Tennis, «leisure class» et nouvelles représentations du corps à la Belle Époque

Abstract

A critical consideration of contemporary tennis can tell us a lot about the birth of the leisure society in XIXth century. In order to read this evolution we must first understand its social organisation along with the dominant perception of the body, which is educated in and through the social activity (Godelier, 1984). This perception of the body itself conjoins cultural and social history. Through the processes of renewal from "Jeu de Paume" to lawn tennis and its impact upon the seaside, tennis builds during the "Belle Époque" a new "didactic of the body". We are witnessing a new way of practising thanks new procedures announcing the "self training" (Rauch, 1980; Peter, 2000; Vigarello, 2007). Through the development of "seaside tennis", the reproduction of tennis images as illustrations on post cards, and the analysis of articles from newspapers of the time, we introduce here questions concerning the appearance, and associated perception, of the body, which is built on new emotions and sociability linked with the birth of the "leisure class" and which comes to define "a society of leisure" (Veblen, 1899; Dumazedier, 1962).