FROM SPORT’S "ORIGINS" IN ENGLAND TO THE OLYMPIC GAMES IDEALIZED BY COUBERTIN: AN OVERVIEW OF THE ACADEMIC LITERATURE IN ENGLISH

Abstract

There is a relative consensus within the Brazilian scientific production that the beginning of the modern features of sport are on English public schools by the end of the 19^th century. However, descriptions on the context of the transformation from practices to sports and their new meanings that influenced Pierre de Coubertin to the Olympic Games “revival” are very rare. Then, the aim of this article is to agglutinate subsides from the academic production in English about the context of transformation of these practices in the English public schools in the 19^th century, as well as their new meanings and the influences on Pierre de Coubertin. We argue that the social conditions through the transition phase have directly influenced for changing the meanings of sport practices had, provoking significant impacts for the development of the sport phenomenon in the 20^th and 21^st centuries.