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Ritual theorizing has tended to focus on perfect rituals, as prescribed in sacred texts, yet ritual mistakes occur all the time--crucial items can go missing or get broken, incorrect phrases can be said. In this book, Kathryn McClymond examines cases in which rituals have gone wrong, embracing the fact that, in fact, they rarely go as planned. From ancient India to modern Iraq, Ritual Gone Wrong demonstrates that ritual disruptions throughout history reveal the fluid, supple, and dynamic nature of ritual.
Roger Bannister was the first person to run the mile in under four minutes. Fifty years on, his status, not just as a champion athlete but also as a true British hero, a gentleman and an amateur from a 'golden era' in sport, retains its unblemished appeal. Until now there has been little criticism and even less close historical study of Bannister and his achievement. This book redresses the balance, presenting a revisionist history of Sir Roger Bannister and in doing so providing fresh insights into the making of this British 'champion'. This book does more than detail the history of a sporting giant. It invites the reader to reconsider the very words often used to describe him - notably 'he...
Despite the close and longstanding links between sport and music, the relationships between these two significant cultural forms have been relatively neglected. This book addresses the oversight with a series of highly original essays written by authors from a range of academic disciplines including history, psychology, musicology and cultural studies. It deals with themes including sport in music; music in sport; the use of music in mass sporting events; and sport, music and protest. In so doing, the book raises a range of important themes such as personal and collective identity, cultural value, ideology, globalisation and the commercialisation of sport. As well as considering the sport/music nexus in Great Britain, the collection examines sport and music in Ireland, the United States, Germany and the former Soviet Union, as well as in the Olympic movement. Musical styles and genres discussed are diverse and include classical, rock, music hall and football-terrace chants. For anybody with an interest in sport, music or both, this collection will prove an enjoyable and stimulating read. This book was previously published as a Special Issue of Sport in Society.
Despite the U.S. and China’s shared economic and political interests, distrust between the nations persists. How does the United States rhetorically navigate its relationship with China in the midst of continued distrust? This book pursues this question by rhetorically analyzing U.S. news and political discourse concerning the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the 2010 U.S. midterm elections, the 2012 U.S. presidential election, and the 2014-2015 Chinese cyber espionage controversy. It finds that memory frames of China as the yellow peril and the red menace have combined to construct China as a threatening red peril. Red peril characterizations revive and revise yellow peril tropes of China as a moral, political, economic and military threat by imbuing them with anti-communist ideology. Tracing the origins, functions, and implications of the red peril, this study illustrates how historical representations of the Chinese threat continue to limit understanding of U.S.-Sino relations by keeping the nations’ relationship mired in the past.
From turn-of-the-century horseracing to the monolithic anti-doping attitudes now supported by sporting organizations, the development of anti-doping ideology has spread throughout modern sport. Yet heretofore few historians have explored the many ways that international sport has responded to doping. This book seeks to fill that gap by examining different aspects of sport’s global efforts to respond to athletes doping. By incorporating cultural, political, and feminist histories that examine international responses to doping, this special issue aims to better articulate the narrative of doping. The work starts with the first mention of doping in any sport. It examines not only the first ef...
This pivot examines how the Theatre Olympics, born in 1995, have served to enrich each host country’s culture, community, and foreign relations. Looking at the host country’s political, social, and cultural circumstances, it considers how the festival expands the notion of Olympism beyond its application to the Olympic Games, expressing the spirit of Olympism and interculturalism in each country’s distinct cultural language. It also emphasizes the festival’s development over the twenty years of its existence and how each festival’s staging has reflected the national identity, theatre tradition, and cultural interest of the hosting country at that time, as well as how each festival director’s artistic principle has attempted to accomplish cultural exchange through their productions.
"Sport, while it has its origins in the love of play and the desire to be entertained and diverted, is a social institution with important political, economic, and social consequences. Playing by the Rules describes how the relation between sport and the state has developed over the last one hundred years, and how, largely by indirection and accident, a public policy with respect to sport has emerged." "Apart from the debate as to whether sport and politics should mix in the first place, John Wilson considers the process whereby sport has become a public policy domain, just like energy, health, transportation and agriculture. He argues that while all modern societies have evolved both sports...
Aretism: An Ancient Sports Philosophy for the Modern Sports World applies a robust ancient ethic to the widely-acknowledged problems faced by modern sports. Aretism—from the Greek word arete ("excellence")—draws a balance between the hard commercialism of modern sports culture and the soft playfulness of recreational models to recover the value of sport for individuals, education, and society at large. The authors' approach proposes practical strategies for athletes, coaches, and physical educators to use when facing ethical challenges in the modern world. Holowchak and Reid present Aretism as a tripartite model of athletic excellence focused on personal, civic, and global integration. T...
In 1973, Wilson Carey McWilliams (1933Ð2005) published The Idea of Fraternity in America, a groundbreaking book that argued for an alternative to AmericaÕs dominant philosophy of liberalism. This alternative tradition emphasized that community and fraternal bonds were as vital to the process of maintaining political liberty as was individual liberty. McWilliams expanded on this idea throughout his prolific career as a teacher, writer, and activist, promoting a unique definition of American democracy. In The Democratic Soul: A Wilson Carey McWilliams Reader, editors Patrick J. Deneen and Susan J. McWilliams, daughter of the famed intellectual, have assembled key essays, articles, reviews, and lectures that trace McWilliamsÕs evolution as a scholar and explain his often controversial views on education, religion, and literature. The book also showcases his thoughts and opinions on prominent twentieth-century figures such as George Orwell and Leo Strauss. The first comprehensive volume of Wilson Carey McWilliamsÕ collected writings, The Democratic Soul will be welcomed by scholars of political science and American political thought as a long-overdue contribution to the field.
'A beautifully written, intellectually challenging, and highly readable exploration of the mysteries of contemporary mass media and popular culture. Real does a masterful job of empowering his readers. Students will find this book fascinating, and in some cases terrifying' - Arthur Asa Berger, San Francisco State University