Sport and Postcolonialism

Compared with modes of representation such as literature, drama, poetry and dance, the world of sport has been largely neglected in postcolonial studies. At both local and global levels, however, sport has been profoundly affected by the colonial legacy. How are individual nations and different sporting cultures coping with this legacy? What does the end of colonialism mean within particular states and sports? How is postcolonialism linked with struggles of race and identity?Sport was a major tool of colonial power and postcolonialism manifests itself in the modern sporting world in several ways, including the huge number of world class athletes from former European empires and the exploitation of child-workers in postcolonial nations by the sporting goods industries. Many former colonial states place considerable importance on elite sport as a form of representation, yet a small number of such states oppose sport in its western form. This book explores the wealth of issues and experiences that comprise the postcolonial sporting world and questions whether sport can act as a form of resistance in postcolonial states and, if so, how such resistance might manifest itself in the rule-bound culture of sport.Its novel approach and topical focus makes this book essential reading for anyone interested in contemporary sports, postcolonialism, race and ethnic studies.

Notes on Contributors, Introduction: Sport and Postcolonialism, 1. The Last Night of the Poms: Australia as a Postcolonial Sporting Society?, 2. 'Black' Bodies 'White' Codes: Indigenous Footballers, Racism and the Australilan Football League's Racial and Religious Vilification Code, 3. Sport, Indigenous Australians and Invader Dreaming: A Critique, 4. Making Strange the Country and Making Strange the Countryside: Spatialized Clashes in the Affective Economies of Aotearoa/New Zealand during the 1981 Springbok Rugby Tour, 5. Sport, Postcolonialism and Modern China: Some Preliminary Thoughts, 6. 'Paki Cheats!' Postcolonial Tensions in England-Pakistan Cricket7. 'When Gold is Fired It Shines': Sport, the Imagination and the Body in Colonial and Postcolonial India, 8. 'Theatre of Dreams': Mimicry and Difference in Cape Flats Township, 9. The Postcolonial and the Level Playing-field in the 1998 World Cup, 10. Sport, Nationality and Postcolonialism in Ireland, 11. Football and FIFA in the Postcolonial World, Bibliography, Index

John Bale Visiting Professor of Sports Studies,University of Aarhus, Denmark and Professor of Sports Geography, Keele University Mike Cronin Senior Research Fellow, De Montfort University