Sports Fiction: A Television Genre. Description of Its Main Values and Narratives
The Institute’s collaborator, Elena Fedotova, presented the findings of a study on sports fiction from the Gendered Sports Fiction research group at the III International SPRING Conference. Sports Marketing, Journalism, Communications and Sponsorship, held at the University of Málaga on February 20-21.
The presentation, titled "Sports Fiction on Television as a Genre", was co-authored with Anna Tous Rovirosa and Raquel Crisóstomo. It focused on identifying the predominant sub-genres and formats of sports-themed TV series, as well as their television characteristics, the values they convey, and the extent to which they achieve their narrative goals.
The results reveal that drama is the dominant format (84%), with American productions (69%), Netflix as the leading platform (29%), and football and basketball as the main sports (20%), followed by hockey, tennis, etc. Most series target an adult audience (67%). The study also found a hedonic approach to storytelling (where the protagonist succeeds in achieving their goals) (33%), emphasizing professional growth objectives (44%) and values such as commitment and responsibility (18%), with some series incorporating nostalgia.
The study is based on TV series broadcast in Spain by U.S. OTT platforms (Netflix, Apple TV, Disney, Starz, HBO, and Prime Video) and European TV channels TVC and NRK between 2018 and 2023.
This research is part of the Gendered Sports Fiction project, funded by the PPC23 call for precompetitive projects at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, and led by Dr. Anna Tous.