Sport has played a central role in modern Ireland’s history. Perhaps nowhere else has sport so infused the political, social and cultural development and identity of a nation. During this so-called ‘Decade of Centenaries’ in Ireland (2014 to 2024) recently there has been an exponential growth in interest and academic research on Ireland’s sporting heritage. This collection of chapters, contributed by some of Ireland’s most preeminent sport and social historians, showcases the richness and complexity of Ireland’s sporting legacy. Articles on topics as diverse as the role of native Gaelic games in emphasising the emerging cultural nationalism of pre-Revolutionary Ireland, the contribution of Irish rugby to the broader British war effort in World War 1, the emergence of Irish soccer on the international stage, and the long running battle to gain official recognition within international athletics for an independent Irish state, are presented. This work’s intention is to illustrate some of the latest and most vibrant research being conducted on Irish sports history. This book was published as a special issue of Sport in Society.

The first history of sport in Ireland, locating the history of sport within Irish political, social, and cultural history, and within the global history of sport. It studies the relationship between sport and national identity, how sport influences policy-making in modern states, and the ways in which sport has been colonized by the media.

In this book, Jane K. Brown offers an original reading of Goethe's complex masterpiece in the context of European Romanticism. Looking at the two parts of Faust in sequence, she views the second part as an elaboration of what was implicit in the first, and she clarifies the patterns of thought and organization underlying the play. In Faust, she argues, Goethe not only situates German culture within the wider European literary tradition, but also demonstrates that all literature is by its nature allusive--that it exists only as part of a tradition.

This history of sport in Ireland, locates it within Irish political, social, and cultural history, and within the global history of sport. There are aspects of Ireland's sporting history that are uniquely Irish, but it is a history of play shared with other societies, near and far. This book offers a unique insight into the British Empire in Ireland; it also assesses the relationship between sport and national identity, and the manner in which states make policy in respect of sport. The manner in which sport has been colonised by the media and has colonised it, in turn, is also examined.

Covering the period from the game's origins in Ireland in the 1870s through to the onset of professional rugby in the twenty-first century, this book seeks to examine Munster rugby within the context of broader social, cultural and political trends in Irish society. As well as providing a thorough chronological survey of the game's development, key themes such as violence, masculinity, class and politics are subject to more detailed treatment. Since the turn of the twenty-first century rugby football in Munster has seen extraordinary growth in terms of popularity and cultural significance. The Munster rugby team in particular has become a hugely important provincial institution through which regional identity has been expressed on the international stage. This book will detail and analyse the game's evolution in Munster from its origins in the 1870s through to the dawn of the professional era in the 2000s. Focusing mainly on the game's two centres of popularity in Limerick and Cork cities, this book will display how contrary to popular myth, rugby football rarely expressed any kind of unitary, coherent identity throughout the province. The game was centred on clubs and was highly adaptable to local conditions throughout its history. In addition, the often fractious internal politics of the game within the province, reflecting the game's contrasting social development in Limerick and Cork, will also be discussed. Drawing on the unpublished records of the game's provincial and national administrative bodies and a comprehensive survey of the provincial press, this book will show how one sport served multifarious roles in terms of class, culture and politics in Munster.

"Sport occupies a central position in Irish social and cultural life, yet still a relatively marginal position within the academy. While significant research has been undertaken by individual scholars, and various important books have been published - such as Rouse's Sport and Ireland; Cronin et al.'s The GAA: A People's History; and, more recently, Curran's Irish Soccer Migrants - there are currently no collections or monographs devoted to the interrelationship of sport, media and the cultural industries in Ireland - a gap we hope the present collection of essays will redress. The title of this collection places the 'interrelationships' of these domains at the heart of our analysis. As humanities and social sciences scholars interested in popular culture and social history, we argue that sport offers an invaluable lens with which to examine change and continuity in Irish life. As editors of this book, our intention has not been to impose a uniform point of view on what aspects of sport in Ireland are worthy of investigation, or to be prescriptive about what constitutes 'media'. Rather, chapters document a variety of approaches and viewpoints on the subject. In addition to examining the current 'state of play' of sports research in Ireland, our intention is that this book will become as a key resource for future scholarship"--

This book is the first to deal with physical culture in an Irish context, covering educational, martial and recreational histories. Deemed by many to be a precursor to the modern interest in health and gym cultures, physical culture was a late nineteenth and early twentieth century interest in personal health which spanned national and transnational histories. It encompassed gymnasiums, homes, classrooms, depots and military barracks. Prior to this work, physical culture’s emergence in Ireland has not received thorough academic attention. Addressing issues of gender, childhood, nationalism, and commerce, this book is unique within an Irish context in studying an Irish manifestation of a global phenomenon. Tracing four decades of Irish history, the work also examines the influence of foreign fitness entrepreneurs in Ireland and contrasts them with their Irish counterparts.