Scientific habits of mind, technological revolutions, and American sport

Guttmann discovered the root of the rationalizing impetus in sport in the worldviews cultivated by the scientific revolution of early modern Europe, as have many other neo-Weberians. Scientific ideas and technological innovations have profoundly influenced the development of modern sports in American history. Some of the first American historians to ponder the rise of modern sport contended that science and technology were key elements in the evolutionary process. Nancy Struna locates elements of modernization much earlier than many other historians, detailing specialization, bureaucratization, rationalization, and other neo-Weberian characteristics invading sport during the colonial era. Urban history has also fueled the acceleration of sport history since the 1970s. Numerous works in American sport history have focused on cities. The industrial revolutions that have transformed the American economy since the mid nineteenth century represent one of the most significant ways that technological change has shaped American sport.