Modern age Olympic Games: between tradition, mega-events and media spectacularization

Abstract

Since its first realization more than a century ago, the Olympic Movement of the Modern Era reveals a close relationship with the dynamics of society, as it has been involved in extra-sporting situations that have altered its course and determined new points of view. Coubertin's idea, from the beginning, was for a grand event, different from amateur competitions, that would attract the attention of the public, especially young people. Since its conception in 1896, the Modern Olympics have grown and gained their own symbols and rituals, becoming a mega event and a big business. Thus, the Games have been idealized with the premise of increasingly larger spectacles, a fact that is due, among other factors, to media coverage. The purpose of this bibliographical research study is to discuss the historical transformations that took place with the emergence and holding of the Olympic Games in the Modern Era, as well as to identify the relations existing in the changes that took place in the holding of this sporting phenomenon and the media. Analyzing the historical course of the Olympics and its relationship with the media may allow us to understand the denial of its original ideology, or at least, the shaking in the belief of the Games as a ‘pure’ competition, clean of political and commercial interests, directed to the magnifying of the universal physical culture.