Routledge Sport, Theory and Social Problems: A Critical Introduction

In a revised, updated, and considerably expanded new edition of Sport, Theory and Social Problems, authors Eric Anderson and Adam White examine how the structure and culture of sport promotes inequality, injury, and complicity to authority at the non-elite levels of play in Anglo-American countries. By introducing students to a research-led perspective on sport, it highlights the operation of power, patriarchy, and pain that a hyper-competitive sporting culture promotes. Each chapter includes at least one key social theory, which is made accessible and pragmatic. The theory is then infused throughout the chapter to help the student engage with a deeper understanding of sport. In addition to examining how sport generates otherness, distracts children from education, and teaches the acceptance of emotional and physical violence, this new edition also examines how organized, competitive sport divides us by race, denies children the right to their own governance, and promotes brain trauma and chronic traumatic encephalopathy in those who are too young to consent to play contact sports. Sport, Theory and Social Problems: A Critical Introduction is an essential textbook for any sport studies degree with a focus on the sociology of sport, sport and social theory, children’s health and wellbeing, or sport and gender studies. Review ‘Anderson and White expose long-ignored problems in organized, competitive youth and school team sports in an effort to elicit transformational actions on the part of readers. They challenge readers to view sports critically, to be aware of empirically unsupported myths about sports, to review research documenting problems in these sports, and to develop strategies that convert sports into activities that foster compassion, cooperation, and consistently positive health outcomes for all participants. As the authors explain, with the mythology and vested interests associated with current sport structures, it will take a long, heated struggle to achieve such outcomes.’ – Jay Coakley, Professor Emeritus of Sociology, University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, USA ‘This is an important book which everyone studying, playing and administrating sport should read. Academically rigorous, intellectually challenging and very well written this book changed the way I think about sport and what I teach. Undergraduates will find this book accessible and the case studies illuminating and thought-provoking. All readers will find the content provocative, interesting and insightful. The work is relevant to sport both in the UK and the USA and more widely. At a time when sport faces so many challenges this book helps us understand why and is seminal in the critical analysis it presents.’ – Andy Smith, Professor and Founding Head of the School of Sport, York St John University, UK 'Sport, Theory and Social Problems is an outstanding introduction to critical theory in sport sociology ... a brilliant addition to the curriculum of any introductory course on the sociology of sport ... This book is powerful, engaging both intellectually and emotionally, pedagogically structured and well written.  It highlights how damaging organized, competitive team sports can be, without claiming that all sport is bad all the time, or that sport cannot be socially good.' - Anne Tjonndal, idrottsforum.org   'In my opinion, this book is a brilliant addition to the curriculum of any introductory course on the sociology of sport. Most readers (sport science/sport sociology students at least) will find that this book confronts them with many of the cultural ‘truths’ we believe about organized sport in Western cultures. Students at both bachelor and master level would benefit greatly from reading Anderson and White’s introduction to critical perspectives on the sociology of sport. This book is powerful, engaging both intellectually and emotionally, pedagogically structured and well written. It highlights how damaging or