Arthur Wharton was the world's first black professional footballer and 100 yards world record holder, and was probably the first African to play professional cricket in the Yorkshire and Lancashire leagues. His achievements were accomplished against the backdrop of Africa's forced colonization by European regimes. But while Arthur was beating the best on the tracks and fields of Britain, the peoples of the continent of his birth were being recast as lesser human beings. The tall Ghanaian was an extreme irritation to many white supremacists because his education and sporting triumphs refuted their theories. In the late Victorian era, when Britain's economic and political power reached its zenith and when the dominant ideas of the age labelled all blacks as inferior, it was simply not expedient to proclaim the exploits of an African sportsman. This shaped the way Wharton was forgotten.

Part of the Sport in the Global Society series, this innovative and creative text explores collective history, memory, and sport culture, tracking the passage of sports away from England. The author investigates why 'elite' English sports - such as rugby and cricket - became national sports in New Zealand and Australia, and asks why 'working class' English sports - such as football - have travelled less well to these areas. Focusing on these sports, the author tracks narratives and myths, tracing the passage of colonial truths, behaviours and practices. Clearly defined sections in the book focus on: * sport and tourism * sport and history * sport and memory. Using a refreshingly broad range of sources to analyze differences between popular culture and sporting memory, this book offers new perspectives on sport and makes an interesting reference for masters and postgraduate readers in sport and cultural studies.

Cricket has been subject to a number of changes over the last twenty years. We can no longer talk of a sport particular to an out-dated English way of life. Cricket has become global and has to exist within the global environment. Primarily the world game has become commercialised. This collection of essays assesses the developments within major playing nations between the World Cups. Do we now live in a world where commercialism is the primary factor in determining sports, or are wider historical prejudices still evident? Seeking to answer these questions, Cricket, Race & the 2007 World Cup focuses on racial and ethnic tensions and their place in the new globalized, cricketing environment. This book was previously published as a special issue of Sport in Society.

'Amusements they must have, or life would hardly be worth living...' Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, 1895 This text explores life in the mining villages of the north-east of England in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - a time of massive social and industrial change. The sporting lives of these communities are often marginalized by historians, but this thoroughly researched account reveals how play as well as work were central to the lives of the working classes. Miners contributed significantly to the economic success of the north-east during this time, yet living conditions in the mining villages were 'horrendous'. Sport and recreation were essential to bring meaning and pleasure to mining families, and were fundamental to the complex social relationships within and between communities. Features of this extensive text include: * analysis of the physical, social and economic structures that determined the leisure lives of the mining villages * the role of 'traditional' and 'new' sports * comparisons with other British regions.

This is an exacting social history of Indian cricket between 1780 and 1947. It considers cricket as a derivative sport, creatively adapted to suit modern Indian socio-cultural needs, fulfil political imperatives and satisfy economic aspirations. Majumdar argues that cricket was a means to cross class barriers and had a healthy following even outside the aristocracy and upper middle classes well over a century ago. Indeed, in some ways, the democratization of the sport anticipated the democratization of the Indian polity itself. Boria Majumdar reveals the appropriation, assimilation and subversion of cricketing ideals in colonial and post-colonial India for nationalist ends. He exposes a sport rooted in the contingencies of the colonial and post-colonial context of nineteenth- and twentieth-century India. Cricket, to put it simply, is much more than a 'game' for Indians. This study describes how the genealogy of their intense engagement with cricket stretches back over a century. It is concerned not only with the game but also with the end of cricket as a mere sport, with Indian cricket's commercial revolution in the 1930s, with ideals and idealism and their relative unimportance, with the decline of morality for reasons of realpolitik, and with the denunciation, once and for all, of the view that sport and politics do not mix. This book was previously published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport

The collection starts from the premise that Olympism and the Olympic Games make sense only when they are placed within the broader national, colonial and post colonial contexts and argues that sport not only influences politics and vice-versa, but that the two are inseparable. Sport is not only political; it is politics. It is also culture and art. This collaboration is a first in global publishing, a mine of information for scholars, students and analysts. It demonstrates that Olympism and the Olympic movement in the modern context has been, and continues to be, socially relevant and politically important. Studies focus on national encounters with Olympism and the Olympic movement, with equal attention paid to document the growing nexus between sports and the media; sports reportage; as well as women and sports. Olympism asserts that the Olympic movement was, and is, of central importance to twentieth and twenty-first century societies. Finally, the collection demonstrates that the essence of Olympism and the Olympic movement is important only in so far as it affects societies surrounding it. This book was published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.

Cricket has been subject to a number of changes over the last twenty years. We can no longer talk of a sport particular to an out-dated English way of life. Cricket has become global and has to exist within the global environment. Primarily the world game has become commercialised. This collection of essays assesses the developments within major playing nations between the World Cups. Do we now live in a world where commercialism is the primary factor in determining sports, or are wider historical prejudices still evident? Seeking to answer these questions, Cricket, Race & the 2007 World Cup focuses on racial and ethnic tensions and their place in the new globalized, cricketing environment. This book was previously published as a special issue of Sport in Society.

In a time of unprecedented political and economic transformation, the middle classes of Victorian and Edwardian England became principal players in a new social order. Nowhere did their culture, values and identity gain clearer expression than in their sports, and their influence is still felt in the way we organise, play and think of sport today.

A Sport-Loving Society presents a selection of groundbreaking essays from the journals which have defined sport history over the past three decades. These essays explore the role of the social institutions and issues of the Victorian and Edwardian periods in shaping the sports of the English middle classes, including:

• education
• the emancipation of women
• religion
• culture and class
• diplomacy and war.

Showcasing the work of prominent sport historians, this book demonstrates the value of sport as a vehicle for the study of wider social change.

Evolving for centuries in relative isolation, sport in Japan developed a unique character reflective of Japanese culture and society. In recent decades, Japan's drive towards cultural and economic modernization has consciously incorporated a modernization of its sports cultures. "Japan, Sport and Society" provides insights into this process, revealing the tensions between continuity and change, tradition and modernity, the local and the global in a culture facing the new economic and political realities of our modern world. The book explores three broad areas of interest:
- sport and modern society in Japan
- current issues in social reconstruction and reproduction through sport
- modernization, globalization and sport in Japan
Providing unprecedented access to new work from Japanese scholars, and raising key questions of globalization and cultural identity, this text represents a fascinating resource for students and researchers of sport and society.

Lost Histories of Indian Cricket studies the personalities and controversies that have shaped Indian cricket over the years and brings to life the intensity surrounding India's national game.
It may be true that that cricket today arouses more passions in India than in any other cricket playing country in the world. Yet, when it comes to writing on the history of the game, Indians have been reticent and much of the past has been obscured and lost. Majumdar here recovers this history and restores it to its rightful place in India's rich sporting heritage.

'Amusements they must have, or life would hardly be worth living...' Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, 1895 This text explores life in the mining villages of the north-east of England in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - a time of massive social and industrial change. The sporting lives of these communities are often marginalized by historians, but this thoroughly researched account reveals how play as well as work were central to the lives of the working classes. Miners contributed significantly to the economic success of the north-east during this time, yet living conditions in the mining villages were 'horrendous'. Sport and recreation were essential to bring meaning and pleasure to mining families, and were fundamental to the complex social relationships within and between communities. Features of this extensive text include: * analysis of the physical, social and economic structures that determined the leisure lives of the mining villages * the role of 'traditional' and 'new' sports * comparisons with other British regions.

First published in 1979, this classic study of the development of rugby from folk game to its modern Union and League forms has become a seminal text in sport history. In a new epilogue the authors provide sociological analysis of the major developments in international ruby that have taken place since 1979, with particular attention to the professionalism that was predicted in the first edition of this text. Sports lovers, rugby fans and students of the history and sociology of sport will find it invaluable. Rugby football is descended from winter 'folk games' which were a deeply rooted tradition in pre-industrial Britain. This was the first book to study the development of Rugby from this folk tradition to the game in its modern forms. The folk forms of football were extremely violent and serious injuries - even death - were a common feature. The game was refined in the public schools who played a crucial role in formulating the rules which required footballers to exercise greater self-control. With the spread of rugby into the wider society, the Rugby Football Union was founded but class tensions led to the split between Rugby Union and Rugby League. The authors examine the changes that led to the professionalisation of Rugby Union as well as the alleged resurgence of violence in the modern game.

The 2003 World Cup was of vital importance to the participating countries. For India, a world cup triumph would make cricket the nation's leading industry; for the host, South Africa, a successful campaign might realize its dream of political unity.
Dealing with themes of racial/political unification, commercialization, the media and globalisation, this book explores the role of cricket and sport in each of the competing nations.
Looking at recent developments such as match-fixing, the abolition of the quota system and the performances of the South African national team, the collection examines the importance of the Cricket World Cup in providing a unified political, social and economic stage from which a united South African identity can finally emerge. The book also explores the role of the Cricket World Cup in relation to West Indian unity, Pakistani economic regeneration, Sri Lankan, Kenyan and Zimbabwean peace.

The struggle for status within sport is a microcosm of the struggle for rights, freedom and recognition within society. Injustices within sport often reflect larger injustices in society as a whole. In South Africa, for example, sport has been crucial in advancing the rights and liberty of oppressed groups. The geographical and chronological range of the essays in Ethnicity, Sport, Identity reveal the global role of sport in this advance.

The collection examines cases of discrimination directed at individuals or groups, resulting in their exclusion from full participation in sport and their consequent struggle for inclusion. It shows how ethnic and national identity are sources of social cohesion and political assertion within sport, and it illustrates the manner in which sport has served to project ethnicity in various, often contradictory ways. It depicts sport as an agent of conservatism and radicalism, superiority and subordination, confidence and lack of confidence, and as a source of disenfranchisement and enfranchisement. That sport has been, and continues to be, a potent means of both ethnic restriction and release can no longer be ignored.

Many books have been written about cricket, cricketers, the grounds they play on and the tours that the players and supporters undertake during the winter months. Writers on the English summer game have looked at the game's history and economic development, but one vital ingredient has been ignored: the game's geography, and how it has changed from a rural, meadowland pastime into a multinational sport and multi-million pound business, based largely in urban agglomerations.
This volume fills this void, looking at the fundamental geography of cricket, especially in England where the game is played by county sides. Besides looking at socio-economic influences, the book examines the physical geography of cricket, in particular, its interrelationship with the local environment and microclimate, and looks ahead to the likely impact that global warming and altered weather patterns will have on the county game.

In the 19th century, Europe exported its politics, goods, ideas, customs - and not least, its sports, to the rest of the world. This imperialism began a process of cultural diffusion in which sport became a cultural bond, moral metaphor and political symbol. It was a two-way process, for as soon as the world beyond Europe became known to the Europeans, sports from other parts of the world entered Europe. The sports of Europe and the United States were imitated and assimilated and became symbols of national and cosmopolitan identity. This work examines the national and international importance of sport and its role in shaping post-millennium global culture.

Stories of remarkable women who devoted their lives to the cause of women's physical liberation are told in this volume. They each shared the same ambition: to free women's bodies through sport. Scholars have studied the paradoxical importance of sport in both reinforcing the male-dominated status quo and emancipating women from traditional repression in both Western and Eastern worlds, but the role that individuals played in achieving the political and economic freedom of women through sport has been neglected. This collection records the bravery of these forgotten inspirational figures whose determination challenged and overcame convention, custom and prejudice to free women from the ranks of the sexualized, controlled and oppressed.

This examination of changes taking place in the world of football focuses on its growing commercialization. It covers such topics as fans being becoming shareholders, with a say in the running of the clubs, and the setting-up of a government-sponsored scheme to support shareholder trusts.

This book examines France's hosting of the soccer World Cup, held in ten cities in summer 1998. It covers the major socio-economic, political, cultural and sporting dimensions of this global sports event, including bidding for and organizing the Finals, the improvement of sporting and transport infrastructures, marketing, merchandzing and media coverage, policing and security during the month-long competition and building a national team. The analysis of France 98 is set within the sporting context of the recent history and organization of French football (the links between football, money and politics; the sporting public) and more broadly within the French tradition of using major cultural and sporting events to focus world attention of France as a leader in the international community. The book concludes with an evocation of the day-to-day impact of four weeks of sporting festivities, and the lessons to be drawn concerning sport and national identity in an era of increasing economic, political, cultural and sporting globalization.

In the Nordic countries (Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland), as elsewhere, sport has been an assertion of individual and group identity, a demonstration of modernity, a source of personal, local and regional self-esteem, a symbol of confrontation and a preparation for war.
This volume is the first major work in the English language to bring together the research and reflections of scholars who have chosen to concentrate on the cultural impact of sport - the modern opium of the masses - in a Scandinavian setting. It explores the political, social and aesthetic impact of modern sport on Northern Europe, and the relationship between the Nordic nations and Nordic cultures, attitudes to the body and the evolution of specific Nordic visions of sport. The Nordic World shows why sport has played such an important part in both twentieth-century Nordic society and contemporary European culture.

In the Nordic countries (Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland), as elsewhere, sport has been an assertion of individual and group identity, a demonstration of modernity, a source of personal, local and regional self-esteem, a symbol of confrontation and a preparation for war.
This volume is the first major work in the English language to bring together the research and reflections of scholars who have chosen to concentrate on the cultural impact of sport - the modern opium of the masses - in a Scandinavian setting. It explores the political, social and aesthetic impact of modern sport on Northern Europe, and the relationship between the Nordic nations and Nordic cultures, attitudes to the body and the evolution of specific Nordic visions of sport. The Nordic World shows why sport has played such an important part in both twentieth-century Nordic society and contemporary European culture.

According to the accepted wisdom, in the 1860s the football games created by public schoolboys were transplanted from these elite foundations, rapidly becoming the sports of the masses. But has this history ever been challenged or explored? Football, The First Hundred Years, provides a revisionist history of the game, challenging previously widely-accepted belief. The book argues that established football histories do not correspond with the facts. Football, as played by the 'masses' previous to the public school codes is almost always portrayed as wild and quite barbaric but Harvey shows evidence suggesting this view to be a serious over-simplification. Football's First One Hundred Years provides a very detailed picture of the football played outside the confines of the public schools, revealing a culture that was every bit as sophisticated as that found within their prestigious walls. Indeed, the administrative body created by public schoolboys, the FA, rapidly collapsed and by 1867, it was the intervention of working class representatives from Sheffield who saved soccer. offering a different perspective on almost every aspect of the established history of the formative years of the game. The book will be of great interest to sports historians and football enthusiasts alike.

In most accounts of Olympic history across the world, India's Olympic journey is a mere footnote. This book is a corrective. Drawing on newly available and hitherto unused archival sources, it demonstrates that India was an important strategic outpost in the Olympic movement that started as a global phenomenon at the turn of the twentieth century. Among the questions the authors answer are: When and how did the Olympic ideology take root in India? Who were the early players and why did they appropriate Olympic sport to further their political ambitions? What explains India's eight consecutive gold medals in Olympic men's hockey between 1928 and 1956 and what altered the situation drastically, so much so that the team failed to qualify for the 2008 Beijing Games? India and the Olympics also explores why the Indian elite became obsessed with the Olympic ideal at the turn of the twentieth century and how this obsession relates to India's quest for a national and international identity. It conclusively validates the contention that the essence of Olympism does not reside in medals won, records broken or television rights sold as ends in themselves. Particularly for India, the Olympic movement, including the relevant records and statistics, is important because it provides a unique prism to understand the complex evolution of modern Indian society.

Sport in South Asian Society: Past and Present is concerned with a detailed study of sports' arrival, spread and advance in colonial and post-colonial South Asia. An array of articles which address critical issues of nationalism, communalism, commercialism and gender through the lens of sport are available under one rubric. The book makes the point that one cannot claim to understand social histories of South Asian sport by simply looking at the history of the game in one province or region. Further, it demonstrates that it would be faulty to understand sport in terms of the exigencies of the colonial state. Drawing inspiration from C.L.R. James' well-known epigram, 'What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?' the book suggests that South Asian sport makes sense only when it is placed within the broader colonial and post colonial context. It demonstrates that sport not only influences politics and vice versa, but that the two are inseparable. Sport is not only political; it is politics, intrigue, culture and art. To deny this is to denigrate the position of sport in modern South Asian society. in the Global Society