Sociology of Pahlavani (the historicity and present of the ancient-heroic sport in Kermanshah)

History is the story of social life and collective phenomena. Methodical analysis and investigation of historical phenomena removes the aura and ambiguity of sanctity from them and ultimately leads to a kind of historical consciousness, which means understanding the dialectic that exists inside the phenomena. Pahlavani is a phenomenon that has been investigated in this essay in the social space of Kermanshah in order to describe its history, changes, necessity and possibility, and to analyze and interpret it from a sociological view. In terms of methodology, some statistical techniques, historical documents, semiotic and discourse analysis, and interviews have been used, depending on the research questions. After presenting a historical picture of the subject, while explaining the sociological functions of the Pahlavani phenomenon (including identity formation and cohesion, etc.), the article examines it from aspects such as social logic, structure, stratification, features of form and content, mythology and finally its relation to today's equivalent phenomena. The main thesis is that despite many attempts to symbolize (or ideologicalize), the Pahlavani phenomenon is a multidimensional phenomenon, but in different periods, depending on the social situation, one of its dimensions (for example, the heroic, the national, the ritual) has been highlighted. Also, due to the social logic of the contemporary world, which relies more on technical and consumption foundations, changes have been made to this phenomenon, which has displaced it from the it’s life-world and has transferred it into a larger consumption system, which is more based on the consumption of signs.