EMERGE 2016: The Future of Sport 2040

Exploring the future of sport in a hands-­on festival at Arizona State University’s Wells Fargo Arena
April 8, 2016

(credit: ASU)

What will sport look like in 2040? What would you like it to be? How can we steer the development of “sport” to answer our cravings for fun, adrenalin, competition and collaboration so common in our species?

Explore these questions and more in an interactive event that dares to challenge preconceptions of what sport is and should be — Emerge 2016: The Future of Sport 2040. Join Arizona State University’s School for the Future of Innovation in Society (SFIS) and its partners on April 29 from 5:00 pm to 10:00pm in ASU’s premier sport venue, Wells Fargo Arena, for a fun, fascinating and forward look at one of the oldest of human activities: sport.

The entire family — sports lovers or not — will find opportunities to play, explore, design, interact;; to engage the mind, move the body and jumpstart the imagination in the form of “visitations from the future.” These visitations, designed by artists, engineers, athletes, biologists and others, are hands-­on, participatory opportunities to explore the futures in which we can thrive. “Emerge is an observation deck on the future. You can’t have better futures without better dreams, and visitations are the way we make dreams reality” said Joel Garreau, a founding Director of Emerge and affiliated faculty at SFIS. Visitations will include:

  • Enhanced humans who are part machine. These cyborgs are already among us. Have your mind blown by the extraordinary abilities of our ParaOlympic athletes from the future.
  • The Future of Fashion Sportswear with national designer Emily Payne (of Project runway season 13 and the 2016 All stars Season) and local designer Angela Johnson.
  • Athletes who are mainly brain and eSport that attract legions of spectators along with cheerleaders, marching bands and god-­and-­goddess avatars who come to life in the flesh.
  • A live presentation from the Science Cheerleaders representing over 300 NFL/NBA cheerleaders pursuing STEM careers, who will be cheering on the future of sports, introducing their new Science of Cheerleading e-­book, and promoting citizen science.
  • An interactive new sport experience, “The Future of Cheating,” a live game that imitates the characteristics of cancer moving through the body.
  • Arizona Storytellers talking about sport in the decades to come.
  • A “Future of Fun” online competition identifying the most innovative playground activities of the future, with winners selected at Emerge on April 29, 2016.
  • An interactive Simulated Fantasy Sports Draft Party where visitors choose the ways that fantasy sports relate to personal ethics and how future innovations shape our choices.
  • An exploration into how Climate Change will shape new sports.
  • The Curtain of Distraction 2040 that employs professional psych-­out experts, materials engineers, and costumers with dastardly imaginations to help ASU win games.
  • The future of violence in sport – proudly proclaimed by women athletes who are more recognized in popular culture than the men in their mixed martial arts.

Emerge 2016 will also feature a host of visionaries who will co-­imagine the future through relay “heats” of conversation. A short list of the visionaries includes David Brian Johnson, Futurist; Emily Payne, Fashion Designer; Misty Hyman, Gold Medalist Olympian; Davy Rothbart, Found Magazine founder – and the list grows weekly. “We are thrilled to be hosting a cutting-­edge, interdisciplinary event that will help not only envision and perform ideas about the Future of Sport, but that will also help to create the Future of Sport,” said David Guston, founding Director of SFIS. Pass the baton and be electrified by these fast-­paced opportunities to peer into the future.

— Event producer