This book, which in May 2010 won the North American Society for Sports History (NASSH) award for the best edited volume published in 2009, brings together some of the leading writers in the area of Irish history to assess the importance of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) in Irish society since its founding in 1884 and it is the first key book to center on the GAA and Irish history. While there has been much written about the GAA, the bulk of work has concentrated on the sporting aspects of the Association - the great games and famous players - rather than the role that the GAA has played in wider Irish history. The chapters cover a large chronological span dating back to the origins of hurling, through the foundation of the GAA, its role in the political life of the nation and ending with an assessment of some of the main issues facing the GAA into the twenty-first century. Importantly, the book also offers original and insightful work on areas including the class make up of the GAA, the centrality of Amateurism in the Association, the role of the Irish language, and the ways in which films have featured Gaelic games.

Canada's embrace of Gaelic games has provided wonderful memories for those of the Irish-Canadian community and has created an opportunity for all to discover an exciting facet of Ireland's culture.

The story of almost 300 years of Gaelic Sports in Europe - from the games fascinating yet invisible 18th, 19th and 20th century European history, to Irish immigrant influence, to Spanish, French, German, Italians and others, embracing Gaelic Football and Hurling as new treasure in their lives. The author examines how five clubs 20 years ago, became 90 today and why new clubs are springing up in countries that had never heard of Gaelic Sports despite cultural, geographic and economic challenges. The book revisits a long forgotten Irish Hurling Tour of Belgium, recounts the birth of a new Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) county board and finds out just why locals in Galicia and Brittany love Gaelic football, and also, why young Germans are passionate about hurling. The book also considers Gaelic Sports future in Europe and what this might mean for the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) in Ireland.

In this book John Connolly and Paddy Dolan illustrate and explain developments in Gaelic games, the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA), and Irish society over the course of the last 150 years. The main themes in the book include: advances in the threshold of repugnance towards violence in the playing of Gaelic games, changes in the structure of spectator violence, diminishing displays of superiority towards the competing sports of soccer and rugby, the tension between decentralising and centralising processes, the movement in the balance between amateurism and professionalism, changes in the power balance between ‘elite’ players and administrators, and the difficulties in developing a new hybrid sport. The authors also explain how these developments were connected to various social processes including changes in the structure of Irish society and in the social habitus of people in Ireland.