Understanding youth in sport: A Foucauldian lens on power, discourse and knowledge in youth sports

Abstract

In my dissertation, I challenged several modes of thought about youth sports and their practices. I purposely chose to explore practices and activities that vary greatly: resistance to competitive sport and the oft-invisible processes that are part of unorganised sports and of organised sports. Instead of drawing on commonly used post-positivist frameworks, I described an alternative way to study youth sport. In doing so, I gave participants a voice and contributed to the theorising of youth sport. A showed how variety in the use of theories, especially those that provide insight into the complex practices of youth sport such as the application of tools based of a Foucauldian approach to reality, can be used to develop policy and change practices that currently may result in youths dropping out, being exploited or abused or missing pleasure in participation. Because youth sport is considered to be an important contributor to the development of youths in society, research and theorising need to go beyond investigating outcomes and, instead, critically examine its complexities. The various studies in my dissertation revealed how a Foucauldian lens can be used to investigate youth sport practices and what this lens has to offer to scholars, administrators and policymakers to enhance their understanding and ability to respond to issues in youth sport.