Lecture by Prof. Niko Besnier (Uni of Amsterdam) on global sport industry and talent search in the Global South, March 9

March 9, at 12:15–13:45
Ülikooli 16–214

Lecture “The Sport Industries in the Neoliberal Age and the Reconfiguration of the Future in the Global South”

Abstract
In recent decades, the global sports industries have undergone radical transformations, as many professional sports have become embedded into a capitalist world order characterized by cutthroat competition for not only the attention of viewers and television channels, but also athletic talent. In this hyper-competitive context for capital of various kinds, clubs and teams are now searching for sporting talent more and more afield in the Global South. The economic downturns that these countries have experienced have devastated labour markets, but the possibility of migrating to seek employment in the sport industries has had a transformative effect on the lives of young people, particularly young men, despite the extremely limited probability of success. Sport migrations open a window into the workings of globalization in the neoliberal moment, the articulation of large-scale global dynamics with the everyday lives of ordinary people and the reconfiguration of how ordinary people see the future.

An open discussion with light snacks will follow after the lecture.

Bio
Niko Besnier is professor of cultural anthropology at the University of Amsterdam and currently research director at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies. In 2012–2017, with funding from the European Research Council (ERC), he directed a research project titled “Globalisation, Sport, and the Precarity of Masculinity”. His last (co-authored) book is “The Anthropology of Sport: Bodies, Borders, Biopolitics” (California, 2017, translated into three languages). He also has published widely on gender, sexuality, language, the economy, and social change.

More information: Ülo Valk, Prof. of Estonian and Comparative Folklore, ulo.valk [ät] ut.ee

The lecture is supported by the European Regional Development Fund (University of Tartu ASTRA project PER ASPERA).