Ep 5 - Ch 4 -- Organized Youth Sports

The fifth episode of the season focuses on chapter 4 "Organized Youth Sports: Whose Interests Do They Serve?" To explore chapter 4, we frame this episode with a discussion of the intertwined sociological concepts "structure" and "agency". After defining these key terms, we layout a history of organized youth sport. This history shows how institutional changes in US society and youth sports have impacted youth agency. We discuss at length the impacts of adult control on youth and anxieties around youth resistance to adult control. This brings us to the present "neoliberal model" of youth sport and how that impacts not only youth but also entire families. We extend this discussion to criticism of how a deficit-reduction model of youth sports is applied to low-income and "at-risk" youth. Finally, we conclude with what gives us hope and makes us excited about youth sports today and in the future.