still far from complete. Most notably, and considering the critique that corporate environmentalism is merely a means to escape government-imposed regulation, there is limited research that considers how members of different industries have attempted to maintain freedom from restrictive external oversight, or that examines the meanings industry members give to their pro-environment (and potentially anti-regulation) work. Certainly there are methodological challenges to obtaining such information. Yet it is important to seek data that provides insight into how and why industry insiders make the decisions they do around the environment if the integrity of such decisions is to be assessed. There is also a strong case to be made that such research is especially needed on sport and leisure industries, given the relatively newfound tendency among sporting organizations like Olympic organizing committees to profess their leadership on environment-related issues (cf., Wilson and Millington in press). The Sociological Quarterly ISSN 0038-0253 bs_bs_banner The Sociological Quarterly 54 (2013) 450-475
In this paper we argue that sport media research would be enhanced by: (a) engagement with the audience research tradition, including “third generation” audience studies that emphasize relationships between viewer interpretations of media and everyday social practices; and (b) the adoption of multimethod research approaches that are sensitive to contradictions and complexities that exist in media consumption. To support this argument, we reflect on the benefits of a multimethod research design used in a recent audience study conducted by the authors on youth interpretations of media and performances of masculinity in physical education (Millington & Wilson, in press). These benefits include: enriching researcher understandings of social/cultural contexts; illuminating social hierarchies; and revealing lived contradictions. We conclude with reflections on epistemological issues and suggestions for future audience projects.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.