This book explores, in breadth and depth, the role of sport in museums.It surveys the history of sport in museums, including the growth in sport museums and halls of fame driven by major sports teams and sport organisations. The book considers the humanistic benefits of the promotion of sporting heritage within museums, and presents cases, museums stories and best practice from around the world.Sport in Museums is essential reading for all students, researchers, curators, a...

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, outdoor soccer was the second most popular organized sport for Australian children after swimming. It far outstripped the popularity of the three other football codes that are played in Australia – rugby league, rugby union and Australian Rules football.Yet the soccer participation phenomenon in Australia is matched neither by the media coverage of the game in these countries, nor by the academic interest in the game. With a few not...

This volume, consisting of papers originally delivered at the Sport and Fashion symposium in 2011, celebrates the connection between sport and the clothes and fashion which are associated with certain sporting activities. Articles include a study of Olympic swimming costumes, women's sport during the inter-war period, the use of sportsmen by clothing industries for brand marketing, and the aesthetic significance of certain items of clothing, specifically the shirt worn by Maradona during t...

Sport is seen as an increasingly important aspect of urban and regional planning. Related programmes have moved to the forefront of agendas for cities of the present and future. This has occurred as the barriers between so-called ‘high’ and ‘popular’ culture continue to disintegrate. Sport is now a key component within strategies for the cultural regeneration of cities and regions, a tendency with mixed outcomes - at times fostering genuinely democratic arrangements, at others pseudo-democ...

England and the 1966 World Cup presents a cultural analysis of what is considered a key 'moment of modernity' in the nation's post-war history. Regarded as having an importance beyond its primary sporting purpose, the World Cup in England is examined within the complexity of the cultural, social and political changes that characterised the mid-1960s. Yet, although addressing the importance of non-sport related connections, the book maintains a focus on football, discussing it as a...

The Making of Sporting Cultures presents an analysis of western sport by examining how the collective passions and feelings of people have contributed to the making of sport as a ‘way of life’. The popularity of sport is so pronounced in some cases that we speak of certain sports as ‘national pastimes’. Baseball in the United States, soccer in Britain and cricket in the Caribbean are among the relevant examples discussed.Rather than regarding the historical development of ...

Football is unquestionably the world’s most popular and influential sport. There is no corner of the globe in which the game is not played or followed. More countries are affiliated to FIFA, football’s governing body, than to the United Nations. The sport has therefore become an important component of our social, cultural, political and economic life. The Routledge Handbook of Football Studies is a landmark work of reference, going further than any other book in considering the hi...

Emerging from the ‘history from below’ movement, sport history was marginalised for decades by those working within more traditional historical fields (and institutions). Although a degree of ignorance still exists, sport history has now acquired a level of credibility through the dedicated work of professional historians. And yet, as this authority has been established, changes to UK higher education funding (the removal of direct state funding, the Research Excellence Framework, and tuit...

This volume draws together scholarship across a number of disciplines – history, sociology, media and cultural studies, political science, Slavonic Studies – to examine the significance of the sport of football within Southeastern Europe, with an especial focus on countries of the former Yugoslavia. The volume is timely as there is growing recognition inside and beyond the academy that football is a key cultural site in which the tensions within the region have and continue to be reflected...

This textbook puts sport in the spotlight of cultural inquiry for the first time. The authors provide the essential resources for the study of sport within culture and popular culture. Sport is an important part of cultural life, yet until recently it has tended to remain on the margins of academic cultural studies.Beginning by considering sport in relation to the pre-cultural studies tradition of cultural commentary, The Uses of Sport then moves on to a critical engagemen...

'Space' and 'place' are concepts central to both geography and sport. Places, for example, are the means of identifying most sports teams, while sport both affects, and is affected by, the physical environment and landscape. In this fully revised and updated edition of his classic, discipline-defining text, John Bale comprehensively explores the relationships between sport, place, location and landscape. Drawing on examples from around the world, the book addresses key topics from the geog...

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 an...