The Racing Game

James David Barber (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

200 Seiten

2005
AldineTransaction (Verlag)
978-0-202-30809-8 (ISBN)

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This study of a unique social world probes beneath the thrill and spectacle of horse racing into the lives of the "honest boys," the "gyps," the "manipulators," the "stoops," and the "Chalk eaters"--the constituents of race track society and the players of the racing game. With scientific precision and journalistic vigor, Scott describes the everyday activities--the objectives and strategies--of those whose lives are organized around track proceedings and who compete with chance and one another.

The players in the racing game range from track owners to stable boys, from law enforcers to lawbreakers, and from casual sportsmen to pathologically addicted gamblers. Considering the self-interests, the normative and operational codes, and the interactional relationships among the major types and subtypes of participants, the author defines the components of strategic movement within the framework of rules and resources to show how a player's relations to the "means of production" governs his behavior.

The fruitful application of sociological theory and method to an unusually interesting social context makes this particularly useful still for courses in social problems and the sociology of organizations and of leisure.

James David Barber

1: Introduction; I: The Performers; 2: What Is a Horse?; 3: The Man on the Horse; 4: The Man behind the Horse; II: The Audience; 5: The Regulars; 6: The Occasionals; 7: Playing the Book; III: The Stage Managers; 8: The Official Family; 9: Conclusion

Erscheint lt. Verlag	30.9.2005
Verlagsort	Somerset
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 229 mm
Gewicht	204 g
Themenwelt	Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Sport ► Reiten / Pferde
	Sozialwissenschaften ► Ethnologie
	Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie
ISBN-10	0-202-30809-X / 020230809X
ISBN-13	978-0-202-30809-8 / 9780202308098
Zustand	Neuware