The Ethics of Sports Fandom

Sports fans are individuals who are interested in and follow one or more sports, teams, and/or athletes. These fans reinforce their identity as a fan by engaging in supportive and repetitive consumption behaviors that relate to the sport or team they are so passionate about. This chapter will provide an overview of the history and cultural heritage of sports fandom, discuss the significance and functions of fandom, underline what motivates individuals to consume sports, examine the consequences and results of fandom, and highlight contemporary research and developmental trends. This chapter would allow for a good understanding of where research on sports fandom is headed and the important issues affecting sports fans.

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Active Within Structures: Predictors of Esports Gameplay and Spectatorship

Communication & Sport ◽

10.1177/2167479520942740 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 216747952094274

Author(s):

Tang Tang ◽

Jake Kucek ◽

Steven Toepfer

Keyword(s):

Consumer Behavior ◽

Conceptual Framework ◽

Significant Role ◽

The Other ◽

Integrative Approach ◽

Individual Factors ◽

Structural Factors ◽

Active Audience ◽

Sports Fandom ◽

Structural Theories

This study puts both esports gameplay and spectatorship into consideration and pinpoints how individual and structural factors explain why people play and watch esports to better understand the complexities and intricacies of esports consumption. Results indicate that both measures commonly associated with active audience, and structural theories played a significant role in explaining esports consumption. Specifically, esports gameplay was explained relatively more by structural factors than by individual factors. Different from esports gameplay, esports spectatorship was driven significantly more by individual factors. Preferences, motivations, availability, and access significantly predicted both esports gameplay and spectatorship. Sports fandom and use of interactive features, on the other hand, only predicted esports spectatorship but did not influence gameplay. By employing an integrative approach, this study aids in the development of conceptual framework that will serve to predict esports consumer behavior.

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Negotiating the Symbols of Gendered Sports Fandom

Social Psychology Quarterly ◽

10.1177/019027250907200101 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 72 (1) ◽

pp. 1-4 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Michael Ian Borer

Keyword(s):

Sports Fandom

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Team identification and sports fandom as predictors of fan aggression: The moderating role of ageing

Sport Management Review ◽

10.1016/j.smr.2018.02.002 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 22 (2) ◽

pp. 194-208 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Anat Toder-Alon ◽

Tamar Icekson ◽

Avichai Shuv-Ami

Keyword(s):

Team Identification ◽

Sports Fandom ◽

Moderating Role

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Playing with Lynching: Fandom Violence and the Black Athletic Body

Television & New Media ◽

10.1177/1527476419879913 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 21 (2) ◽

pp. 169-183

Author(s):

Poe Johnson

Keyword(s):

Fan Studies ◽

Black Athletes ◽

Common Occurrence ◽

White Supremacist ◽

Sports Fans ◽

Parallel Development ◽

Sports Fandom ◽

Shared History ◽

Jack Johnson ◽

The Relationship

This article traces the parallel development of lynching culture and the fandom surrounding the black athletic body. While only recently have fan studies scholars started to theorize the relationship between racism, sports, and fandom activity, their shared history goes back to at least Jack Johnson, the first black boxer to win the heavyweight championship. From this first encounter with the black athletic body, sports fans with white supremacist leanings have employed lynching iconography and rhetoric to discipline athletes who challenged the general perception of how a public black figure out to behave. I argue that not only is racialized fan violence directed toward black athletes a common occurrence, but that the logics of lynching culture are deeply and perhaps irrevocably intertwined with those of sports fandom writ large.

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