Abstract

The present study seeks to examine the underrepresented transnational phenomenon of everyday verbal abuse in amateur football. Based on 34 semi-structured interviews with German and French amateur referees, a contrastive sociolinguistic model was developed which allows to identify type-specific influencing factors on the evaluation of verbal abuse. Although individual referee related characteristics have similar values across different types, especially the high intrinsic motivation, active communication, the disturbing influence of third parties, and the identification of alleged perpetrator groups, the comparative analysis shows that personal ambition, knowledge of rules, observed lingual behaviour, and the hierarchisation of verbal abuse based on its motivation have a significant influence on the evaluation of verbal abuse by German and French referees in amateur football. Due to the explorative nature of the non-representative sample, the present study is only an initial contribution to a better understanding of the phenomenon observed throughout Europe. It is therefore desirable that this study is followed by quantitatively oriented studies. Key words: verbal abuse, verbal devaluation, amateur football referee, Germany, France.