From the racecourse to the silver screen: An analysis of horse racing in cinema within the framework of the sociology of the leisure

This study examines horse racing within the frameworks of leisure sociology and the sociology of gambling, focusing on how this practice is represented in cinematic narratives through the method of critical discourse analysis. In modern societies, leisure is not merely a time of rest or entertainment, but a sociological category through which individuals construct identity, express class affiliations, and produce cultural meanings. As such, horse racing emerges as a unique social practice that functions both as a leisure activity and a gambling behavior involving risk, chance, and symbolic competition. The thesis investigates horse racing as a social event and as a cultural phenomenon of representation. Through critical discourse analysis of selected films, the thesis explores how horse racing is portrayed in cinema, which social meanings are attached to it, and how themes such as luck, fate, loss, aspiration, addiction, and class mobility are constructed around it. These representations reveal the embedded ideological codes and cultural narratives that frame leisure in contemporary society. By positioning cinema as a powerful discursive arena where social realities are reflected and restructured, this study argues that leisure is a culturally and ideologically mediated field, rather than a neutral domain. In doing so, it contributes to both leisure studies and cultural representation analysis, offering a multidisciplinary and critical perspective on a rarely examined intersection in Turkish academic literature.