Publications / Articles / 2009 / 2009:089 Noen avsluttende bemerkninger
Noen avsluttende bemerkninger
Meningen med idretten Oslo: Unipub (2009)
The chapter refers to the four types of relations that are described in the introductory chapter and shows how the different chapters exemplify and shed light on these different types of relations. Furthermore, central insights on the individual meaning of sports emerging from the chapters are pointed out. First; the meanings of the different sports vary and are specific.
The meaning of football, where strategy, interaction and resistance dominate is far from the meaning of alpine skiing, where focus is placed on yourown technique. Second, a shared trait of many of the sports is that they open for intense experiences: the feeling of your breath while running, the intensity of jumping out of the plane in parachuting, the feeling of catching the baseball in the glove.
Thirdly, the experience of flow is central, but can be created in various ways, through the mastery of complex tasks as in sailing, or through simple, standardised movements, as in fitness training. The meaning of sports may be linked to individual moments, but is also strongly linked to continuity: it emerges as part of doing a sports and of continuing to do it.