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Sport - Identity - Religion

The practice of sport in Ancient Greece is unimaginable without being embedded in a religious context. During the Roman Empire a clearer separation of the two areas of sport and religion becomes visible. Why did the embedding of sport in everyday religious life appear so important? Can a similarity between the religious identity and that formed by sport be observed in many cases? In the late Empire, for instance, pagan and Christian groups also demonstrated their rivalry through sport. What role, then, does sport play in connection with religion in constructing the identity of individuals or groups? What significance does sport possess in initiations in ancient and modern societies? How great was and is the influence of 'religious' phenomena on the formation of identity through sport? What is it like in societies in which the religious collective forbids certain groups (e.g. women)? Can a development from the ancient identification of sport and religion up to the modern absolute independence of the one from the other (especially in the Western world) be observed? When does this separation commence to come into being? And why does this separation still not exist in many societies?

Key-note speaker: Catherine Morgan