A Foundation for Sports Geography
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STAGES |
ENVIRONMENT |
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PERMEABLE BOUNDARIES No spatial limits; uneven terrain; spatial interaction between "players" and "spectators"; diversified land use. |
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ENCLOSURE Limits of pitch defined; players segregated from spectators. |
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PARTITIONING Embankments, terraces, grandstands; payment for entry; segregation of spectators by social class; start of segregation within crowd; specialized land use. |
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SURVEILLANCE Enclosed ground; synthetic pitch and concrete bowl; TV replay screen; total segregation within crowd; panopticism; diversified land use. RULES OF EXCLUSION STRONG |
A four-stage model of the evolution of the modern stadium. Lines refer to possible freedoms of movement for players and spectators (from Bale, 1993).






Global Village Basketball is an
The Department of Biological Flow is a project of research-creation by Sean Smith and Barbara Fornssler exploring the concept of the moving human body as it is integrated with broader information networks of signal and noise.
August 15th, 2009
[...] of the key characteristics of modern sport is its boundedness. While this usually implies a boundedness in terms of spatial parameters, it also often implies a bounded temporality as well. A game begins at a particular time and it [...]
February 20th, 2010
[...] disciplining of the sporting spectator during the 19th and 20th centuries (as outlined by Bale) serves to render this mass of individuals a temporary layer or component of the stadium [...]
March 21st, 2010
[...] again. The projection of Olympism onto the screen of ponchos completely smoothed the striations of the enclosed stadium layout, creating from their disciplinary subjects the unity of a single [...]