Abstract
This historical research looks into the debate about sports practice promoted by doctors, educators and chroniclers in the cities of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro between 1915 and 1929. Its historical source is the intellectual production of that period. This study analyzes the debates in the intellectual environment that reveal specific representations about youth sport practice and identifies stances taken by subjects on sport and their contribution to ongoing debates. We conclude that dissent about the role played by sports practice was partly related to eugenics control and rationalization of youth entertainment. Such conflicts and tensions evidenced different discourses circulating about sports, which share the desire to educate adolescents in order to eradicate habits seen as dangerous and immoral.
Keywords
History; Sports; Education; Adolescent