Norbert Elias PDF

SÁNCHEZ.A, FELE. G.
NORMATIVIDAD EN DEPORTE: 23
a) En defensa encontramos simpleza y seguridad: más razonables (mejor)

es una acción defensiva cuanto más simple y segura.
b) En ataque encontramos simpleza y amenaza: más razonable (mejor) es
una acción ofensiva cuanto más simple y amenazante.
c) En contraataque encontramos simpleza, amenaza y rapidez: más
razonable (mejor) es una acción de contraataque cuanto más simple, amenazante
y genere rapidez al juego.
Un tratamiento más específico de las reglas práxicas en cada disciplina
implicaría analizar las distintas acciones, fases o sistemas de juego. Por ejemplo,
si analizamos las reglas práxicas que gobiernan la realización del servicio de
tenis podríamos decir que el jugador debe realizar un servicio que trate de buscar
el desplazamiento del oponente mediante una dirección y efecto de la bola que
le obligue a restar fuera de pista y/o que genere un espacio importante donde
dirigir el siguiente golpeo, consiguiendo llevar la iniciativa en el punto (Nielsen
& McPherson, 2001:657).
Muchas veces es fácil ver si el jugador realizó un error en su decisión táctica.
La obviedad de tales acciones no es solo transparente a los ojos del entrenador
sino a los ojos de un espectador bien informado que conoce el juego. Esto es así
porque los que ven el juego lo entienden gracias a esa serie de criterios práxicos
que, si bien no siempre son adquiridos de forma explícita, actúan como parte
de un trasfondo de interpretación del juego. Es así como podemos apreciar que
una acción del jugador fue inteligente o que tenía buena (razonable) intención
aunque la jugada no resultó; o que el jugador debía haber pasado pero esperó
demasiado y estropeó la jugada al no hacerlo. Por supuesto hay una serie de
casos mucho más controvertidos desde el punto de vista práxico: ¿debería
haber pasado o regateado? Quizá haya situaciones en las cuales ambas opciones
pueden representar un buen sentido del juego. Las acciones potencialmente
buenas están ahí en la situación para ser jugadas. Se muestran públicamente en
el juego, en la situación social de interacción, en medio del flujo de acciones a
medida que el juego se desarrolla.
Resultados: en el apartado anterior sobre reglas práxicas hemos indicado
que en la situación real de juego nunca podemos separar la decisión táctica
de la ejecución técnica y eso va a tener unas consecuencias específicas sobre
los resultados finales de la acción. Según los resultados podemos diferenciar
diversos casos:
Buena decisión táctica + buena ejecución técnica--------- ►Buen resultado
Un jugador resuelve un lv s l contra el portero mediante un regate bien
ejecutado.
Buena decisión táctica + mala ejecución técnica--------- ►Mal resultado
Un jugador intenta un pase para dejar a un compañero claramente
desmarcado pero falla el pase.
Mala decisión táctica + buena ejecución técnica--------- ►Buen o mal
resultado
a) Buen resultado: imaginamos una situación en la cual el portero ha recibido
la pelota del defensa y decide regatear al delantero que ha venido a presionar.
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ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13883
24 SÁNCHEZ.A, FELE. G. NORMATIVIDAD EN DEPORTE:.
Si bien en un principio esa acción estaría contra las reglas práxicas que hablan
sobre lo razonable en el juego, en ese caso el resultado de la acción es positiva
debido a una buena ejecución técnica.
b) Mal resultado: imaginamos que en la misma situación anterior el portero
falla en el regate y le marcan gol. En este caso, la decisión táctica y la ejecución
técnica fueron malas.
Antes de pasar a analizar casos concretos de análisis en el próximo
apartado, deberíamos aclarar nuevamente la relación entre los distintos tipos de
normatividad y las expectativas constitutivas de juego. Los eventos constitutivos
de juego, lo que se considera como juego normal, se presentan en todo
momento relacionados con ciertas expectativas respecto a los distintos tipos
de normatividad. El juego normal debe darse dentro unas reglas básicas de
reglamento, de acuerdo con un código ético y atendiendo a lo que marcan
las reglas de preferencia de juego o práxicas.6 En principio, la mayor tensión
parecería vivirse entre el código ético (no todo vale para ganar) y el práxico
(criterios de eficacia para ganar) dentro de lo que marcan las reglas básicas de
juego. Sin embargo, como veremos en los siguientes casos, la articulación entre
códigos normativos es más confusa y compleja de lo que cabría esperar a partir
de esta primera aproximación analítica a la cuestión.
5. ESTUDIOS DE CASO (AE) QUE MUESTRAN LA ARTICULACIÓN

ENTRE DISTINTOS TIPOS DE NORMATIVIDAD
El modo en que aparecen en la práctica acciones de juego problemáticas

desde el punto de vista de los diversas normatividades es el siguiente: (Io)
primero se rompe la normalidad fáctica (la jugada es anormal respecto a los
patrones normales de actividad, a las acciones que se encuentran en el juego de
modo habitual) lo cual (2o) tiene implicaciones sobre la normatividad (la jugada
se entiende como caso de violación de alguna normatividad, que puede ser la del
reglamento, la ética del fair-play la de reglas práxicas o combinadas). Depende
del caso, los jugadores contrarios apelarán a un código u otro dirigiéndose o
bien al representante del reglamento en el campo (el árbitro) o directamente
al propio jugador infractor de la normalidad. Puede ocurrir también que los
propios compañeros recriminen las acciones de alguien de su mismo equipo
que ha violado algún tipo de normatividad (por ejemplo, si esa acción lleva a
un desenlace desastroso para el propio equipo). De cualquier modo, a quién se
dirigen los jugadores a protestar o a recriminar nos dice mucho sobre el tipo
de norma que creen que ha violado. La intensidad de la recriminación viene
6 Como indica A. Rawls “Las partes de una práctica constitutive deben orientarse a
las mismas reglas/prácticas [reglamento], debn asumir eso de los otros y asumir que los otros
asumen lo mismo de ellos. Los participantes deben además asumir competencia [reglas práxicas]
y buenas intenciones [fair play] cada uno de los demás- hasta que los hechos demuestren lo
contrario. Si alguno de los requerimientos anteriores fallase, la inteligibilidad mutual también
fallaría11(2009: 368; los corchetes son nuestros).
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ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13883
SÁNCHEZ.A, FELE. G. NORMATIVIDAD EN DEPORTE: 25
además marcada por el resultado (positivo o negativo) de la jugada. Es decir, la

protesta es más fuerte si, haciendo esa jugada problemática sacaron beneficio. Si
no lo sacaron, hay recriminación pero puede ser también en forma de burla (por
ejemplo, porque ha hecho el ridículo).
Veamos ahora cada uno de esos casos problemáticos mediante el análisis
detallado de los altemos etnometodológicos (AE) que presentan simultaneidad
y/o conflictividad en su regulación mediante distintas normatividades. Por
motivos de espacio vamos a mostrar ejemplos que ponen en relación los tipos
de normatividad de dos en dos, dejando casos más complejos para futuras
investigaciones.
5.1. Reglas práxicas y reglas éticas (fair play)
Comencemos con algunos casos obvios. En primer lugar, deberíamos

tener en cuenta que la ruptura de las expectativas del rival es la base del juego
deportivo. Si tu juego es fácil de esperar tus oponentes estarán en una mejor
posición para contrarrestar tus acciones. En un partido entre Brasil y Uruguay,
celebrado el 17 de junio de 1970, el famoso jugador Pele corre hacia un balón
que un compañero ha pasado adelantado (Fig.2). El portero uruguayo corre hacia
el punto en el cual se supone que Pele tomará contacto con el balón para así
poder limitar el ángulo de tiro hacia la portería y poder para la posible acción de
disparo del delantero.
Fig.2 Secuencia de la maniobra del gol de Pele.7
Pele, en vez de tocar el balón, continua corriendo en la misma dirección sin

realizar cambio de velocidad o paso. De ese modo sobrepasa al portero por su
derecha, dejando que el balón siga su curso y pase al portero por su izquierda.
Tras sobrepasar al portero, Pele gira rápidamente hacia la derecha, coge el balón
y lo introduce en la portería, marcando gol.
Nadie protestaría por esta forma de engañar al adversario. De hecho, se
considera en alta estima que un jugador sea capaz de realizar una jugada tan
inesperada para superar al adversario. El caso del caño (túnel, cacha, sotana)
es una conocida maniobra para regatear a un oponente haciendo pasar el balón
por debajo de las piernas. Esta acción, si bien tuvo que ser muy sorpresiva en
sus primeras realizaciones, es hoy en día utilizada con regularidad como un
7 http://www.voutube.com/watch?v=rvIGWJx CmA
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recurso técnico más y es perfectamente razonable desde el punto de vista de la

noramtividad práxica. La acción muestra tanto la habilidad del que la realiza
como la responsabilidad del defensor (por no estar suficientemente alerta). Sin
embargo, puede ser en ocasiones realizada con la intención de ridiculizar al
adversario: tocar el balón para que pase por debajo de las piernas del defensa
pueden considerarse en algunos momentos como un acto de falta de respeto.
Esta acción por tanto entra dentro de la normatividad práxica pero puede ser
controvertida desde el punto de vista ético: lo que para unos es considerado
como un uso creativo, inteligente y eficiente de los recursos para solucionar
una situación, otros pueden considerarla poco respetuosa. Por tanto, en este tipo
de jugadas podemos distinguir dos tipos de expectativas derivadas de dos tipos
distintos de normatividad: reglas práxicas y reglas éticas.
Afirmamos que las consideraciones práxicas prevalecerán sobre las éticas
en la interpretación de la jugada si la eficiencia de la acción prevalece sobre (o,
en caso límite, iguala) su estética. En caso de contradecir esta expectativa, hay
más posibilidades de que tome más relevancia interpretativa la normatividad
ética y el juego se considere poco ético porque no hay verdadera necesidad de
realizarlo. Hablamos de que el jugador se adorna, lo hace de cara a la galería,
por lucimiento personal, lo que puede llevar a una actitud irrespetuosa frente al
rival.
Tomemos el caso de la Espaldinha de Ronaldo. En el partido entre el Real
Madrid y el Atlético de Madrid celebrado el 7 de noviembre de 2010 (Fig.3),
Ronaldo lanza a gol desde un lateral y el portero despeja la pelota, que sale
bombeada hacia la posición del delantero madridista.
Fig3. Ronaldo realizando la espaldinha en el partido frente al Atlético de Madrid8
Éste, en vez de pararla, controlarla o pasarla de un modo convencional (con

la cabeza, con la pierna, con el pie), decide en el momento en que la bola va caer
darse la vuelta y contactar con la parte superior de la espalda, pasándosela a un
compañero. La acción implica un pase del balón sin contacto visual, casi en una
actitud de desentendimiento del juego que no representa el cuidado y atención
que normalmente se considera en un juego entre futbolistas profesionales. En
este caso es dudoso que la eficiencia de la acción prevalezca sobre el adorno
del propio jugador. Más aun, esta jugada es considerada poco ética, irrespetuosa
para su oponente directo: el defensa Raúl García, que cuando finaliza la jugada
se dirige a Ronaldo con las siguientes palabras: “Eso no lo haces con 0-0, ¿eh?
8 http://www.voutube.com/watch?v=axVF23Khp80
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Te pego una hostia...” Que el defensa haga mención al marcador (el Real
Madrid iba ganando 2 goles a 0 a un minuto de acabar el encuentro) deja claro
que la gratuitad de la acción se debe a una situación de superioridad manifiesta
del Real Madrid en ese punto, lo que añade mayor grado de desconsideración
hacia los rivales.
5.2. Reglamento y reglas éticas (fair play)
Hay situaciones en las cuales la facticidad normal de las acciones vendría

determinada mediante el reglamento pero ocurre algo inusual que tiene
implicaciones desde el punto de vista ético, que se erige como normatividad
predominante en la regulación del curso de las acciones.
En el partido disputado entre Dinamarca e Irán en 2003, justo antes de
finalizar la primera parte, alguien en el público silbó y un jugador iraní, creyendo
que el árbitro había pitado final del tiempo reglamentario, coge la pelota con las
manos encontrándose dentro del área de meta (Fig 4) .A continuación la pasa
con el pie hacia el árbitro, como ocurre normalmente cuando acaba el tiempo
de juego. La cuestión es que, debido a que el árbitro no había pitado final, el
juego era válido y se vio forzado a señalar el penalti a favor de Dinamarca. El
árbitro no podía comportarse de otro modo si quería atender a lo que indica
el reglamento: era un caso claro de juego deliberado del balón con las manos
dentro de la propia área de meta. No había además nada en el reglamento que
le permitiera enmendar esa aparente extraña situación. Tras una discusión entre
los jugadores, los entrenadores, etc., se toma una decisión. Uno de los jugadores
daneses, Morten Weighorst, se dirigió a lanzar el penalti tirándolo de forma
deliberada fuera, por la línea de fondo, siendo felicitado por los jugadores iranís
y aplaudido por el público.
Fig 4. El danés Weighorst fallando a posta el penalti.9
El tiro fuera de penalti no se puede considerar una mala ejecución pero

sí una acción que está sujeta al reglamento. Al mismo tiempo, no tomar la
oportunidad de marcar gol era una forma de respetar la regla no escrita de
fair play que indica no tomar ventaja de una situación favorable adquirida en
circunstancias fortuitas, cuando los jugadores no tienen responsabilidad en el
perjuicio causado a su equipo. La situación sería muy distinta si por ejemplo
9 https://www.voutube.com/watch?v=mKPBIS3 BSo
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un delantero se hallara en una situación ventajosa para marcar tras un error

garrafal del portero al fallar un pase de uno de sus compañeros. En este caso, el
delantero tiene todo el derecho del mundo (según el reglamento pero también
según las reglas éticas) para continuar y marcar, no dando al equipo contrario la
posibilidad de enmendar tan craso error.
5.3. Reglamento y reglas práxicas
Hay otro tipo de acciones en las cuales se transgrede lo que indica el

reglamento y han sido producidas por circunstancias anormales o extrañas,
asociadas a cuestiones de tipo práxico (sobre la eficiencia en el juego), que
ganan prioridad como normatividad que regula el curso de acción. La falta
táctica es el más claro ejemplo de ello: es un acto deliberado de falta, muy
diferente a la falta que puede darse en un lance del juego por el control del balón
o por una acción mal calculada del defensa frente al atacante (o viceversa). En
el caso de la falta táctica, la acción del jugador no se orienta hacia el control
del balón sino a dificultar la acción del contrario para que no pueda encontrarse
su equipo en posición de clara ventaja. Normalmente son faltas que ocurren
por ejemplo en el medio del campo para frenar un posible contraataque. La
falta resultante, incluso aunque genere un libre directo o una tarjeta amarilla
(o incluso roja) se considera necesaria como mal menor frente a la ventaja que
podría obtener el equipo contrario si no se realizara tal acción. Este tipo de
acción se denomina táctica precisamente porque se enseña como parte más de
los fundamentos defensivos del fútbol y está por tanto sujeta a la normatividad
práxica sobre la eficiencia de juego (algo análogo a una maniobra de creación
deliberada del fuera de juego, si bien ésta no está penada por el reglamento).
En un encuentro entre Uruguay y Gana para el pase a semifinales de los
Mundiales de Suráfrica de 2010, cerca de la finalización de la prórroga (el
marcador era 1-1 en esos momentos), hay un remate de cabeza de los jugadores
gañeses que es detenido en línea de gol con las manos por el jugador de
campo uruguayo Luis Suárez (Fig. 5). El árbitro lo expulsa con tarjeta roja. A
continuación el jugador ganés Gyan estrella el balón contra el larguero, fallando
el penalti, generando el júbilo en la celebración del propio Luis Suárez. Minutos
después se acaba el tiempo reglamentario y Uruguay acabara imponiéndose en la
tanda de penaltis, consagrando a Suárez como el héroe del partido.
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Este ejemplo, si bien no es una falta táctica muy comente, sí muestra bien la
relación entre el reglamento y la normatividad práxica, imponiéndose esta última
debido a la infracción de las reglas de juego como mal menor frente al objetivo
final, que era ganar el partido.
6. CONCLUSIONES Y FUTURAS VÍAS DE INVESTIGACIÓN
Como principales conclusiones del presente estudio podemos destacar que

el enfoque etnometodológico: (1) ha permitido la reespecificación de un sentido
más amplio de normatividad a partir de los análisis concretos del trabajo de
construcción in vivo de la propia interacción entre miembros que realizan una
actividad deportiva. El análisis de las grabaciones hizo visible la, hasta ahora
oculta, dimensión práxica y mostró la compleja articulación entre los distintos
tipos de normatividad; (2) ha mostrado la doble dimensión del orden de juego:
facticidad y normatividad. Una jugada no normal desde el punto de vista de
cualquiera de los tres tipos de normatividad se produce en primer lugar (y no
a la inversa) por la ruptura fáctica de lo habitual (de los hechos que ocurren
normalmente), lo cual tiene consecuencias normativas. En el momento en que
se rompen esos patrones normales de acción aparece un caso de violación que
remite a uno o varios de los tipos de reglas sancionadoras: reglamento, ética
deportiva y reglas práxicas.
Cabe destacar que este artículo tan solo ha sido una primera aproximación
a la normatividad deportiva. Como indicábamos en el apartado de análisis, no
se han mostrado casos de estudio más complejos como ejemplos que impliquen
a la vez los tres tipos de normatividad, algo que se dejará para próximas
investigaciones.
Así mismo, no hemos podido prestar atención suficiente atención a la jugada
innovadora ni a otro tipo de jugadas que merecen especial atención en sí mismas
al romper de modo radical con las expectativas constitutivas de juego: la jugada
sin sentido. Estos tipos de jugada pueden además ayudamos a entender mejor las
propias dinámicas de cambio de los juegos deportivos. Por ejemplo, podremos
observar cómo la consideración sobre algunas acciones puede cambiar con el
tiempo debido a que su relación con algún tipo de normatividad cambia. De
jugada innovadora (salto tipo Fosbury) puede pasar a ser simplemente una buena
10 http://www.voutube.com/watch?v=tDpx9GGH79I
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30 SÁNCHEZ.A, FELE. G. NORM ATM DAD EN DEPORTE:.
jugada si se adquiere y es usada de forma habitual por los demás jugadores como
recurso adecuado y se considera como parte normal del buen juego.
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ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13883
Relevancia teórica y empírica de los documentos en
la sociología del deporte figuracional
Documents a n d detachm ent in the figurational sociology o f
sport
Pa d d y D olan a n d Jo h n C onnolly
paddy.dolan@dit.ie (IRLANDA)
Recibido: 15.04 2014

Aceptado: 22.12 2014
RESUMEN
El artículo aborda las implicaciones metodológicas de la utilización de un

enfoque (histórico) figuracional aplicado al estudio de los juegos gaélicos (los
deportes irlandeses del Hurling y el Fútbol Gaélico) y, en particular, al estudio
de su organización y gestión desde fines del siglo XIX a nuestros días. Siguiendo
a Norbert Elias, los autores defienden la importancia del método deductivo en la
investigación documental. El problema de la generalización o representatividad
de los documentos históricos se puede abordar mediante el tratamiento de los
documentos como parte de la contrastación empírica, por lo que constituye una
estrategia que retroalimenta los propios resultados teóricos y empíricos. Basán
dose en la explotación de documentos tales como informes periódicos de los ár
bitros, así como documentos organizativos tales como las actas de las reuniones
en los distintos niveles de gestión, contribuyen a la discusión sobre las fronteras
entre la historia, la sociología y la sociología histórica. Aun poniendo en práctica
la perspectiva Eliasiana del desapego emocional, y la participación secundaria,
los autores también observan las dificultades para evitar lecturas “parciales” de
la historia nacional irlandesa al desarrollar su investigación, dado que los juegos
gaélicos se han entrelazado con la narrativa y el proyecto de autodeterminación
nacional en Irlanda. En este sentido, los investigadores reconocen el significado
teórico de los deportes como motor y símbolo de identificaciones emocionales, a
la vez que se esfuerzan por crear distancia de su propio habitus nacional, con el
fin de dar prioridad a la participación en la generación de conocimiento interge
neracional sobre los mitos nacionales.
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34 DOLAN.P, CONNOLLY.J. DOCUMENTS AND DETACHMENT..
PALABRAS CLAVE
Juegos Gaélicos; Deporte; Figuracionismo; Norbert Elias; Emociones; des

prendimiento.
ABSTRACT
This article discusses the methodological implications of using a figurational

approach to the study of Gaelic games (the Irish sports of hurling and Gaelic
football) and their organisation and governance from the late nineteenth cen
tury onwards. Following Norbert Elias, we argue that data generation guided
by theories, and potentially modifying such theories, are essential components
of research endeavours. The problem of generalisation or representativeness of
historical documents can be addressed by treating documents as part of a figu
ration of evidence, thereby constituting a mutually supporting network of data
that serves as a scaffold or structure for theoretical and empirical findings. Based
on the experience of using documents such as newspaper and referee reports of
matches, and also organisational documents such as the minutes of meetings at
various levels of governance, we contribute to the discussion concerning borders
and boundary maintenance between history, sociology and historical sociology.
While we elaborate on the Eliasian perspective on emotional detachment, and
secondary involvement, when conducting research, we also note the difficulties
in avoiding ‘preferred’ readings of national history given that Gaelic games have
been intertwined with the narrative and project of national self-determination in
Ireland. Researchers are compelled to recognise the theoretical significance of
sports as a motor and symbol of emotional identifications, but must also create
distance from their own national habitus in order to prioritise participation in
intergenerational knowledge generation over further national myth-making.
KEY WORDS
Gaelic games, sport, figurations, Norbert Elias, emotions, detachment.
1. INTRODUCTION
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of methods in figurational

sociology. We do this by interrogating the methods used in our recent analyses
of the development of various aspects of sport under the auspices of the Gaelic
Athletic Association (GAA, established 1884) in Ireland (Dolan and Connolly,
2009, Connolly and Dolan, 2010, Dolan and Connolly, 2014, Connolly and Do
lan, 2011, Connolly and Dolan, 2013a, Connolly and Dolan, 2013b, Connolly
and Dolan, 2012). We have focussed on the sports of hurling and Gaelic football,
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DOLAN.P, CONNOLLY.J. DOCUMENTS AND DETACHMENT.. 35
both standardised and codified in the late nineteenth century, though an ancient
indigenous pedigree is often claimed for hurling in particular. Both sports are
team field games involving fifteen against fifteen.
As these studies have taken the form of journal articles, there has been little
scope for extended methodological discussions. The articulation of methods
adopted and adapted for any study are clearly relevant for the status of any con
sequent explanations, but, following Elias, we are reluctant to espouse a specific
methodology that others should follow in the pursuit of knowledge. As P unning
(Dunning and Hughes, 2013: 175) recalls in a note Elias wrote in response to an
early draft of the preface to Quest for Excitement, Elias refused to state a par
ticular methodology to follow; rather he used methods in the plural depending
on the research questions pursued. It is clear enough from his body of work that
he used what would be called ‘mixed methods’ in the current methodological
parlance, but as his concern was generally to analyse and synthesise various
social processes over time, the use of historical documents were indispensable.
His implicit (through occasionally explicit) mistrust of highly statistical inquiries
sprang from their tendency to construct variables whose meaning, function and
direction were often stripped of context (in terms of social situations), culture
(in terms of historically-specific meaning), and structure (in terms of the inter
related functions and meanings of processes, events and part-structures that can
be understood only as parts of an integrating whole).
The structure of the paper begins with our account of the theory-guided
necessity of data generation and analysis. In our case we have attempted to
use (though not, we hope, in an hagiographic way) the ideas and theories of
Norbert Elias, and his followers such as Eric Dunning, in order to explain the
development of sporting organisation, the emotional control of players and
spectators (by themselves and by others), and the changing constitution of sports
games themselves, all within the context of broader changes in social structures.
Throughout this research we have been mostly reliant on the use of historical
documents in forms such as newspaper accounts of matches, referee reports, and
minutes from organisational meetings, that relate to the organisation and playing
of Gaelic games in Ireland from the 1880s to the present. Though we have also
generated and used qualitative interviews (see especially, Connolly and Dolan,
2012), they are not our main concern in this paper. The next section examines
the relative focus and field of inquiry of the related social science disciplines,
Sociology and History, and also the emergent subdiscipline of Historical Socio
logy that in many respects constitutes a sequestration of historical perspectives
from mainstream sociological concerns. Then we examine the key issue of emo
tional involvement on the part of researchers (often depicted as reflexivity in the
methodological literature) and indeed the people portrayed in our research fin
dings. Finally we deal with the status of documents in the construction of actual
social processes. Throughout this we attempt to relate these ‘methodological’
concerns with our actual research practices in developing and publishing our
findings and analyses.
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2. GUIDANCE BY THEORY
In order to understand various sporting practices and processes, including

spectator and player violence (though not considered ‘sporting’ in the moral
sense, such violence did occur in the spaces where games were played), we
find it necessary to employ theoretical frameworks in order to recognise the
relevance of data that might relate to such processes and practices. However, we
are not suggesting that theories should remain sacrosanct in the face of evidence
derived from historical documents and other sources. Elias continually stresses
the importance of developing ‘testable’ models and explanations; in other
words, data from other social contexts and situations could be used to revise the
prevailing models as long as such revisions accounted for the evidence (facts) in
such diverse contexts. In that way, we have sought to use figurational theory as a
resource to explain Gaelic games in Ireland, and insofar as the data derived from
that particular national context suggests modifications of figurational theories as
they pertain to sport or the contexts of its production and change over time. One
of the key themes in figurational sociology is interdependence, and this applies
as much to the research process as it does to relations between people:
Without the constant interdependence o f the development o f bodies o f detailed

knowledge and synthesizing models, o f empirical exploration and theory, analysis
and synthesis, the production o f detailed knowledge, no matter how careful
the method o f production, remains uncertain, often enough misleading and
scientifically irrelevant. (Elias, 1997: 367-8)
So our approach towards data generation was already shaped by our

knowledge of figurational theory. Naturally researchers choose theoretical
resources and models that they find most compelling. This is a choice structured
by the career trajectory of the researcher, so it is in fact a choice limited by
opportunity, combining planned and unplanned aspects. The first author was
introduced to the work of Elias while studying for a postgraduate sociology
degree; the second author was introduced to his work through conversations
with the first author. This of course is an example of social interdependence;
we depend on others over the course of our lives, and such dependencies are
not entirely controlled by the protagonists. By figuration Elias (2012a: 525)
means ‘a structure of mutually orientated and dependent people ... the network
of interdependences formed by individuals’. The nuances and subtleties of
figurational sociology are beyond the scope of this paper, but it is appropriate to
suggest some key aspects which informed the theoretical lens through which we
searched for and made sense of data. Firstly, we recognised that Gaelic games
developed into more formal encounters during the late nineteenth century. The
first author had already used Elias’s theories to examine the development of
consumer culture in Ireland over the course of the twentieth century (Dolan,
2005, Dolan, 2009a, Dolan, 2009b). The choice of a figurational approach for
that study was not immediate or automatic, but followed dissatisfaction with an
earlier inclination towards a Foucauldian analysis. This concern stemmed from
EMPtRIA. Revista de Metodología de Ciencias Sociales. N.° 30, enero-abril, 2015, pp. 33-52.
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the unsuitability of Foucault’s archaeological or genealogical mode of analysis

to connect different normative frameworks surrounding consumer culture. As
Burke (1992: 151) notes, Foucault’s work demonstrates a ‘failure to discuss the
mechanics of change’.
Elias, on the other hand, stresses the sequential order of social change
without resorting to teleology or notions of progress. The dynamic of change
consists of the unstable tensions between contending groups and individuals
comprising any particular social unit, and indeed tensions between such units
at higher levels of integration or interdependence. As actions have unforeseen
and unintended consequences, the order of change is largely unplanned, but
the relative contribution of planned and unplanned aspects of social change
depends upon the power balances between the various groups and individuals.
In the context of Irish sport, it was clear that the formation of the Gaelic Athletic
Association in 1884 was related to broader changes involving the rise of cultural
nationalism in Ireland during this late nineteenth-century period (Mandle,
1987). Of course as researchers we are reliant on secondary historiographic
literature for this knowledge. As such, we exist in a network of interdependences
with other researchers, in this case historians who have collected and analysed
primary documents concerning organisational formation and change, at the level
of both states and sporting organisations.
Broadly speaking, Elias argues that as people become more constrained
and enabled by denser, more diverse, longer, and m ultiplying webs of
interdependence, they must learn and exercise more even and all-round self
steering capacities to navigate this complex social terrain. This occurs over
many generations, and new standards of social conduct and new symbolic
repertoires develop to reflect and also to channel these social changes. Part of
these greater requirements for more flexible and even self-steering included the
capacity to control (not simply constrain, but to manage in a more refined way)
emotions in dealing with others. This newer concern for emotional self-control
combined with decreasing social inequality between classes and genders led to
the development of a conception of self oriented to what Elias (2010) labelled
homo clausus (closed person). People increasingly felt closed off or separate
from others, as if some barrier kept them apart. Though this is an inaccurate
perception of social reality, it was based on a real feeling of personal separation,
and therefore was real in its consequences. In fact Elias argues that this perceived
duality is the basis for much epistemological theory in the philosophy of
science and knowledge (Elias, 2007b, Elias, 2007a, Elias, 2012b, Kilminster,
2007). According to Elias, the ‘subject’ of knowledge does not first deduce
hypotheses or conclusions from laws in his or her imagination or ‘mind’ and
then seek support in the ‘objective’, ‘external’ world. Nor does the researcher
simply observe facts devoid of prior synthetic reflection, and then attempt to link
observations together to formulate theory. There is a constant ‘two-way traffic’
between two layers of knowledge: that of general ideas, theories or models
and that of observations and perceptions of specific events’ (Elias, 2007b: 89).
Historical research in particular is sometimes conceived as free from theory,
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following E.P. Thompson’s famous treatise The Poverty of Theory:
But despite an ideology of ‘nothing but the facts,’ historians seldom engage
in radical inductivism. They do not simply walk arbitrarily into archives and
demand documents, storing up facts as the experience dictates. They seek to test
existing claims and extend understanding to new (or hitherto unstudied) events.
They treat studies of specific towns and social movements, fertility rates and
royal succession crises as cases to be compared as well as appreciated in their
specificity. They have theories, even when they choose to express them implicitly
rather than explicitly. Above all, in light o f the present debate, they write
narratives that are hardly exercises in induction or indeed in pure empiricism.
(Calhoun, 1998: 855)
Tough we do not self-identify as ‘historians’, we engaged with newspaper
and organisational archives informed and guided by an existing theoretical
framework, or what Elias often refers to as a ‘fund of social knowledge’
passed down intergenerationally producing a chain of interdependence linking
researchers over many decades and even centuries (see Gabriel and Mennell,
2011). When we look at relations between players on the field, or between
players and spectators, and between team managers and organisational
functionaries within the Gaelic Athletic Association we have the concepts of
figuration and habitus at our disposal. The difficult challenge for following
generations of researchers, and particularly those following a sociologist of the
calibre of Norbert Elias, is not to treat such concepts with ‘too much respect’,
to use a sporting analogy. We endeavour to interrogate theories and concepts
against found and emerging evidence, but we could not even recognise evidence
without the symbolic repertoire of concepts that other social scientists have
bestowed on the research community. To facilitate this, we endeavour to avoid
seeing the social world as if from the position of homo clausus, and instead
recognise the changing and multiple forms of connections between many
people over time and place. In other words, figurational researchers, whether
investigating sports or other social practices, attempt to bypass the dualistic
tendencies of philosophical theories of knowledge (see Kilminster (1998, 2007).
In the next section, we address the vexed issue of using history for
sociological inquiry, and indeed the value of the boundaries between the
disciplines of history and sociology. One apparent solution of these border
disputes has been the emergence of a relatively new subdiscipline titled historical
sociology.
3. HISTORY, SOCIOLOGY AND HISTORICAL SOCIOLOGY

Though we use historical evidence in our examination of Gaelic games in
Ireland, we do not adopt a traditional historiographic strategy: ‘The sociologist’s
history is not the historian’s history’ (Elias in Elias and Dunning, 2008: 152).
By this we mean that we are less concerned with the imagined inventors and
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creators of Irish sports and sporting organisations. This is not to say that such
people were not important in the development and popularisation of the sports,
but that their actions and orientations were framed and enabled in the complex
network of social relations which they formed with others. This figuration
included not just those they interacted with face-to-face but also distant others,
and also previous generations who inherited, upheld and modified the traditions
of Irishness, and in particular the ideal of cultural distinction. It is only in this
social context that leaders of the new sports movement could even conceive
of the need for sports distinct from British sports that were proving to be
enormously successful across the social classes in Britain, Ireland and beyond.
In that sense, as Elias argues, sport has a relative, but limited, autonomy (Elias
in Elias and Dunning, 2008: 158). Once people conceive of new sports, they
generally coalesce in the form of an organisation to frame rules, set standards of
play and adjudication, develop competitions at various levels (in terms of age,
gender, ability and geographic region), and to co-ordinate the activities of the
organisation itself as it grows and changes in partly unplanned ways (by virtue of
the growing numbers of people with different interests and priorities that become
involved in the sports and their organisation). So while historians of Gaelic
games in Ireland have tended to focus on origins, narrative, and key individuals
in the development of sports, we have tried to focus on the changing structure of
relations between Irish and British social groups. This includes relations between
sporting organisations more or less loyal to central sporting organisations
in the United Kingdom (as it was then in the late nineteenth century). While
figurational sociologists do not dismiss the significance of important historical
figures, they are placed in the fluid context of power relations between groups,
including social classes and ethnic groups. Such individuals are formed in the
fluid intersections between many social processes and relations over time. In
terms of the Gaelic Athletic Association, the specific actions of Michael Cusack
(usually recognised as the key founder of the GAA) become less important than
shifting power relations within Ireland and between Irish and British groups.
This does not diminish his uniqueness, in that the complex, changing figurations
comprising millions of people allow for the formation of differentiated people
depending on their initial position and subsequent trajectories through these
figurations.
Though history and sociology as disciplines have sought to maintain their
independence, their objects of investigation are more or less the same - societies
(Elias, 1997: 363—4). Elias suggests that the division of history and sociology as
‘independent subject areas’ is a function of their organisational demarcation in
universities, and therefore a myth, though in earlier work (The Court Society)
he presents a clearer distinction between these disciplinary perspectives: ‘The
former [historical perspective] throws light on particular individuals, in this case
individual kings, while the latter [sociological perspective] illuminates social
positions, in this case the development of the royal position’ (Elias, 2006: 4).
Elias claims that historians do not treat famous historical figures as occupants
of social roles within a hierarchical but fluid structure. Monarchs have (or
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rather had, in absolute monarchies) greater scope for decision making, but this
is by virtue of their relative power ratio with other social positions, and the fact
that the monarchy as an historically developed social institution brings with
it privileges largely irrespective of the current occupant as an individual with
specific strengths, abilities and flaws.
Similarly, in our work, we have sought to treat historical figures as occupants
of particular social positions within the broader organisational figuration of the
GAA, which itself exists within national and international figurations. This
does not mean that such figures are inactive, passive instruments of inexorable
structures colliding with other structures. They have been enabled through their
habitus formation and relate to others according to particular sets of emotional
dispositions and strategising capabilities. These resources are afforded by their
nodal positions and their trajectory within the social networks they form with
others. Individual figures with the GAA are also not entirely coherent and
consistent in their wishes and deeds, as their locations in figurations at different
levels of integration produce contradictions and dilemmas. The same person
can be acting on behalf of a small club, a larger provincial unit, the central
organisation working at national level, or even within an international context
in the form of the recent development of the hybrid sport of International Rules
devised to enable games between Ireland and Australia. But it makes little sense
to locate the source of action and motivation in the individual him or herself,
especially when our concerns have included the cultural significance of national
identification for the development of sport and the fact that these sports are team
games. Even individual sportspeople tend to have opponents and must learn
the rules of the game from experienced and knowledgeable others. But in team
sports, and in relations between players and spectators, it is entirely obvious
that people do not act as isolated individuals intent on pursuing their own
individually-derived ends. The whole game constitutes an interdependent, fluid
pattern (Elias and Dunning, 1966).
Elias (2006: 9-10) does argue that differences between history and sociology
do not constitute absolute opposites. He contends that at least sociology as a
discipline has expectations of relating emerging or generated facts to theoretical
models or synthetic frameworks that protect, to some degree, against the
incursion of present controversies and moralities.
Elias (2006: 8, original emphasis) also criticises historians for attributing
blame (though they are not the only social scientists open to that particular
charge):
Ranke pointed to the heart of the problem: the historian apportions praise
and blame. ... Contemporary circumstances decide how he sees ‘history’, and
even what he sees as ‘history’. He makes his selection from the events of the
past in the light of what he approves or disapproves in the present.
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The personal latitude afforded to individual historians to pursue their

interests in events and polities of the past unencumbered by theoretical models
has become a badge of honour amongst historians, but this lack of structure
in narratives of events can easily serve as propaganda for particular groups
(Elias, 1997: 368). These ‘extra-scientific issues of the day’ lead to the constant
rewriting of history (Elias, 2006: 37).
So, in principle at least, Elias argues that historical evidence should be used
by sociologists because they are tasked with explaining how and why people act,
think and feel as they do, and all the evidence for this has already happened - it’s
in the past. The main reason to treat the recent past as the everyday, recurring
present is based on the belief that social structures, cultural traditions, values,
standards of conduct and emotional displays, self-experience, social contours
of belonging and identification, and so on, do not really change. As Elias finds
this implausible, sociologists must therefore construct their explanations (or
theories) to account for such changes in the myriad aspects of societies. For Elias
this is not so much a researcher preference as it is a requirement dictated by the
nature of the subject matter of sociological inquiry - societies themselves, up
to and including global society. Of course change can happen over a relatively
short time period so the framing of any research problem in terms of time
period depends upon the actual degree of change in the processes, practices and
structures of interest. In relation to Gaelic games in Ireland, it became clear early
in the project that rule changes were a significant factor in their development,
and also an indicator of changing standards of emotional control concerning
violence and crowd safety. Following Elias, we never sought absolute origins,
but attempted to construct processes from the evidence regarding rule changes
and organisational development. We also used newspaper reports (see below for
further detail) to trace the conduct of both players and spectators over time.
The question of time periods is a difficult one when drawing on historical
evidence. While social processes can initially appear to be going in a more
or less consistent direction, closer inspection often revealed qualifications,
exceptions, reverses, and at the very least uneven diffusion and acceptance of
newer standards of conduct. This is why we have been reluctant to fix change
to any particular date. This is consistent with Elias’s own periodisation of
social change. While there are occasional spurts (even civilising spurts) in
one direction, change tends to be gradual and uneven. There is a succession
of events, but no single great event that serves as an imagined watershed of
historical change.
The ‘independence’ of the disciplines of history and sociology has led,
somewhat paradoxically, to the emergence of the subdiscipline of historical
sociology. But this development is largely confined to the large research
community within North America. Debates on the usefulness of historical
sociology centre around the status of theory. Calhoun (1998) rebuts Kiser and
Hechter’s insistence on the construction of covering laws as the basis for a
more scientific historical sociology: ‘Thinking of explanation only in terms
of causality, and of theory only in terms of the general theories that generate
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causal explanations, leaves out many important efforts to achieve relatively

general understandings of social life’ (Calhoun, 1998: 865). The use of narrative
explanations are considered important by Calhoun in building explanations of
how certain events and processes unfold in particular societies over particular
time periods. Elias (2007b: 20) also argues that the emphasis on finding singular
causes tends to lead to a misguided search for origins of social change. Searches
for scientific laws also elevate the status of recurring events or conditions that
could ‘explain’ changes in something else, but the natural sciences also deal with
‘unrepeatable and unique phenomena’ (Elias, 2006: 12).
The concern with finding some order (in the non-normative sense) or
structure to social change does not constitute naive optimism in relation to the
future. The concept of ‘social development’ is treated suspiciously because
of connotations of nineteenth century notions of moral progress, or twentieth
century reductions of long-term social processes to simple stage models like
‘modernisation’. As Elias states:
The notion o f a developm en t ordain ed by nature which leads tow ards a

h appier coexistence o f human beings is entirely alien to me. The p ro g ress some
o f our fathers believed in, universal and autom atic progress, does not exist. But
fo rw a rd steps, ju s t like backw ard steps in certain regards, can be observed.
(Elias, 2008b: 10)
In our studies of sport in Ireland we have sought to identify order in the

apparent discontinuities of social structure. Elias sees the order of change in
terms of changing densities and complexities of multiple forms of dependencies
between people, which have unintended consequences. Thus, there is continuity
through the recurring events and ruptures (Dolan, 2010). This is not the same
as arguing that there is a spirit or law guiding diverse changes across many
social spheres. Elias does not rely upon some ‘base’, economic or otherwise,
to explain superstructural changes. As a contrast, we can see that Foucault
is explicitly suspicious of all claims to historical continuity, on the grounds
that it is linked with an ‘originating subject of all knowledge and practice’
(Foucault, 2000a: 301), and that ‘the notion of development’ assumes that event
sequences must be ‘the manifestation of one and the same organizing principle’
(p. 302). For Foucault (2000b: 429) , ‘History appears then not as a great
continuity underneath an apparent discontinuity, but as a tangle of superimposed
discontinuities.’ But it is precisely this tangle, or intertwined plans and actions
of interdependent people over many generations, that constitutes the structure of
social change. Once Foucault refuses the challenge of deciphering order then the
fragments of history left to us as documents are elevated as a sealed discursive
formation. Paradoxically Foucault does occasionally state that the discursive can
be related to the non-discursive, but this is left largely unexplained. However,
Elias does not rely on a single subject of knowledge, nor does he reduce any
social process to a single organising principle. Processes become interdependent,
like the monarchical state’s capacity to generate income through taxation and
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the related capacity to fund a standing army and claim the monopoly of physical
violence within a particular territory. Each process reinforced the other, but there
is no origin of change, no single moment from which the engines of history first
began.
Sport has a relative autonomy through history, but it is not immune to the
vagaries of other social processes and institutions. We show how Gaelic games
in Ireland, primarily through the standardisation of hurling and Gaelic football
rules, were organised on a national scale partly in response to the actions,
ambitions and exclusions of other sporting bodies. While this form of national
cultural resistance could be conceived as a deliberate plan, such planning could
only occur in the context of pre-existing folk games sufficiently different from
rugby, soccer and cricket to constitute a national heritage. The competitive
figuration between rival sports organisations also shaped the actions and
feelings of sports administrators towards each other. Exclusions on one side
were countered by exclusions on another. And this sporting figuration makes
little sense unless examined as part of a broader Irish-British figuration that
was changing rapidly due to the heightened commercialisation of agricultural
production in Ireland, the intensification of industrialisation in Britain, and the
consequent shifts in power ratios between classes in both nations, but within the
same state in the late nineteenth century.
While some may ask what have these historical processes and events got to
do with understanding sport in Ireland today, well the we-feelings of supporters
and administrators are passed on from one generation to the next. Children
in any nation develop that national identity through pedagogical practices at
home and in school. In Ireland at least, the development of the national sporting
organisation that is the GAA is taught as part of Irish history. It is presented as
not only a manifestation of changing British-Irish relations, but also a driver
of change. It takes time for such we-feelings to change, and to understand the
operations of collective emotions and memories they must be examined in
time, not devoid of a temporal context in order to establish some imagined, and
misguided, notion of recurring laws or eternal features of the human condition.
Also, the present should not be reduced to a new rupture characterised as epochs
like ‘second modernity’, ‘late modernity’, ‘risk society’ or ‘liquid modernity’
(Inglis, 2014).
Indeed Inglis echoes Elias’s (1987) concerns about the discipline of
sociology decades after warning about the ‘retreat of sociologists into the
present’:
I f sociologists today wish to avoid the condescension o f future generations,

then it is a vision o f a profoundly historically-sensitive sociology they should be
defending, not the kind o f sociology that was already in large part enslaved to the
present. (Inglis, 2014: 114)
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Another major theme of Elias’s methods is the balance of emotional

involvement and detachment in research, and we address below our approach to
detachment.
4. INVOLVED DETACHMENT
One of the main arguments in Elias’s Involvement and Detachment is that

the development of more reality-congruent knowledge develops in a spiral
process with greater capacity for detachment on the part of people towards
objects, events, and processes that they encounter in life. Elias is not claiming
that researchers should adopt a perspective of value-neutrality in respect of their
objects of investigation, simply because following a more emotionally detached
perspective is a value of scientific inquiry. Also involvement and detachment
are not polar opposites, nor are people predisposed to one inclination or the
other: ‘One cannot say of a person’s outlook in any absolute sense that it is
detached or involved ... Normally adult behaviour lies on a scale somewhere
between these two extremes’ (Elias, 2007b: 68-9). Kilminster (2007: 122-4)
also argues that sociological research entails involved detachment, in that
a passionate commitment to scientific discovery is required, not a diffident,
indifferent emotional staleness to the process. However, detachment does mean
distancing oneself from preferred outcomes of research, and ensuring that the
political or moral perspectives of the researcher do not prejudice the findings.
This is a considerable challenge; as sociologists participate in the ‘objects’ of
their investigations, they are highly susceptible to feelings of danger, anger
or outrage (Elias, 2007b: 13). Such participation is also necessary to generate
understanding:
[social scientists] cannot cease to take p a rt in, and to be affected by,

the so c ia l a n d p o litic a l a ffa irs o f th eir gro u p s a n d th eir tim e. Their
ow n p a rticip a tio n and involvem ent, m oreover, are them selves conditions
fo r com prehending the problem s they try to solve as scientists. F or while,
in order to understand the structure o f molecules, one need not know what it
fe e ls like to be one o f its atoms, in order to understand the functioning o
f human groups one needs to know, as it were, from the inside how human beings
experience their own and other groups, and one cannot know without active
participation and involvement. (Elias, 2007b: 84)
In our studies of the development of sport it has of course been difficult

to access the experience of administrators, officials, players and spectators
over time. We have attempted this through the examination of historical
documents contained in the GAA archives and also newspaper reports of
matches and organisational changes. But it is important to empathise with those
participants in terms of a kind of sociological and methodological imagination
whereby one’s developing knowledge of immediate and broader figurations, the
dynamics of organisations and matches themselves, affords an understanding
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
of participants’ perspectives. This of course does not mean that researchers

can experience the exact emotions and calculations of historical figures, but
one can, so to speak, imagine oneself in their fluid positions within dynamic
figurations. In fact, Kilminster claims that Elias’s method of writing allows
‘the reader to experience, or perhaps to re-experience to a degree, the dominant
behavioural codes of the different historical stages, from the unavoidable point
of view of the current one’ (Kilminster, 2007: 86, original emphasis). Similarly,
through reading historical documents, researchers can imagine the prevailing
standards and social situations of particular historical periods. Researchers
also face the emotional difficulty of detaching themselves somewhat (and
perhaps temporarily) from their own national habitus. Learning about Gaelic
games and the GAA is part of Irish people’s socialisation process (one could
even say nationalising process, in that children are encouraged to become
emotionally attached to the sports as a source of national pride, given that sport
is increasingly globalised). Consequently we must forgo ‘preferred’ readings
of history from a nationalistic perspective. The development of Gaelic games
must be seen less as a phoenix rising from the flames of national revolution and
destiny towards its fateful dominance in the people’s practice and imagination,
and more an outcome of interdependencies and interactions between competing
sporting activities and organisations.
Doing figurational research can also produce ‘secondary forms of
involvement’ (Elias, 2007b: 40) in that finding connections between processes
and structures produces its own enjoyment. Discovering the strangeness of
historical events and practices from a modern perspective is an early form
of involvement, not without its pleasures, for the researcher, but a detour via
detachment requires reducing the distance between past and present by locating
such events and practices within the figurations, standards of conduct, and
traditions of the past. Much of early figurational work on sport by Elias and
Dunning focussed on violence - by players and spectators in particular, but also
by hooligan groups with tenuous connections to actual sports (in Dunning’s
work with colleagues at the University of Leicester; for example, see Dunning
(1994, 1996), Dunning, Murphy, and Williams (1988), Dunning and Sheard
(2005)). Similarly, we find relatively high levels in the early development
of Gaelic games in Ireland, and also different forms or structures of violent
events over time. This can be particularly challenging from the perspective of
maintaining ‘involved detachment’ in the scientific sense described above. We
came across accounts of death and severe bodily assault in the early decades
of the GAA. But it is important to eschew a moralising perspective on those
participants involved in such violence at the time. This is not to excuse it,
but simply to acknowledge that moralising can interfere with developing
explanations of the dynamics of violent encounters and the formation of a
social habitus quick to anger and violent assault. Remaining relatively detached
involves focussing on the actions of participants in context rather than the
painful and humiliating effects on victims. It also means avoiding blame
attribution, at least initially. Secondary reinvolvement may lead to blame
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
attribution in terms of the exercise of state monopolies of violence control

within stadia, but blaming specific individuals who seem to perpetrate violence
according to newspaper reports runs the risk of seeking the origin of action
within the imagined isolated subject - a very homo clausus ‘solution’. Of course
journalists often do attribute blame to particular participants in violent actions,
and this is useful in order to understand the moral standards of the time period
in question.
During the actual discovery of evidence particular events can evoke
emotions on the part of researchers, and these responses can be useful in
building explanations and descriptions. There is no strict opposition between
rationality and irrationality when it comes to connecting events and processes;
Elias (1991: 75) notes that rationality and irrationality should not be treated as
opposites, as the path towards more reality-congruent knowledge often involves
fruitful detours and milestones which are more fantasy-oriented. Researcher
emotions can also be evoked by documentary evidence even though violent
events occurred in the distant past. Seal (2012) discusses her feelings of
empathy, but also negative emotions, towards women incarcerated for murder in
the mid-twentieth century. Her evidence comprised of case file documents which
included details of the women’s early lives. While she does not use a figurational
approach, Seal is imagining the lives these women led in terms of their limited
life chances given the constraints and opportunities afforded by the figurations
they formed. Seal (2012: 690) argues: ‘To remain indifferent to the pain that is
an integral part of homicide prosecutions seems amoral and ethically troubling,
especially as the research was largely conducted for my benefit as part of my
academic career.’ This seems like a moral argument against taking a detached
perspective, but figurational researchers attempt to move beyond the initial
emotional involvement. Also, Elias stresses that research is an intergenerational
pursuit, and this realisation actually assists in the capacity to suspend initial
emotional involvement. We did not pursue our studies into Irish sport primarily
for the benefit of our academic careers, but simply to make a small contribution
to a figurational body of work on sport. The concern of individual researchers
for their careers is entirely understandable, especially in the context of the
increasingly pressurised environment of research metrics and ‘flexible’ or short
term employment contracts in universities. But when researchers locate their
work within a flow of intergenerational work, then the prospect of ‘their’ work
producing feelings of guilt or unease for using the experiences of others becomes
less pressing:
In fact, I can say that one of the afflictions o f our time originates from the fact
that the chain of generations has been loosened or broken. One no longer has
the feeling that this chain still exists. People believe they can seek the fulfilment
of their own life here and now in our own time. They do not see that none of
their tasks is an end, that it becomes meaningless if is not taken up by the next
generation, whose task is also taken up by the generation following them. (Elias,
2008a: 265)
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
For us, part of the relative detachment process involved a degree of de
personalising of sports participants. We analysed people as spectators, players,
referees, officials, administrators, and so on, but not as individual life stories.
Many newspaper reports did not carry such evidence in any event, though more
recently there has been a more pronounced personalisation of news stories, itself
a manifestation of the individualisation of our times. If researchers can view
themselves as part of intergenerational links of knowledge development, then the
emotional pressure of imagining what impact the research outcomes mean for
the individual researcher him or herself can recede to some extent.
We now turn to the status of such documents in figurational research, and the
practicalities of finding and using them for our studies of Irish sport.
5. DOCUMENTS AND FIGURATIONAL DYNAMICS
We used documents in the form of newspaper reports, referees reports,

organisational minutes of meetings, and organisational reports to reconstruct
practices, events and moral standards of earlier periods. The newspaper
reports were mainly used as accounts of matches, in order to get access to
player and spectator behaviour. Referees reports from the GAA archives
were used to supplement newspaper reports and in particular to get a sense
of the changing ‘shame thresholds’ (Elias, 2012a) as evidenced by referees’
accounts of spectator and player transgressions of codes of conduct. The GAA
archives also contained documents pertaining to the minutes of meetings at
various levels with the overall organisation; these were used to build models
of the organisational figuration. Though qualitative interviews with journalists
and broadcasters were also generated, our main reliance was on historical
documents in various forms. In other words, we treated documents as fragments
and legacies of events that really happened. This does not mean we acted as
naive empiricists gullible to every journalist’s written word in a newspaper.
Such accounts were treated critically and sceptically in the light of other
evidence available. So the documents themselves constituted a kind of symbolic
figuration enabling realistic interpretation. A figurational account of the use of
documents in understanding the development of consumer culture addresses
the use of parliamentary debates as documentary sources (Dolan, 2009c), but
here we focus mainly on newspapers. A recurring theme in the historiographical
literature is the status of documents as reliable accounts of events depicted
in such documents. Much of this has been propelled by the ‘postmodern’ or
‘poststructural’ turn in history (see Munslow, 2006). Foucault’s work has been
highly influential in this ‘new history’ focussing as it does on discourse rather
than events or social conditions.
Chartier (1997: 77) argues that discourse does not simply invent events and
other non-discursive practices because the processes of discursive construction
of events and practices are themselves socially formed by people according to
the material and symbolic resources at their disposal. For Chartier, these social
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
48 DOLAN.P, CONNOLLYJ. DOCUMENTS AND DETACHMENT..
processes are ‘objective’ and ‘external to discourse’. Now, the postmodern

approach to historiography could posit that knowledge of such social processes,
properties, communities and organisations could only be ascertained through
the existence of fragments such as documents. So we are still left with a
constellation of texts from which to narrate versions or stories of the past. But,
for example, if several journalists attend the same match and write reports from
their perspective for their newspapers, and such accounts largely overlap in the
narrative and sequence of actions, then we, as researchers, can be reasonably
confident that such actions did in fact occur. Of course people can only make
sense of actions and objects through symbols developed over time by people,
but this does not mean that nothing happened. Elias presents the matter rather
succinctly when he states: ‘If the symbols of a language were not to some extent
congruent with reality, with the data they represent, humans could not survive
... But side by side with reality-congruent representations communal fantasies
abound in languages past and present’ (Elias, 1991: 97).
Generally we have found that when journalists used words and phrases like
‘riot’, ‘crowd disorder’, ‘free fights’, ‘remarkable scenes’, and ‘disgraceful’,
they provided details of various participant actions to warrant those descriptions.
Our focus was on descriptions of individual and collective actions, such as
hitting, punching, kicking, striking with sticks, throwing stones, slapping,
headbutting, and so on. Of course words can change meaning, but this can
usually be ascertained by the association of words with other words. If a
constellation of words, regularly associated with each other, change their
meaning simultaneously then deciphering meaning can be difficult, but this
rarely happens abruptly because new meanings create uncertainty amongst
people communicating, so they elaborate with more words. Journalists existed
in a figuration with newspaper editors and counterparts in other newspapers, as
well as readers, so the words used had to make sense to a broader figuration.
This is not to say that mistakes could not have been made, but research findings
are always open to modification or correction by further evidence.
Dibble (1963) states that historians generally use documents to make sense
of other documents, and also interpret events depicted in documents. Dibble also
suggests that historians tend to, implicitly if not explicitly, follow established
rules on the interpretation of documents. These rules include: the greater
reliability of testimony in documents containing specific details rather than
general conditions (on this point, see also Earl et al„ 2004); testimony recorded
shortly after events tends to be more accurate than witness accounts written
long after the event. But, more critically for our purposes, Dibble (1963: 207)
refers to the need for historians to develop a ‘sociology of documents’ to support
the reliability of evidence. This is akin to treating documentary evidence as a
symbolic figuration (see above). Bryant (2000: 498) also argues that artifacts,
including documents, from the past were produced and functioned ‘in a larger
social matrix’. Knowledge of such a social figuration lends understanding to
the meaning and functions of documents. Referees reports could lead to further
action against players and clubs, and they could be contested. Typical defences
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
included provocation rather than the denial of any particular actions, so players
sought to influence moral interpretations rather than effectively claim referees
had fabricated stories to wilfully punish players. Similarly newspaper journalists
wrote reports knowing that some of those present at matches would read their
reports. A journalist’s professional reputation and livelihood depended on his or
her credibility. In other words their writing was enabled and constrained by the
figuration they formed with others - these interdependencies placed an onus of
accuracy on their accounts of matches.
Booth (2006) is right to argue that media reports often contain silences, as
not everything can be reported. So reports are invariably partial. But newspaper
reports do not have to be complete in order to be useful. We have used such
reports to understand sports violence. No doubt many spectators ate sandwiches
at matches, and this is rarely reported. This does not mean the report cannot
be trusted. It simply means that the journalist supposed that such details were
irrelevant or of little interest to his or her readers. Also, if accounts are compared
chronologically over time, silences can be as revealing as details of events. For
example, early newspaper reports sometimes commented that the crowd were
well-behaved; this rarely if ever occurs in recent decades. The implication is
not that crowds have become increasingly rowdy, but that their proper conduct
is no longer worthy of comment. It is taken for granted. Similarly, Elias largely
constructs his analysis of advancing thresholds of shame based on what is no
longer written in etiquette texts. The silences are meaningful precisely because
they reflect changing reality.
We followed several strategies for generating newspaper reports. These
included manually searching for newspaper accounts in the National Library
of Ireland based on reading histories of Gaelic games in Ireland, as well online
searches of The Irish Times historical archive (providing Irish Times articles
from i 859), and the broader Irish Newspaper Archive, which provides access
to many national and provincial newspapers, some of which date from the
eighteenth century. These digital databases allow word searches within the
content of entire articles, so are more flexible than newspaper archives based
on keyword indexes constructed manually by librarians (see Deacon, 2007,
Upchurch, 2012). In constructing our account of social changes, we tried to
demonstrate the shifting structural character of violent events at sports matches,
and to relate such changes to changing habitus formation in Ireland over the long
term. Newspaper reports can be subject to selection bias in terms of focussing
on violent acts (Earl et al., 2004), but we did not seek empirical generalisation
in terms of quantification. We sought to relate figurational dynamics at various
levels of social integration with the changing structural orders of violent events.
We gain access to these events mainly through accounts left by journalists, but
as witnesses rather than participants, they are normally less biased (McCullagh,
2000: 59). An exception we found concerned local newspaper accounts of
matches involving a team from that locality. Reports tended to have a more
partisan tone, but violence was usually described and then justified (due to
provocation) rather than significant details omitted (based on reports of the same
ISSN: 1139-5737, DOI/empiria.30.2015.13884
matches in national newspapers, or newspapers based in the opposing team’s

locality). So we critically interpreted witness accounts, rather than selecting
those suiting a preordained narrative.
6. CONCLUSION
In this paper, we describe the process of using figurational theory for the
study of Gaelic games in Ireland. Though we address various choices regarding
methods employed, we stress the need for a theory-informed approach to
data generation, analysis and synthesis. However, following Elias, we argue
against the pursuit of laws or deductive schemes in the pursuit of knowledge.
Rather, in our studies of sport we have sought to uncover the connections
between multiple social processes over time, including the changing nature of
the social habitus for players, spectators and administrators alike. Following
a figurational approach, this entails an involved detachment in examining
historical documents, and the realisation that we are but a link in the chain of
researchers over many generations.
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SÁNCHEZ.A, FELE. G.

a) En defensa encontramos simpleza y seguridad: más razonables (mejor)

5. ESTUDIOS DE CASO (AE) QUE MUESTRAN LA ARTICULACIÓN

El modo en que aparecen en la práctica acciones de juego problemáticas

además marcada por el resultado (positivo o negativo) de la jugada. Es decir, la

5.1. Reglas práxicas y reglas éticas (fair play)

Comencemos con algunos casos obvios. En primer lugar, deberíamos

Fig.2 Secuencia de la maniobra del gol de Pele.7

Pele, en vez de tocar el balón, continua corriendo en la misma dirección sin

recurso técnico más y es perfectamente razonable desde el punto de vista de la

Fig3. Ronaldo realizando la espaldinha en el partido frente al Atlético de Madrid8

Éste, en vez de pararla, controlarla o pasarla de un modo convencional (con

5.2. Reglamento y reglas éticas (fair play)

Hay situaciones en las cuales la facticidad normal de las acciones vendría

Fig 4. El danés Weighorst fallando a posta el penalti.9

El tiro fuera de penalti no se puede considerar una mala ejecución pero

un delantero se hallara en una situación ventajosa para marcar tras un error

5.3. Reglamento y reglas práxicas

Hay otro tipo de acciones en las cuales se transgrede lo que indica el

6. CONCLUSIONES Y FUTURAS VÍAS DE INVESTIGACIÓN

Como principales conclusiones del presente estudio podemos destacar que

Becker, H. (1963). Outsiders. New York, The Free Press of Glencoe.

mundane expertise”. The Sociological Review, 54(3), 405-425.

Recibido: 15.04 2014

El artículo aborda las implicaciones metodológicas de la utilización de un

Juegos Gaélicos; Deporte; Figuracionismo; Norbert Elias; Emociones; des­

This article discusses the methodological implications of using a figurational

Gaelic games, sport, figurations, Norbert Elias, emotions, detachment.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of methods in figurational

In order to understand various sporting practices and processes, including

Without the constant interdependence o f the development o f bodies o f detailed

So our approach towards data generation was already shaped by our

the unsuitability of Foucault’s archaeological or genealogical mode of analysis

following E.P. Thompson’s famous treatise The Poverty of Theory:

3. HISTORY, SOCIOLOGY AND HISTORICAL SOCIOLOGY

The personal latitude afforded to individual historians to pursue their

causal explanations, leaves out many important efforts to achieve relatively

The notion o f a developm en t ordain ed by nature which leads tow ards a

In our studies of sport in Ireland we have sought to identify order in the

I f sociologists today wish to avoid the condescension o f future generations,

Another major theme of Elias’s methods is the balance of emotional

One of the main arguments in Elias’s Involvement and Detachment is that

[social scientists] cannot cease to take p a rt in, and to be affected by,

In our studies of the development of sport it has of course been difficult

of participants’ perspectives. This of course does not mean that researchers

attribution in terms of the exercise of state monopolies of violence control

5. DOCUMENTS AND FIGURATIONAL DYNAMICS

We used documents in the form of newspaper reports, referees reports,

processes are ‘objective’ and ‘external to discourse’. Now, the postmodern

matches in national newspapers, or newspapers based in the opposing team’s

BOOTH, D. (2006): “Sites of troth or metaphors of power? Refiguring the archive”,

archives and ‘push button’ content analysis”, European Journal of Communication,

ELIAS, N. (2008b): “What I mean by civilisation: Reply to Hans Peter Duerr”, IN

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