IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/jglhis/v8y2013i02p256-278_00.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

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

Author

Listed:
  • Dyreson, Mark

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.

Suggested Citation

  • Dyreson, Mark, 2013. "The republic of consumption at the Olympic Games: globalization, Americanization, and Californization," Journal of Global History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(2), pages 256-278, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:jglhis:v:8:y:2013:i:02:p:256-278_00
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S1740022813000211/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cup:jglhis:v:8:y:2013:i:02:p:256-278_00. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/jgh .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.