CHANGES IN SOCIETY
Changes in Society
Great Grandparents
•
idle hands
Grandparents
•
refresh from work
Parents
•
work to support their leisure/play
Today’s young adults
•
work hard and play hard
Children/Grandchildren
•
Play is the purpose of life
Urbanization
 Population movement
 Rural to Urban
 Drastic increase in the American Population
 Development of “Factory” towns
 Work Week
 Was 70 to 80 hours a week
 As a result of labor unions became 40 hours a week
 Decrease in child labor
Protestant Work Ethic
 The Industrial Revolution
 Entrenched the thought of work as good and leisure as evil
 Despite the use of Protestant Work Ethic
 Leisure and Recreation interests grew
 Work week reduced to 40 hours
Leisure Interests 1800’s
 Professional Sport
 Grew in popularity
 Wrestling
 Foot races
 Shooting events
 Horse races
 Sports Promotions emerged as a business
 Bare knuckle fighting evolved into boxing with gloves
 Social Class Differences
 Baseball known as a working class sport
 Development of permanent baseball stadiums
 General Popular Pastimes
 Croquet
 Archery
 Lawn Tennis
 Women began participating in recreation activities during the
1800’s
Growth of Commercial Amusement
 Large Cities
 New forms of amusement/recreation developed
 Dance Halls
 Shooting galleries
 Bowling alleys
 Billiard parlors
 Beer gardens
 Red light districts
Recreation Movement Late 1800’s
 Education and improving intellectual cultivation became a
civic concern.
 Development of free public libraries
 Recreation Movement
 Forms of leisure activity were provided in an organized
manner
 State Parks were being developed
 Municipal Parks were being developed because of reckless
development of urban growth
Playground Movement
WHY?
 Wave of urbanization reaches its peak
 Population doubled -14 million to 30 million between 1880 & 1900
 At the centuries end 28 cities had a population over 100,000
 Social reformers called tenements buildings overcrowded, filthy,
dark, with out of control crime
 Boston Sand Garden was the first playground in the country
 Designed specifically for children
 Piles of sand with some play equipment
 Monitored by citizens until 1887 when women were hired to monitor
 1889 the city of Boston dedicated city money to add support
Pioneers of the Playground Movement
 Joseph Lee – Father of the playground movement
 Organized playgrounds in vacant lots
Luther Halsey Gulick
Instrumental in development of the Playground Association – 1906
Distinguished play from recreation
Jane Addams
Established the Hull House (a settlement house – middle class
volunteers would live and share knowledge and culture with their
poorer neighbors) in Chicago housing a model playground of the time
Styles of Playgrounds
 Traditional - consists of steel slides, seesaws, swings, merry-go
rounds and climbing apparatus placed on dirt, asphalt or grass.
 Contemporary - Offer more stimulation, children can modify
equipment to create new challenges, items such as tires, railroad
ties, and cable spools are used to build wooden climbing
platforms, ladders, tire nets, suspension bridges.
 Adventure - This playground style began in post-WW 2 Europe
when children designed their own playgrounds out of sites of
bombed out buildings.
 Modern - Today, designers are combining some elements of each
of the playground styles to create a safer and more varied play
environment that offer a developmental progression of challenges
and skill building opportunities. Equipment is safe, reliability, easy
to install, and manufactured in an array of colors and shapes. Soft
contained play equipment playgrounds offer soft, pliable tunnels,
climbers, slides and other moving components.
Late 20th Century
Family Structure –
Between 1970 and 1997 the proportion of children in 2 parent
families decreased from 85% to 68%. That decline was
higher for African-American families.
At the end of the 20th century over 37% of all families lived
below the poverty level
The number of people working has also grown over the past
two decades as more women have entered the work force
and as the number of single parent families increased.
Baby boomers waited longer to have children and the number
of children was smaller than in the past.
The number of Baby Boomers started moving into their senior
years in 2011 and will be a population bulge for the next 20
years.
These seniors are more active, have more money and live
longer than older adults previously did.
Health Conditions –
High numbers of overweight children and adults.
Better healthcare
Advanced medical technology
Pharmaceutical advancements
Social Development –
Violence diminishes the perceived freedom that people feel
which changes human behavior
Increased diversity in the U.S. with a larger number of
immigrants
Values from the U.S.
 The U.S. is an Urban society with an Urban value system.
 Values of consumption and conspicuous display
 ex: buying products to show how wealthy one is, expecting
campgrounds to have indoor plumbing, air conditioning and
electricity
Work as a Value
 Although having a good time is an American tradition, few
nations have exhibited more respect for the work ethic than
the U.S.
 The 40 hour work week is the standard. However, with
technology and commuting, those hours have extended.
 America ranks below most industrialized nations in the
average number of vacations per year.
Values as a Basis for Change
Sociologists refer to social and personal values as those beliefs
and behaviors that an individual or a society deems important
to its welfare.
Every society develops a social value system
As society changes when different groups develop (ex.
Divorced population increased) and the value system is
altered.
Recreation and Leisure Changes
 More than 70 federal agencies develop programs and policies
that affect recreation and leisure behaviors or supervise and
maintain recreation resources.
 Fish and Wildlife Service (regulatory)
 National Park Service (resource management)
 The demand for recreation on a local level has extended to
developing services and partnerships for older adults,
childcare and after school programs for youth.
 Tourism has become a year round activity and have an
economic impact on the local communities.
 Technology has influenced leisure and communication by
providing instant entertainment.