The history of regional sporting events in 20th- century Asia yields insights into Western and Asian perspectives on what defines modern Asia, and can be read as a staging of power relations in Asia and between Asia and the West. The Far Eastern Championship Games began in 1913, and were succeeded after the Pacific War by the Asian Games. Missionary groups and colonial administrations viewed sporting success not only as a triumph of physical strength and endurance but also of moral education and social reform. Sporting competitions were to shape a "new Asian man" and later a "new Asian woman" by promoting internationalism, egalitarianism and economic progress, all serving to direct a “rising” Asia toward modernity. Over time, exactly what constituted a “rising” Asia underwent remarkable changes, ranging from the YMCA’s promotion of muscular Christianity, democratization, and the social gospel in the US-colonized Philippines to Iranian visions of recreating the Great Persian Empire. Based on a vast range of archival materials and spanning 60 years and 3 continents, Pan-Asian Sports and the Emergence of Modern Asia shows how pan-Asian sporting events helped shape anti-colonial sentiments, Asian nationalisms, and pan-Asian aspirations in places as diverse as Japan and Iran, and across the span of countries lying between them.

Anyone wishing to gain an insight into the PE and sporting experiences of Chinese citizens both in historical and contemporary society will find this book essential reading.

In the second half of the twentieth century, the Olympics played an important role in the politics of the Cold War and was part of the conflicts between the Capitalist Block, the Socialist Block and Third World countries. The Games of the New Emerging Forces (GANEFO) is one of the best examples of the politicization of sport and the Olympics in the Cold War era. From the 1980s onward, the Olympics has facilitated communication and cooperation between nations in the post–Cold War era and contributed to the formation of a new world order. In August 2016, the Games of the XXXI Olympiad were held in Rio de Janeiro, making Brazil the first South American country to host the Summer Olympics. This was widely regarded as a new landmark event in the history of the modern Olympic movement. From the GANEFO to Rio, the Olympic Games have witnessed the shifting balance in international politics and world economy. This book aims at understanding the transformation of the Olympics over the past decades and tries to explain how the Olympic movement played its part in world politics, the world economy and international relations against the background of the rise of developing countries. The chapters in this book were published as a special issue in The International Journal of the History of Sport.

Chile and the South American Games of Santiago 2014 offers an interesting case to examine an event of sizeable magnitude in a country with little history of hosting sport mega-events (SMEs). This case study will expand the readers understanding of third-order SMEs like the South American Games and highlight the circumstances under which they occur. It also contributes to advance and challenge our knowledge as to what extent previous findings made on impact, legacies, justifications, and challenges identified on larger scale SMEs hosted in the developed world, inform the process and outcomes of second or third-order SMEs organized in less developed countries. This monograph is suitable for scholars and practitioners who want to expand their knowledge on sport event planning outside the rim of the global north. It is an essential read for scholars and graduate students in policy studies, sociology, international business, sport and event management, and tourism and hospitality. Likewise, it is an important resource for event planners, government officials, event rights holders, and sport destination marketers involved with the planning of sport mega-events across the world.

This is the first handbook devoted entirely to leisure theory, charting the history and philosophy of leisure, theories in religion and culture, and rational theories of leisure in the Western philosophical tradition, as well as a range of socio-cultural theories from thinkers such as Adorno, Bauman, Weber and Marx. Drawing on contributions from experts in leisure studies from around the world, the four sections cover: traditional theories of leisure; rational theories of leisure; structural theories of leisure; and post-structural theories of leisure. The Palgrave Handbook of Leisure Theory is essential reading for students and scholars working in leisure studies, social theory as well as those working on the problem of leisure in the wider humanities and social sciences.

Includes entries for maps and atlases.

This nine-volume reference contains over 10,000 articles exploring every aspect of Japanese society, history, politics, economy, thought and culture. The 50,000-item index is cross-referenced for easy location of facts.