This reference work aims to provide sports enthusiasts, journalists, librarians, students and scholars with an authorative source of information on a comprehensive range of subjects covering the history and organization of football in Britain. Over 250 entries focus on key organisations or individuals, famous clubs, major competitions, events, venues and incidents, institutions and organisations as well as key issues such as gender, racism, commercialization, professionalism and drugs, alcohol and football.

"Includes entries on: individual sports, from football to fencing and polo to pigeon racing; the London Marathon, the Grand National, the Isle of Man TT races, the Olympic Games, the F.A. Cup, Test Matches, the Boat Race, Wimbledon, Wembley Stadium and much more; key issues such as fair play, gender, racism, commercialization, professionalism, alcohol and drugs; the sociology, psychology and language of sport; and sport in drama, film, literature and the visual arts."--BOOK JACKET.

This book constitutes the first full volume dedicated to an academic analysis of British football as depicted on film. From early single-camera silents to its current multi-screen mediations, the repeated treatment of football in British cinema points to the game’s importance not only in the everyday rhythms of national life but also, and especially, its immutable place in the British imaginary landscape. Through close textual analysis together with production and reception histories, this book explores the ways in which professional footballers, amateur players and supporters (the devoted and the demonized) have been represented on the British screen. As well as addressing the joys and sorrows the game necessarily engenders, British football is shown to function as an accessible structure to explore wider issues such as class, race, gender and even the whole notion of ‘Britishness’.

Providing a social, economic and political study of field sports and those other activities and customs labelled as rural sports, from the earliest of times to the present day in all of the United Kingdom and Ireland. This book brings together several distinct types of traditional rural sports with particular emphasis on the social history and 'traditional' aspects. It contains several hundred entries focusing on individual sports and others providing analysis of key concepts, themes and terminologies. The Encyclopedia of Traditional British Rural Sports is an invaluable reference that provides students, scholars and sports enthusiasts with a focussed and authoritative source of information on the history and culture of rural sport in Britain.

There has been an explosion in the quantity of sports history literature published in recent years, making it increasingly difficult to keep abreast of developments. The annual number of publications has increased from around 250 to 1,000 a year over the last decade. This is due in part to the fact that during the late 1980s and 90s, many clubs, leagues and governing bodies of sport have celebrated their centenaries and produced histories to mark this occasion and commemorate their achievements. It is also the result of the growing popularity and realisation of the importance of sport history research within academe. This international bibliography of books, articles, conference proceedings and essays in the English language is a one-stop for the sports historian to know what is new.

First published in 2006, this work is a valuable guide for the researcher in Victorian Studies. Updated to include electronic resources, this book provides guides to catalogs, archives, museums, collections and databases containing material on the Victorian period. It organises the vast array of reference sources by discipline to help researchers tailor their investigations.

The development of sport in the twentieth century has been examined from a variety of angles. Rarely, though, has the work of the creative writer been considered in detail. This book directs its attention to this neglected area, examining a selection of novels in which the subject of sport has featured prominently. It highlights the ways in which novelists in the second half of the twentieth century have approached sport, explained its place in society, and through the sporting subject constructed a critique of the historical circumstances in which their narrative is set. The study therefore seeks to complement the increasing body of work on the representation of sport through such media as film, television, and autobiography. It also brings a fresh dimension to the use made by historians of literary sources, suggesting that creative fiction can be far more valuable as historical evidence than has customarily been acknowledged.

This volume argues for a more quantitative, economic and theoretical approach to sports history. The author notes that sport can have peculiar economics as in no other industry do rival businesses have to cooperate to produce a sellable output. He also demonstrates, via a case study of early gate-money football in Scotland, that sports producers were not always seeking profits, and often put winning games and trophies ahead of making money. Another analysis examines how industrialisation affected sport, how sport became an industry in its own right and how the workplace became a major provider of sports facilities. A look at third sector economics highlights how the popularity of football provided an ideal vehicle for charity fundraising. The book observes that most sports participants are amateurs but at the elite level the paid player has a key role, and this is assessed through case studies of the jockey and the golf professional. Finally, the author discusses and evaluates various theories relating to the historical development of the sports club. This book was originally published as a special issue of Sport in Society: Cultures, Commerce, Media, Politics.

There has been an explosion in the quantity of sports history literature published in recent years, making it increasingly difficult to keep abreast of developments. The annual number of publications has increased from around 250 to 1,000 a year over the last decade. This is due in part to the fact that during the late 1980s and 90s, many clubs, leagues and governing bodies of sport have celebrated their centenaries and produced histories to mark this occasion and commemorate their achievements. It is also the result of the growing popularity and realisation of the importance of sport history research within academe. This international bibliography of books, articles, conference proceedings and essays in the English language is a one-stop for the sports historian to know what is new.

Entries cover such diverse subjects as coaching, drug testing, hooliganism, cultural imperialism, economics, gay games, amateurism, extreme sports, exercise physiology and Olympism.