Winner of the British Sociological Association Philip Abrams Memorial Prize 2017 This book is a case study of an African-Caribbean-founded football club, Meadebrook Cavaliers, from the English East Midlands. Covering the years 1970 to 2010, it seeks to address the paucity of research on the British African-Caribbean male experience in leisure and sport as well as on the relationship between "race" and local-level football. The development of the club was intimately connected to wider changes in the social and sporting terrain. Based on a mix of archival and ethnographic research, the book examines the club's growth over four decades, exploring the attitudes, social realities and identity politics of its African-Caribbean membership and the varying demands and expectations of the wider black community. In doing so, it shows how studies of minority ethnic and local football clubs can shed light on the changing social identities and cultural dynamics of the communities that constitute them.

This book deals broadly with tourism planning and development from the perspective of Croatia, a major Adriatic tourism destination which is fast becoming one of the most popular vacation spots in the European Union. With the recent accession of Croatia to the EU, Croatia is undergoing a rapid political and economic transition and generating scholarly interest in the country's primary, secondary, and tertiary industries. This book examines the country's long history and thriving success in the tourism industry through issues of destination image and identity, management challenges, economic impact, and how to attract tourists in the midst of extreme political changes. The book explores the implications of policy decisions on product development and takes a theoretically sound approach to destination planning and problem-solving in Croatia. Its timely view of Croatian national tourism policy and the broader Adriatic/Mediterranean region makes this book of interest to all scholars, students, and practitioners engaged in various aspects of destination development planning and management.

Book reading often seems to function as a barometer of cultural vitality. For those who wish to argue that we live in a dumbed-down age, the alleged decline in book reading often becomes the benchmark of falling cultural standards. Although pessimistic critics and commentators may shout that the time of the book is over, as they have since the fifteenth century, millions of readers worldwide are not listening to them. Despite the allure of television and the internet, book reading remains a popular activity. However, despite the huge global audiences for books, it is surprising that the complexity of everyday book culture is not readily comprehended. To the apparently simple and perennial question: 'what do people do with books?', this research offers a sophisticated response that goes beyond the narrow perception that reading is solely the consumption of narrative. It combines a number of different academic approaches (cultural geography and sociology; literary and cultural studies; and cultural history) in order to better understand the complex nature of readers' everyday encounters with their books. Through the use of an ethnographic method, which grounds the analysis firmly in the experience of real embodied readers, this work reveals the rich textures of everyday reading culture. It demonstrates how seemingly mundane acts of popular reading are, in fact, complex performances enabled and curtailed simultaneously by three cultural economies: the spatio-temporal, the social and the textual. While the consumption of narrative (often thought to be an entirely adequate definition of reading) remains significant, it is only a single element in an everyday reading practice that is, as this book shows, anything but ordinary.

Despite campaigns to educate and increase awareness, discrimination continues to be a deep-rooted problem in sport. This book provides an international, interdisciplinary and critical discussion of various forms of discrimination in sport today, with contributions from world-leading academics and high-profile campaigners. Divided into five sections, the book explores racism, sexism, homophobia, disability, and the role of media in both perpetuating and tackling discrimination across a variety of sports and sporting events around the world. Drawing on examples from football, rugby, cricket, tennis, climbing, the Olympics and the Paralympics, it offers a critical review of current debates and discusses the latest empirical research on the changing nature of discrimination in sport. Taking into account the experiences of athletes and coaches across all performance levels, it presents recommendations for further action and directions for future research. A timely and challenging study, Sport and Discrimination is essential reading for all students and scholars of sports studies with an interest in the sociology of sport and the relationship between sport, society and the media.

This edited volume considers the U.S.-Mexico soccer rivalry, which occurs against a complex geo-political, social, and economic backdrop. Multidisciplinary contributions explore how a long and complicated history between these countries has produced a unique rivalry-one in which loyalties split friends and family; fan turnout in many regions of the U.S. favors Mexico; and games are imbued with both national pride and politics. The themes of nationhood, geography, citizenship, acculturation, identity, globalization, narrative and mythology reverberate throughout this book, especially with regard to how they shape place, identity, and culture.

This book describes cutting-edge applications of human factors for sports, injury prevention and outdoor recreation disciplines and provide practical guidance on a range of methods for describing, representing, and evaluating human, team, and system performance in various domains. Contributions in this book show how various human factors methods, applied historically in the complex safety critical domains, are suited to describing and understanding sports performance and sports injury prevention. The book discusses a wealth of methods for different purposes, such as data collection, task analysis (including cognitive task analysis), workload measurement, assessing situation awareness, performance assessment (including team performance assessment),decision making and cognition in sports, human error identification, and interface evaluation methods. With respect to other publications in human factors and ergonomics, which have been more focused on the biomechanical, physiological, environmental, and equipment-related aspects of sports performance, this book gives a special emphasis to research on analysis of individual and team sports, cognitive and social human factors, and covers both sports and outdoor recreation disciplines. Based on the AHFE 2017 Conference on Human Factors in Sports, Injury Prevention and Outdoor Recreation, held on July 17-21, 2017, in Los Angeles, California, USA, this book provides readers with a timely survey of new methods that can be implemented during any sport or outdoor recreation event, and for analyzing and improving the performance and safety of both individuals and teams.

The sensory revolution in the social sciences is transforming the ways in which the senses and the sensorium are studied and understood in relation to bodies in action. This is the first book to investigate the impact, and challenges, of this revolution for those interested in physical culture. Providing vivid examples of sensory scholarship in action from sport, physical activity, leisure and recreation, this book brings together leading figures to discuss how we go about seeking the senses, how we engage in somatic work, and how we create meanings and come to understand ourselves and others as embodied beings in a variety of social settings over time. Featuring original reflections on athletics, running, cycling, sailing, kayaking, windsurfing, glow sports, jiu jitsu, mixed martial arts and yoga, this ground breaking collection showcases the latest sensory research in physical culture as well as paving the way both conceptually and methodologically for future work in this area. Seeking the Senses in Physical Culture: Sensuous scholarship in action is fascinating reading for all those interested in physical cultural and body studies; the sociology, psychology and philosophy of sport; leisure and recreation studies; and physical education.

This book brings together some of the leading authors in sport and sociocultural diversity. Social and cultural diversity becomes a key conceptual framework and lens through which to examine and understand a wide range of cultural issues related to: nationalism, gender, race, ethnicity, indigenous culture, sexuality, (dis)ability and even religiosity. This volume explores the dimensions of cultural diversity that relate to many of the aforementioned dimensions as they are located within the broad context of sport. The chapters are grounded in a variety of concepts and theories, and deal with policy, inclusion, affirmative action legislations, identity, and equity in all aspects of sports organisations as well as related issues that have emerged within the context of social and cultural diversity.Topics covered include: Politics of Identity and Representation, Theorising Sport and Inclusion Practices, Accommodation and Resistance to Diversity/Equality, Symbolic Construction of Sports Communities, Ethnocentrism and Whiteness, Ethnic Identities and Corporate Managerialism, Exploration of Alternative Leadership Paradigms, and Affirmative Action. Themes considered include: Gender, Race, Ethnicity, Indigeneity, Sexuality, (Dis)Ability, and Religiosity. The volume provides accounts from authors throughout the world in examining current ideas about social and cultural diversity in sporting worlds.

Sport is enjoyed by millions of people across the world, and both watching and playing sport constitutes a major part of modern leisure time. But sport is also a huge worldwide industry. In Globalizing Sport, George Sage invites readers to explore a deeper understanding of the global dynamics of sport - not only competitions but of the big businesses of money, media coverage, athletic apparel and more. He shows how phenomena such as migration, labour, commerce and politics affect the athletes and the fans, continually reshaping the business and experience of sport. Globalizing Sport puts sport in its political, economic and social context, revealing its connections with businesses, countries, media outlets and education systems.

Analyzing the key players and political moments in women's professional tennis since 1968, this book explores the historical lineage of social activism within women's tennis and the issues, expressions, risks, and effects associated with each cohort of players. Drawing on original qualitative research, including interviews with former players, the book examines tennis's position in debates around gender, sexuality, race, and equal pay. It looks at how the actions and choices of the pioneering activist players were simultaneously shaped by, and had a part in shaping, larger social movements committed to challenging the status quo and working towards increased economic equality for women. Taking an intersectional approach, the book assesses the significance of players from Althea Gibson and Martina Navratilova to Venus and Serena Williams, illuminating our understanding of the relationship between sport, social justice, and wider society. This is important reading for researchers and students working in sport studies, sociology, women's studies, and political science, as well as anybody with an interest in social activism and social movements. It is also a fascinating read for the general tennis fan.

Western digital game play has shifted in important ways over the last decade, with a plethora of personal devices affording a range of increasingly diverse play experiences. Despite the celebration of a more inclusive environment of digital game play, very little grounded research has been devoted to the examination of familial play and the domestication of digital games, as opposed to evolving public and educational contexts. This book is the first study to provide a situated investigation of the site of family play- the shared spaces and private places of gameplay within the domestic sphere. It carries out an empirically grounded and critical analysis of what marketing and sales discourses about shifts in the digital games audience actually look like in the space of the home, as well as the social and cultural role these ludic technologies take in the everyday practices of the family in the domestic context. It examines the material realities of video game technologies in the home; including time management and spatial organization, as well as the discursive role these devices play in discussions of technological competence and its complex relationship to age, generational differences, and gender performance. Harvey's interdisciplinary approach and innovative methodology will hold great critical appeal for those studying digital culture, children's media, and feminist studies of new media, as well as critical theories of technology and leisure and sport theory.

This innovative new text examines sport's relationship with politics and argues that sport has always been political, even as far back as antiquity. However, in the last 30 years there has been an unprecedented politicization of sport through increasing government intervention. Jonathan Grix takes a comprehensive and engaging look at sport politics by examining state involvement in initiatives from sports mega-events through to grass-roots and community sport activities. Providing an accessible introduction to this growing area of study, the text examines a number of approaches to the topic - including theories from Political Science, Sociology and International Relations - and adopts a critical framework throughout. In doing so the text discusses the relationship between social capital and sport, how governments use sport for non-sporting objectives and the role of governance in sport policy. Real-world examples demonstrate just how entwined sport and politics are: from ardent soccer fans effectively 'locked-in' by ever-increasing ticket prices, to taxpayer's money funding ever more extravagant international sports mega-events, to the moral and political implications of doping.

This volume is built around three assumptions - first, that for huge numbers people around the world, including many sport lovers, there are more important things in life than sport; second, that the governance of sport is in many ways problematic and needs to be confronted; and, third, that contrary to the still-popular belief that sport and politics don't mix, sport often provides an ideal theatre for the enacting of political protest. The book contains studies of a range of protests, stretching back to the death of suffragist Emily Davison at the Derby of 1913 and encompassing subsequent protests against the exclusion of women from the sporting arena; the Berlin Olympics of 1936; Western imperialism; the Mexico Olympics, 1968; the state racism of apartheid in South Africa; the effect of the global golf industry on ecosystems; Israeli government policy; resistance to the various attempts to bring the Olympic Games to Canadian and American cities; the cutting of welfare benefits for disabled British citizens; class privilege in the UK; Russian anti-gay laws; and high public spending on sport mega-events in Brazil. The collection will be of interest to scholars and students with an interest in Sports Studies, History, Politics, Geography, Cultural Studies and Sociology.

The social role of sport enterprises is being increasingly recognized at both local and global levels. Sport has the ability to influence community cohesion, physical and mental health, social inclusivity, and provides positive role models across society. More businesses in sport are incorporating these social aspects into their plans as a way of differentiating themselves from their competitors. This, in turn, has led to more social innovation in sport. Recently, there has been more emphasis on social entrepreneurship in sport due to the growing need to capture its societal impact. This book explores the non-profit role sport plays in society, and demonstrates how social enterprises can both address some of the negative social outcomes of sport and support businesses as they develop their social objectives. The over-arching aim of the book is to focus on how social entrepreneurship in sport is important in developing a better global society.

The multiplicity of tourism encounters provide some of the best available occasions to observe the social world and its making(s). Focusing on ontological politics of tourism development, this book examines how different versions of tourism are enacted, how encounters between different versions of tourism orderings may result in controversies, but also on how these enactments and encounters are entangled in multiple ways to broader areas of development, conservation, policy and destination management. Throughout the book, encounters and controversies are investigated from a poststructuralist and relational approach as complex and emerging, seeing the roles and characteristics of related actors as co-constituted. Inspired by post-actor-network theory and related research, the studies include the social as well as the material, but also multiplicity and ontological politics when examining controversial matters or events.

While the relationship between sport and religion is deeply rooted in history, it continues to play a profound role in shaping modern-day societies. This edited collection provides an inter-disciplinary exploration of this relationship from a global perspective, making a major contribution to the religious, social scientific and theological study of sport. It discusses the dialectical interplay between sport and Christianity across diverse cultures, extending beyond a Western perspective to include studies from Africa, South America and Asia, as well as Europe, the UK and the US. Containing contributions from leading experts within the field, it reflects on key topics including race, gender, spirituality, morality, interfaith sport clubs, and the significance of sport in public rituals of celebration and mourning. Its chapters also examine violent sports such as boxing and mixed martial arts, as well as reflecting on the cult of sporting celebrity and the theology of disability sport. Truly international in scope, Global Perspectives on Sports and Christianity is fascinating reading for all those interested in the study of sport, sociology and religion.

Much of the existing literature seeks to make sense of tourism based on singular approaches such as visuality, identity, mobility, performance and globalised consumption. What is missing, however, is an overarching framework within which these valuable approaches can be located. This book offers one such framework using the concept of dwelling taken from Heidegger and Ingold as the starting point from which to consider the interrelatedness of being, dwelling and tourism. The anthropological focus at the core of the book is infused with multidisciplinary perspectives that draw on a variety of subjects including philosophy, material cultural studies and cultural geography. The main themes include sensuous, material, architectural and earthly dwelling and each chapter features a discussion of the unifying theoretical framework for each theme, followed by an illustrative focus on specific aspects of tourism. This theoretically substantive book will be of interest to anyone involved with tourism research from a wide range of disciplines including anthropology, sociology, geography, cultural studies, leisure studies and tourist studies.

Twitter, Facebook, online forums, blogs and websites - scholars are increasingly turning to digital sources to study sport and physical activity. These platforms have generated new digital content ripe for analysis and are making it possible to investigate communities that were previously inaccessible. However, they have also created theoretical, methodological, practical and ethical challenges. This book critically examines the opportunities open to qualitative researchers working in digital spaces and offers novel insights into how the rise of new technology is helping to shape sport studies. Showcasing original research on emerging themes, trends and issues such as digital sociology, media citizenship, online gaming, Big Data, fitness apps and online fan cultures, this collection leads the way in this fast-developing field of study. It not only considers the possibilities and limitations of using digital tools to conduct qualitative research into sport, but also provides innovative examples of how researchers can adapt successfully to ever-evolving technologies. Digital Qualitative Research in Sport and Physical Activity is essential reading for all students and scholars interested in the latest digital developments in sport studies and research methods.

Public awareness of and sensitivity to questions of pain, risk and injury in sport is more acute than ever before. Whether it is questions of what sport (and fans) can realistically and responsibly expect of athletes, how revered practices almost inevitably culminate in suffering bodies, or the widespread attention being paid to injury outcomes (especially concussion), it is clear that sport in many settings currently operates in a climate that is both more scientifically and medically aware and more sensitive to risk 'outcomes'. This volume closely explores the full panorama of pain, risk and injury in the cultural, organizational and legal orbits of sport spaces. Aimed at students, researchers as well as applied professionals, the volume sets the cultural, structural and organizational context that gives rise to pain, risk and injury in the first place, provides substantive empirical examples from diverse sports arenas, looks at the key issues and dimensions of pain, risk and injury in the social consciousness today, and explores three different 'spins' on making sense of the subject matter -- from the position of the issue of consent and the courts, from the position of exploitation and corporate victimization, and from the understudied position of why athletes exit sport as an outcome of pain and injury and with what consequences. This timely and needed addition to the sport literature is an exciting 'on-the-bubble' treatment of a topic that is increasingly troubling authorities and affecting how and whether sport is undertaken.

Bidding contests for sporting and cultural events are attracting increasing media and public attention. Yet, despite the cost, size and scale of these bidding contests, relatively little academic attention has been paid to the strategies and tactics used to develop successful bids. Event Bidding: Politics, Persuasion and Resistance develops a comprehensive, critical understanding of the bidding processes surrounding the award of major peripatetic events. This is achieved by drawing together existing knowledge on the subject of event bidding, combining this with historical and contemporary examples to enable a critical commentary on the bidding process itself and the struggle for power that it represents. The text draws on case studies of 'mega events' including the FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games as well as a range of smaller peripatetic events from across the world to analyse the bidding process and some of the increasingly controversial issues which emerge during often lengthy and expensive bid campaigns. Finally, the text reflects on a range of critical issues of contemporary significance in bidding contests, including the growing ethical and governance issues surrounding the development and award of events as well as the impact of growing oppositional movements surrounding each contest. This timely volume brings theory and practice together in one place to produce a critical appraisal of a phenomenon with a relatively recent history and is particularly suitable for students, researchers and academics of sports, events, tourism and related subject fields focusing on the strategic and political dimensions of major events.

Few issues have engaged sports scholars more than those of race and ethnicity. Today, globalization and migration mean all major sports leagues include players from around the globe, bringing into play a complex mix of racial, ethnic, cultural, political and geographical factors. These complexities have been examined from many angles by historians, sociologists, anthropologists and scientists. This is the first book to offer a comprehensive survey of the full sweep of approaches to the study of sport, race and ethnicity. The Routledge Handbook of Sport, Race and Ethnicity makes a substantial contribution to scholarship, presenting a collection of international case studies that map the most important developments in the field. Multi-disciplinary in its approach, it engages with a wide range of disciplines including history, politics, sociology, philosophy, science and gender studies. It draws upon the latest cutting-edge research to address key issues such as racism, integration, globalisation, development and management. Written by a world-class team of sports scholars, this book is essential reading for all students, researchers and policy-makers with an interest in sports studies.

While efforts to include gay and lesbian athletes in competitive sport have received significant attention, it is only recently that we have begun examining the experiences of transgender athletes in competitive sport. This book represents the first comprehensive study of the challenges that transgender athletes face in competitive sport; and the challenges they pose for this sex-segregated institution. Beginning with a discussion of the historical role that sport has played in preserving sex as a binary, the book examines how gender has been policed by policymakers within competitive athletics. It also considers how transgender athletes are treated by a system predicated on separating males from females, consequently forcing transgender athletes to negotiate the system in coercive ways. The book not only exposes our culture's binary thinking in terms of both sex and gender, but also offers a series of thought-provoking and sometimes contradictory recommendations for how to make sport more hospitable, inclusive and equitable. Transgender Athletes in Competitive Sport is important reading for all students and scholars of the sociology of sport with an interest in the relationship between sport and gender, politics, identity and ethics.

Leisure and food seem to be a natural fit, but the recent, unprecedented focus on all aspects of food has not been reflected in the field of leisure studies. This book is the first to combine these vital aspects of human interest by exploring the interface between leisure and food in a number of areas. For example, it examines sports nutrition products, which straddle the boundary between junk and food. It also looks into hosting sustainable meals, and what eaters can learn about sustainable food choices and food citizenship. It visits ethnic restaurants and inquires about the authenticity of eatertainment experiences from both the supply and demand side. And it takes up gardening, while investigating questions of food security, social capital, gardening narratives and the role of place. The book concludes with a dynamic reflection that sums up these leisure and food practices and sites, and challenges us to continue these debates. This book was published as a special issue of Leisure/Loisir.

Sport is often thought of as simply "games," but it can in fact be much more. Sport can be responsible for guiding social justice movements, igniting city-wide riots, uniting countries, permanently injuring youth, revolutionizing views about race, gender and class, and producing several of the most successful global industries. Reports of ethical crises in athletics are constant fodder for popular attention, whether performance enhancing drugs in baseball, corruption in college athletics, the epidemic of brain damage among NFL players, and others too numerous to mention. As a proxy for social concerns, we naturally think of sport in inherently moral terms. Yet we can hardly define the term "sport," or agree on acceptable levels of sporting risk, or determine clear roles and responsibilities for fans, players, coaches, owners, media and health care personnel. Bringing together 27 of the most essential recent articles from philosophy, history, sociology, medicine, and law, this collection explores intersections of sports and ethics and brings attention to the immense role of sports in shaping and reflecting social values.

This book is a response to the burgeoning interest in cultural tourism and the associated need for a coherently theorized approach for understanding the practices that such an interest creates. Cultural tourism has become an important and popular aspect of contemporary tourism studies, as well as providing a rich seam of upscale product development opportunities in the industry as a whole. Much of the related literature, however, focuses upon describing and categorizing cultural tourism from a supply-side perspective. This has prompted the taxonomizing of cultural tourists on the basis of their level of involvement and interest in cultural tourism products and/or their economic worth as a sought after market segment. There have been few recent attempts at a rigorous re-theorization of the issues beyond conventional representational theories; this book aims to fill that void. This groundbreaking volume provides a theoretical and empirical account of what it means to be a cultural or heritage tourist. It achieves this by exploring the interactions of people with places, spaces, intangible heritage and ways of life, not as linear alignments but as seductive 'moments' of encounter, engagement, performance and meaning-making, which are constitutive of cultural experience in its broadest sense. The book further explores encounters in cultural tourism as events that capture and constitute important social relations involving power and authority, self-consciousness and social position, gender and space, history and the present. It also explores the consequences these insights have for our understanding of culture and heritage and its management in the context of tourist activity. In capturing the 'cultural moment', this book provides a better understanding of the motivations, on-site activities, meaning constructions and other cultural work done by both tourists and tourist operators. The volume confronts and explores the cultural, political and economical interrelations between culture, heritage and the tourism industry. In so doing, it also investigates how this co-mingling of identity, representation and social life may be better apprehended with the wider shift in critical thought towards notions of affect and performativity. The book is a fundamental and influential contribution to research in this field. It will be of significant value to students, academics and researchers interested in this broad topic area.