Professional sports today have truly become a global force, a common language that anyone, regardless of their nationality, can understand. Yet sports also remain distinctly local, with regional ...teams and the fiercely loyal local fans that follow them. This book examines the twenty-first-century phenomenon of global sports, in which professional teams and their players have become agents of globalization while at the same time fostering deep-seated and antagonistic local allegiances and spawning new forms of cultural conflict and prejudice. Andrei Markovits and Lars Rensmann take readers into the exciting global sports scene, showing how soccer, football, baseball, basketball, and hockey have given rise to a collective identity among millions of predominantly male fans in the United States, Europe, and around the rest of the world. They trace how these global--and globalizing--sports emerged from local pastimes in America, Britain, and Canada over the course of the twentieth century, and how regionalism continues to exert its divisive influence in new and potentially explosive ways. Markovits and Rensmann explore the complex interplay between the global and the local in sports today, demonstrating how sports have opened new avenues for dialogue and shared interest internationally even as they reinforce old antagonisms and create new ones. Gaming the World reveals the pervasive influence of sports on our daily lives, making all of us citizens of an increasingly cosmopolitan world while affirming our local, regional, and national identities. Adapted from the source document.
Playing While White argues that whiteness matters in sports culture, both on and off the field. Offering critical analysis of athletic stars such as Johnny Manziel, Marshall Henderson, Jordan Spieth, ...Lance Armstrong, Josh Hamilton, as well as the predominantly white cultures of NASCAR and extreme sports, David Leonard identifies how whiteness is central to the commodification of athletes and the sports they play.Leonard demonstrates that sporting cultures are a key site in the trafficking of racial ideas, narratives, and ideologies. He identifies how white athletes are frequently characterized as intelligent leaders who are presumed innocent of the kinds of transgressions black athletes are often pathologized for. With an analysis of the racial dynamics of sports traditions as varied as football, cycling, hockey, baseball, tennis, snowboarding, and soccer, as well as the reception and media portrayals of specific white athletes, Leonard examines how and why whiteness matters within sports and what that tells us about race in the twenty-first century United States.
For the first time, this book examines the strategies of leaders of emerging nations to use sport as a tool for reaching social, economic, cultural, political, technological or environmental goals ...and gaining international prestige. It assesses whether sport can really be an effective tool in international development.The book explores the unique challenges, issues and opportunities offered by sport for development in emerging nations. Bringing together case studies of sport and development in countries including Brazil, China, Czech Republic, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Poland, Qatar, South Africa, South Korea and Turkey, the book looks at policies designed to achieve development through, by and for sport, and whether they have achieved their socio-economic objectives. It considers the way that emerging nations have used major international sports events as political and developmental projects, as well as the importance of sporting infrastructure, professional leagues, participation programmes and the influence of nationalism and ideology.With a truly global perspective, this book is important reading for any student, researcher or policy-maker with interest in sport management, sport development, development studies, international economics, globalisation or political science.
The Routledge Handbook of Sport and Sustainable Development is a comprehensive and powerful survey of the ways in which sport engages with its social, environmental, and ethical responsibilities. It ...considers how sport can use its unique profile and platform to influence the attitudes of sport fans and consumers to promote positive social and environmental action around the world and to contribute to sustainable development, perhaps the most important issue of our time. The book is structured around the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals, with a section devoted to each goal that contains chapters reviewing key theory and current research, measurement and evaluation issues, and the application of current knowledge in real-world development situations. Drawing on research and expertise from management, sociology, development studies, psychology, and other disciplines, the book examines the role that sport must play in areas such as health and well-being, poverty, education, gender equality, decent work, responsible consumption, and climate action. Representing a keynote work on the wider social responsibilities of sport as both an industry and sociocultural activity, this is essential reading for any advanced student or researcher working in sport development, sport management, sport sociology, event studies, development studies, or environmental studies, and for any development practitioner or sport management professional looking to understand how to achieve positive social change in and through sport.
Sports fandom—often more than religious, political, or regional affiliation—determines how millions of Americans define themselves. In We Average Unbeautiful Watchers , Noah Cohan ...examines contemporary sports culture to show how mass-mediated athletics are in fact richly textured narrative entertainments rather than merely competitive displays. While it may seem that sports narratives are “written” by athletes and journalists, Cohan demonstrates that fans are not passive consumers but rather function as readers and writers who appropriate those narratives and generate their own stories in building their sense of identity.  Critically reading stories of sports fans’ self-definition across genres, from the novel and the memoir to the film and the blog post, We Average Unbeautiful Watchers recovers sports games as sites where fan-authors theorize interpretation, historicity, and narrative itself. Fan stories demonstrate how unscripted sporting entertainments function as identity-building narratives—which, in turn, enhances our understanding of the way we incorporate a broad range of texts into our own life stories. Building on the work of sports historians, theorists of fan behavior, and critics of American literature, Cohan shows that humanistic methods are urgently needed for developing nuanced critical conversations about athletics. Sports take shape as stories, and it is scholars in the humanities who can best identify how they do so—and why that matters for American culture more broadly.
The Scandinavian and Nordic countries have some of the highest participation rates in sport and physical activity in the world and are therefore important case studies across a range of subjects, ...from sport policy to physical activity and health.
This is the first book to bring together studies of all those countries in one volume, examining sport, physical activity and exercise, and exploring the factors behind such high levels of participation. Rich in empirical data, the book examines trends in sports participation, organisation and policy in each of the constituent countries, highlighting common themes and outcomes.
This is a valuable resource for students, researchers and academics working in the fields of sport, physical education, leisure, sport policy, sport development, the sociology of sport and physical activity and health.
Sport has changed. Traditions and territorial distinctions are dissolving as a result of new global, political, economic and cultural conditions. The team of authors examine these changes, ...investigating the power relations that govern the new global sport and assessing the consequences for the future of sport.
The book is founded on a series of case studies, linked by a common process-sociological approach, and is divided into four sections - each dealing with an important aspect of sport and globalization:
* the local-global nexus - how global sports processes are played out at the level of local communities * lived experiences - the reality of global sport for players and supporters * identity politics - the impact of global sport on national consciousness * sporting futures - the emergent political, economic and cultural forces that are shaping global sport, and their implications for its development.
The text introduces new approaches to the study of sport and globalization, updating and extending Maguire's previous work, and is therefore an essential resource for all those working in this fast-changing area.
Joseph Maguire is Professor of Sociology of Sport and Co-Director of the Centre for Olympic Studies & Research at Loughborough University, UK, as well as Past President of the International Sociology of Sport Association (1995-2003). Joseph Maguire has written extensively in the area of globalisation, sport, culture and society.
1. Local - Global Nexus. 2. Lived Experiences. 3. Identity Politics. 4. Sporting Futures.
What is single-case research?
How can single-case methods be used within sport and exercise?
Single-case research is a powerful method for examining change in outcome variables such as behaviour, ...performance and psychological constructs, and for assessing the efficacy of interventions. It has innumerable uses within the context of sport and exercise science, such as in the development of more effective performance techniques for athletes and sportspeople and in helping us to better understand exercise behaviours in clinical populations. However, the fundamental principles and techniques of single-case research have not always been clearly understood by students and researchers working in these fields.
Single-Case Research Methods in Sport and Exercise Psychology is the first book to fully explain single-case research in the context of sport and exercise. Starting with first principles, the book offers a comprehensive introduction to the single-case research process, from study design to data analysis and presentation. Including case studies and examples from across sport and exercise psychology, the book provides practical guidance for students and researchers and demonstrates the advantages and common pitfalls of single-case research for anybody working in applied or behavioural science in a sport or exercise setting.
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