This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Safai, P. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

A Critical Analysis of the Development of Sport Medicine in Canada, 1955–80

York University, Canada, psafai{at}yorku.ca

Using a combination of archival research and semi-structured in-depth interviews, this study outlines the early development of sport medicine in Canada, from the mid-1950s to the late 1970s, in relation to the development of Canadian high performance sport during this period of time. I argue that the early development of sport medicine in Canada dovetailed with and benefited from the broader professionalization and rationalization of high performance sport, and that transformations in the production of international and national sport after the Second World War laid the foundation for the formalized and institutionalized entity we recognize today as sport medicine. These transformations were underpinned by the ideological re-centering of international high performance (specifically Olympic) sport from a moral and educational initiative to the all-out pursuit of sporting excellence that, in turn, was attentive to the claims of expertise from nascent sport medicine practitioners. The development of sport medicine is outlined from the late 1950s to the incorporation of the Sport Medicine Council of Canada (SMCC; later known as the Sport Medicine and Science Council of Canada, SMSCC) in 1978, and particular attention is paid to two turning points in the growth of sport medicine in Canada following initiatives to locate sport medicine in Canadian health and sport circles prior to the 1968 Mexico City Olympic Games: a) the negative experiences of the Canadian contingent at the 1968 Games in contrast to; b) the provision and delivery of sport medicine at and following the 1976 Montréal Olympic Games.

Key Words: Canadian high performance sport • ideology of excellence • Olympics • social organization of sport • system of sport medicine professions

International Review for the Sociology of Sport, Vol. 42, No. 3, 321-341 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/1012690207088115


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				N. Theberge `We Have all theBases Covered': Constructions of Professional Boundaries in Sport Medicine International Review for the Sociology of Sport, June 1, 2009; 44(2-3): 265 - 281. [Abstract] [PDF]