Examining Possibilities of Structural Change and Cultural Transformation of Sport “Fields” Focusing on “Yuru Sports”

Focusing on “Yuru Sports”, this paper examined possibilities of structural change and cultural transformation of sport “fields”. Based on Bourdieu's discussion of the “fields”, the analysis was conducted from the perspectives of reproduction strategies, acquisition of legitimacy and symbolic struggle.<br> 　“Yuru Sports” have a value consciousness of “immediacy, playability and secularity” relativizing modern sport, and focus on “creating” sport in response to social issues. In the process of “creating”, the viewpoint from “minorities” is considered important, and the theoretical methodology of “minority design” is emphasized.<br> 　The development of “Yuru Sports” focused more on increasing sustainability of the field where the sports were created rather than spreading and developing them as individual sports. From the management of the World Yuru Sports Association, it was observed that the Association planned to form its own professional sport “field” and establish relative autonomy, based on sport as industry.<br> 　Next, the study focused on the movement toward the industrialization, which is closely linked to the methodology of promoting “Yuru Sports”. By organizing the tectonic shift from “sport as education” to “sport as industry” from the perspective of the “sacred-secular-play” diagram and cultural functions, the characteristics of “Yuru Sports” and the possibilities of structural change were examined.<br> 　In order to gain legitimacy as an industry, sport and its self-reflective function as a form of play will be further questioned. In this sense, “Yuru Sports” suggest the possibility of acquiring legitimacy through the methodology of internalizing self-reflective thinking by questioning its' own existence in the process of “creation” with minorities as the starting point.<br> 　Furthermore, the study focused on the “new sports” movement in Japan analyzing its strategy and the way it was swallowed by the framework of modern sports in order to analyze the trend of “Yuru Sports” relatively.<br> 　Finally, the potential of “Yuru Sports” was examined from the perspective of well-being and cultural enjoyment, the creation of a sport-creating culture, and cultural transformation.