La construction d’un territoire de sports et de loisirs, les redéfinitions de l’Oisans de 1960 à nos jours.

Ever since the end of the 18^th century, European social imagination has turned towards a promotion of mountain areas. In France, the emergence and thriving of mountaineering until the mid-20^th century brought Oisans its respectability. However, starting from the 1960s, other recreational sports customs appeared and became the purpose of both winter and summer breaks.

Through a fine analysis at a micro-historical level of a territory, the Oisans, the aim of this thesis is to observe the socio-cultural process that led to the reshaping of this alpine area by the diversification of recreational sports practice. The historical dimension as well as the studied period (1960 until today) present a long-time interpretation that is vital to understand the apparition and spread of these practices. Some sports are going to develop, while others will be short-lived. The path of some sports will particularly be studied, not only for their symbolic dimension, but also because they are becoming the driving force behind the touristic economy of the territory (mountaineering and other related activities, such as skiing, road cycling or mountain biking).

Source materials make it possible to highlight the representations of local and exterior stakeholders that determine the future orientations of the territory. Two consequences deserve to be emphasized. Since the 1960s and particularly because of the Grenoble Winter Olympic Games, the development of tourism as a sole paradigm incites territory stakeholders to equip themselves with dedicated infrastructures without truly taking global warming into account. Ten to twenty years later, the development of winter sliding sports derived from skiing but practiced according to new methods (monoskiing, then snowboarding, skwal…) led not only territory stakeholders to adapt, but also modify the customs and influence of sports activities on the territory, as is shown by our case study regarding Les Deux Alpes ski instructors. As of today’s date, with the assumption of a complete melting of the ice caps, climatic changes encourage to question social and cultural innovations in sports practice able to answer this issue.

This study offers a substantial diagnosis as part of a forecasting reflection. “Tomorrow, which territory/ries for which recreational sports practice?”.