Doing Sports History in a Hostile World
By Malcolm MacLean If we want to ensure that “sport history [is] supported as an important area of research”, as Kevin Wamsley asked his brief to contributors to this forum, we need to be institutionally savvy and politically sharp. Now that we’re all up to speed on sucking eggs… Sport, like many other forms of…
The History of Sport beyond Sports History
By Tony Collins Why do sports history? This is a question both for historians and students – and of course for university administrators. Across the Anglophone world the humanities, and history in particular, are under attack as universities embrace a free-market model of tertiary education. Departments are shrinking, jobs are becoming more scarce, and the…
Kinesiology, Genealogy, and An (Ephemeral) Quantitative Turn
By Jaime Schultz I confess: prior to 2005, when I landed my first academic position, I had never heard the word kinesiology. That may not be entirely true. I probably heard it or read it somewhere (most likely on a NASSH program), but the term didn’t register. It didn’t resonate. I had no idea what kinesiology meant. Today,…
Sport History Beyond 2016: Survive and Thrive
By Maureen Smith Three Sundays ago, I read through the New York Times and was delighted to see Randy Roberts and Johnny Smith’s book Blood Brothers? The Fatal Friendship Between Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X reviewed in the newspaper’s Sunday Book Review (March 18, 2016, pBR19). Rarely is a book with sport as its subject…
President’s Forum: A New NASSH Exchange Platform
By Kevin Wamsley Beginning with a contribution by Maureen Smith later this week, we are launching a new platform for NASSH members to exchange views and commentaries on matters of concern and relevance in our discipline. The “President’s Forum: Taking Charge of the Future of Sport History at Academic Institutions,” provides a stage for various…
