Comparative History of Sports and Politics

Catalog description

Although sport is popularly considered as a sphere separate from other aspects of social and political dynamics, this course illustrates the contrary reality that both active and passive involvements in competitive sports have taken part in shaping and undermining social structures, political mobilizations, collective identities, patterns of domination, and more. This course takes a global and comparative perspective to follow the processes through which national, racial, ethnic, civic, religious, local, and gender identities have been constructed by sport. Special emphasis is given to: the relation between sports, colonialism, and anti-colonialism; sports as a political battleground for the production of meanings in ethno-national conflicts and colonial contexts; the importance of sport in deeply divided societies; and the implications of sport globalization on various collective identities. Theoretical themes are illustrated through various particular case studies from around the globe, including North America, Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe, Africa, India, the Middle East, and Papua-New Guinea.