Editing Leisure (section)

== History ==
Leisure has historically been the privilege of the [[upper class]].<ref>Peter N. Stearns, ed., ''Encyclopedia of European social history from 1350 to 2000'' (2001) 5:3–261.</ref> Opportunities for leisure came with more money, or organization, and less working time, rising dramatically in the mid-to-late 19th century, starting in Great Britain and spreading to other rich nations in Europe. It spread as well to the United States, although that country had a reputation in Europe for providing much less leisure despite its wealth.  Immigrants to the United States discovered they had to work harder than they did in Europe.<ref>{{cite book|author=Mark Wyman|title=Round-trip to America: The Immigrants Return to Europe, 1880–1930|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SJOh-Yt4PdkC&pg=PA53|year=1993|publisher=Cornell University Press|page=53|isbn=978-0801481123}}</ref> Economists continue to investigate why Americans work longer hours.<ref>Edward C. Prescott, "Why do Americans work so much more than Europeans?" (No. w10316. National Bureau of Economic Research, 2004) [https://www.minneapolisfed.org/research/qr/qr2811.pdf online].</ref> In a recent book, Laurent Turcot argues that leisure was not created in the 19th century but is imbricated in the occidental world since the beginning of history.<ref>Laurent Turcot, Sports et Loisirs. Une histoire des origines à nos jours. Paris, Gallimard, 2016.</ref>

=== Canada ===
In Canada, leisure in the country is related to the decline in work hours and is shaped by moral values, and the ethnic-religious and gender communities. In a cold country with winter's long nights, and summer's extended daylight, favorite leisure activities include horse racing, team sports such as hockey, singalongs, roller skating and board games.<ref>Suzanne Morton, "Leisure", ''Oxford Companion to Canadian History'' (2006) pp. 355–356.</ref><ref>George Karlis, ''Leisure and recreation in Canadian society: An introduction'' (2011).</ref><ref>Gerald Redmond, "Some Aspects of Organized Sport and Leisure in Nineteenth-Century Canada." ''Loisir et société/Society and Leisure'' 2#1 (1979): 71–100.</ref>  The churches tried to steer leisure activities, by preaching against drinking and scheduling annual revivals and weekly club activities.<ref>{{cite book|author=Lynne Sorrel Marks|title=Revivals and Roller Rinks: Religion, Leisure, and Identity in Late-nineteenth-century Small-town Ontario|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2T4miKwsIIcC&pg=PR1|year=1996|publisher=University of Toronto Press |isbn=978-0802078001}}</ref>  By 1930 radio played a major role in uniting Canadians behind their local or regional hockey teams. Play-by-play sports coverage, especially of ice hockey, absorbed fans far more intensely than newspaper accounts the next day.  Rural areas were especially influenced by sports coverage.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Lorenz | first1 = Stacy L. | year = 2000 | title = A Lively Interest on the Prairies": Western Canada, the Mass Media, and a 'World of Sport,' 1870–1939 | journal = Journal of Sport History | volume = 27 | issue = 2| pages = 195–227 }}</ref>

=== France ===
Leisure by the mid-19th century was no longer an individualistic activity. It was increasingly organized. In the French industrial city of [[Lille]], with a population of 80,000 in 1858, the cabarets or taverns for the working class numbered 1300, or one for every three houses. Lille counted 63 drinking and singing clubs, 37 clubs for card players, 23 for bowling, 13 for skittles, and 18 for archery. The churches likewise have their social organizations.  Each club had a long roster of officers, and a busy schedule of banquets, festivals and competitions. At the turn of the century thousands of these clubs had been created.<ref>Theodore Zeldin, ''France, 1848–1945, vol. 2, Intellect, Taste and Anxiety'' This made many people happy as now they could spend more time together.
 (1977) pp 2:270–271.</ref>

=== United Kingdom ===
[[File:DV257 no.10 The start.png|thumb|A caricature of upper class Victorian tourists, 1852]]
As literacy, wealth, ease of travel, and a broadened sense of community grew in Britain from the mid-19th century onward, there was more time and interest in leisure activities of all sorts, on the part of all classes.<ref name="Peter J. Beck 2008">Peter J. Beck, "Leisure and Sport in Britain." in Chris Wrigley, ed., ''A Companion to Early Twentieth-Century Britain'' (2008): 453–469.</ref>

Opportunities for leisure activities increased because real wages continued to grow and hours of work continued to decline. In urban Britain, the nine-hour day was increasingly the norm; the [[1874 Factory Act]] limited the workweek to 56.5 hours. The movement toward an eight-hour day. Furthermore, system of routine annual vacations came into play, starting with white-collar workers and moving into the working-class.<ref>[[G. R. Searle]], ''A New England?: Peace and War, 1886–1918'' (Oxford University Press, 2004), 529–570.</ref><ref>Hugh Cunningham, ''Time, work and leisure: Life changes in England since 1700'' (2014)</ref> Some 200 seaside resorts emerged thanks to cheap hotels and inexpensive railway fares, widespread banking holidays and the fading of many religious prohibitions against secular activities on Sundays.<ref>[[John K. Walton]], ''The English seaside resort. A social history 1750–1914'' (1983).</ref>

By the late [[Victorian era]], the leisure industry had emerged in all British cities, and the pattern was copied across Western Europe and North America. It provided scheduled entertainment of suitable length and convenient locales at inexpensive prices. These include sporting events, music halls, and popular theater. By 1880 football was no longer the preserve of the social elite, as it attracted large working-class audiences. Average gate was 5,000 in 1905, rising to 23,000 in 1913. That amounted to 6 million paying customers with a weekly turnover of £400,000. Sports by 1900 generated some three percent of the total gross national product in Britain. Professionalization of sports was the norm, although some new activities reached an upscale amateur audience, such as lawn tennis and golf. Women were now allowed in some sports, such as archery, tennis, badminton and gymnastics.<ref>Searle, ''A New England?'' pp. 547–553</ref>

Leisure was primarily a male activity, with middle-class women allowed in at the margins. There were class differences with upper-class clubs, and working-class and middle-class pubs.<ref>Peter Haydon, ''The English pub: a history'' (1994).</ref> Heavy drinking declined; there was more betting on outcomes. Participation in sports and all sorts of leisure activities increased for average English people, and their interest in spectator sports increased dramatically.<ref>John K. Walton, ''Leisure in Britain, 1780–1939'' (1983).</ref>

By the 1920s the cinema and radio attracted all classes, ages, and genders in very large numbers. Giant palaces were built for the huge audiences that wanted to see Hollywood films. In Liverpool 40 percent of the population attended one of the 69 cinemas once a week; 25 percent went twice. Traditionalists grumbled about the American cultural invasion, but the permanent impact was minor.<ref>[[Charles Loch Mowat]], ''Britain between the Wars 1918–1940'' (1955) pp. 246–250</ref>

The British showed a more profound interest in sports, and in greater variety, that any rival. They gave pride of place to such moral issues as sportsmanship and fair play.<ref name="Peter J. Beck 2008"/> [[Cricket]] became symbolic of the Imperial spirit throughout the Empire. Soccer proved highly attractive to the urban working classes, which introduced the rowdy spectator to the sports world. In some sports, there was significant controversy in the fight for amateur purity especially in rugby and rowing.  New games became popular almost overnight, including golf, lawn tennis, cycling and hockey. Women were much more likely to enter these sports than the old established ones.  The aristocracy and landed gentry, with their ironclad control over land rights, dominated hunting, shooting, fishing and horse racing.<ref>Derek Birley, ''Land of sport and glory: Sport and British society, 1887–1910'' (1995)</ref>

Cricket had become well-established among the English upper class in the 18th century, and was a major factor in sports competition among the public schools. Army units around the Empire had time on their hands, and encouraged the locals to learn cricket so they could have some entertaining competition. Most of the Empire embraced cricket, with the exception of Canada.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Cooper | first1 = David | year = 1999 | title = Canadians Declare 'It Isn't Cricket': A Century of Rejection of the Imperial Game, 1860–1960 | journal = Journal of Sport History | volume = 26 | pages = 51–81 }}</ref>  Cricket test matches (international) began by the 1870s; the most famous is that between Australia and Britain for "[[The Ashes]]".<ref>Derek Birley, ''A Social History of English Cricket'' (1999) [https://www.amazon.com/Social-History-English-Cricket-Classics/dp/1781311765/  excerpt]</ref>