A comprehensive, state-of-the-art reference collection, bringing together an authoritative and international line-up of scholars to examine key social and political issues related to the Olympics. An essential, 'one-stop' volume for a wide range of academics, students and researchers.

A comprehensive, state-of-the-art reference collection, bringing together an authoritative and international line-up of scholars to examine key social and political issues related to the Olympics. An essential, 'one-stop' volume for a wide range of academics, students and researchers.

This book explores how the Olympic industry has shaped hegemonic concepts of sporting masculinities and femininities for its own profit and image-making ends, examining its continuing marginalization of athletes on account of their race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and class.

This handbook illustrates the utility of global sport as a lens through which to disentangle the interconnected political, economic, cultural, and social patterns that shape our lives. Drawing on multidisciplinary perspectives, it is organized into three parts. The first part outlines theoretical and conceptual insights from global sport scholarship: from the conceptualization and development of globalization theories, transnationalism and transnational capital, through to mediasport, roving coloniality, and neoliberal doctrine. The second part illustrates the varied flows within global sport and the ways in which these flows are contested, across physical cultures/sport forms, identities, ideologies, media, and economic capital. Diverse topics and cases are covered, such as sport business and the global sport industry, financial fair play, and global mediasport. Finally, the third part explores various aspects of global sport development and governance, incorporating insights from work in the Global South. Across all of these contributions, varied approaches are taken to examine the ‘power of sport’ trope, generating a thought-provoking dialogue for the reader. Featuring an accomplished roster of contributors and wide-ranging coverage of key issues and debates, this handbook will serve as an indispensable resource for scholars and students of contemporary sports studies.

The Olympic Games: A Social Science Perspective presents a broad, multi-disciplinary account of all things Olympic from the relationship of the modern to the ancient games, to the possible future of the grandest of athletic spectacles. This extended new edition covers the Olympic phenomenon from political, economical and sociological perspectives, from its history and the media to commercialism and drug use. Its detailed analyses and extensive bibliography make it essential reading for researchers and students in leisure and sports studies.

Analysing the politics of the 2012 London Olympics, Stephen Wagg examines the framing of London's bid to host the Games, arguments about the Games' likely impact and the establishment of 'Fortress London' to protect the Games. The book asks who won, and who lost out, in this important event as well as exploring its media coverage and legacy.

This handbook provides a critical assessment of contemporary issues that define the contours of the Paralympic Movement generally and the Paralympic Games more specifically. It addresses conceptualisations of disability sport, explores the structure of the Paralympic Movement and considers key political strategic and governance issues which have shaped its development. The Palgrave Handbook of Paralympic Studies is written by a range of international authors, a number of whom are senior strategists as well as academics, and explores legacy themes through case studies of recent Paralympic games. Written in the wake of the 2016 Rio Paralympic Games, it provides an assessment of contemporary challenges faced by the International Paralympic Committee and other key stakeholders in the Paralympic Movement. Its critical assessment of approaches to branding, classification, social inclusion and technological advances makes this handbook a valuable resource for undergraduate study across a range of sport and disability related programmes, as well as a point of reference for researchers and policy makers.