Paper Title
Role of Media in Sports in Turkey
Abstract
Sports is one of the oldest institutions of the human history. Sportive activities can vary according to the changing life conditions. Sports that is perceived as valuing the free time or enjoying the time has recently become more of this perception. Today, sports is an activity including determination to win requiring strength and effort for the sportsmen and an activity satisfying visually and creating excitement for the audiences (Küçük and Koç, 2015:8). Media enables conveying messages to people, observing the events around, answering various problems that occur around, and providing to be in a harmony with the surrounding. Besides all these, media has an efficient role upon practicing government policies and using economic instruments (Ceylan, 2012:51). Media as a mass communication tool is one of the most important factors of social life as of the technological improvements. Media is one of the remarkable instruments, as well, in shaping attitude and behaviors of the societies. Media has become efficient upon the development of individuals taking the place of society and social classes (Başlar, 2013:82). Sports media has recently not broadcasts sports news but also reflects magazine dimension of the sports. Information and interpretations especially towards popular sports has frequently appear on media. For increasing their audiences, media organs can prioritize magazine dimension of sports, and determine their broadcasting policies according to the ratings (Wheeler, 2011:238). Especially the broadcasting on football in Turkey are very common. News only on football is broadcasted and newspapers are printed. Moreover, most of the broadcasts includes information determined according to the ratings. Sports media in Turkey determines their broadcast stream on football. Football has dominated the majority of sports media. Other sports branches are generally included in case of important organizations. For example, interest towards athleticism in Turkey only increases during the Olympics, and interest towards volleyball and basketball increases only during the important matches. There are newspapers and magazines including only football, and football-contented discussion programs are broadcasted every day in a week. Football has been one of the inevitable phenomenon of our life. As the development on the internet, football has been followed interactively by more and more people. For that reason, sports media’s adopting fair, honest, ethical and moral broadcasting understanding will provide positive development of individuals’ attitudes and behaviors towards sports. In this study, documentation method will be used, and structure, sharers, and efficiency of sports media in Turkey will be evaluated in terms of different perspectives. Consequently, sports media has important roles upon providing individuals to love football and other sports. Sports media should broadcast as appropriate to all sports understandings of anyone. Sports media is required to determine broadcasting policies including female athletes and all sports branches adequately within the framework of peace and fellowship developing the natural culture being away from hate speeches. All these can increase the interest of the society towards sports, play important role in peace and fellowship of the masses, and cause training successful sportsmen in different branches of sports.
Key Words- Media, Sports, Sports media