Author: Kay Schaffer
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 9780813528205
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 340
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Book Description
Exploring the cultural politics of the Olympic Games, these essays investigate such topics as the emergence of women athletes as cultural commodities, the orchestrated spectacles of the opening and closing ceremonies, and the Gay Games. Unforgettable events and decisions are also discussed.
Author: Gerald P. Schaus
Publisher: Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press
ISBN: 1554587794
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 406
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Book Description
The Olympic Games have had two lives—the first lasted for a millennium with celebrations every four years at Olympia to honour the god Zeus. The second has blossomed over the past century, from a simple start in Athens in 1896 to a dazzling return to Greece in 2004. Onward to the Olympics provides both an overview and an array of insights into aspects of the Games’ history. Leading North American archaeologists and historians of sport explore the origins of the Games, compare the ancient and the modern, discuss the organization and financing of such massive athletic festivals, and examine the participation ,or the troubling lack of it, by women. Onward to the Olympics bridges the historical divide between the ancient and the modern and concludes with a thought-provoking final essay that attempts to predict the future of the Olympics over the twenty-first century.
Author: David C. Young
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470777753
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 200
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Book Description
For more than a millennium, the ancient Olympics captured the imaginations of the Greeks, until a Christianized Rome terminated the competitions in the fourth century AD. But the Olympic ideal did not die and this book is a succinct history of the ancient Olympics and their modern resurgence. Classics professor David Young, who has researched the subject for over 25 years, reveals how the ancient Olympics evolved from modest beginnings into a grand festival, attracting hundreds of highly trained athletes, tens of thousands of spectators, and the finest artists and poets.
Author: Robert G. Weisbord
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 1412856345
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 220
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Book Description
Sports are the opiate of the people, particularly in the United States, Europe, and parts of South America. Globally, billions of fans feverishly focus on the summer and winter Olympics. In theory, international fraternalism is boosted by these “friendly competitions,” but often national rivalries eclipse the theoretical amity. How the Olympics have dealt with racism over the years offers a window to better understanding these dynamics. Since their revival in 1896, the modern Olympics have been periodically agitated by political and moral conundrums. Racial tensions, the topic of this volume, reached their apex under the polarizing presidency of Avery Brundage. Race in sports cannot be disentangled from societal problems, nor can race or sports be fully understood separately. Racial conflict must be contextualized. Racism and the Olympics explores the racial landscape against which a number of major disputes evolved. The book covers various topics and events in history that portray discrimination within Olympic games, such as the Nazi games of 1936, the black American protest on the victory stand in Mexico City’s Olympics, as well as international political forces that removed South Africa and Rhodesia from the Olympics. Robert G. Weisbord considers the role of international politics and the criteria that should be used to determine nations that are selected to take part in and serve as venues for the Olympic Games.
Author: Benson Bobrick
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
ISBN: 0375872523
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 162
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Book Description
A history of the Olympic Games, starting with their inception in Ancient Greece and leading up to the 1936 games in Nazi Berlin.
Author: Allen Guttmann
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 9780252070464
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 254
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Book Description
Traces the history of the modern Olympics from 1896 to 2000, contrasting the ideal of the game with the often politicized reality.
Author: Lee Chin-Chuan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113441241X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 289
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Book Description
This volume provides the most expert, up-to-date and multidisciplinary analyses on how the contemporary media function in what has rapidly become the world's biggest market.
Author: Paul Close
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 113424889X
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 267
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Book Description
The stage is set for the Beijing Olympiad to be the greatest mega-event, sporting or otherwise, in history. Still, the issues taxing many minds include whether the Beijing Games will be successful; whether they will be wrought with and wrecked by troubles; and who they will benefit. What value will the 2008 Games be to the people of China? Will they mainly serve the purposes of the dominant political, economic and cultural groups at and between the local, regional and global levels of modern social life? The Beijing Olympiad examines these among other questions, providing a range of original insights of interest to an array of scholars, researchers and students from Sports Studies to Sociology, Politics, Economics, International Relations and Legal Studies.
Author: Beatriz Garcia
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136335986
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 310
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Book Description
This book explores how cultural policies are reflected in the design, management and promotion of the Olympic Games. Garcia examines the concept and evolution of cultural policies throughout the recent history of the Olympic Games and then specifically evaluates the cultural program of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. She argues that the cultural relevance of a major event is highly dependent on the consistency of the policy choices informing its cultural dimensions, and demonstrates how such events frequently fail to leave long-term cultural legacies, and are often unable to provide an experience that fully engages and represents the host community, due to their over-emphasis on an economic rather than a social and cultural agenda.
Author: Mike Robinson
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317380185
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 137
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Book Description
Going far beyond being just a mega sport event, the Olympic Games are, and have been in the past, important settings for tourism and cultural change. Hosting the Olympic Games presents a unique opportunity for countries to promote, regenerate, and develop cities and regions, and to firmly locate them within an increasingly competitive global tourism marketplace. From Athens to Rio de Janeiro, Olympic landmark buildings, ‘districts’, and ‘parks’ have permanently transformed cities and regions, and gained tremendous material and symbolic value as tourist attractions. On another level, the Olympic Games produce a kaleidoscopic range of intangible and quasi-religious engagements with place and spectacle. They have a tremendous impact on the image of the host country, while invoking collective memories and touching on emotions such as suspense, compassion, togetherness, and pride. Tourism has also become a major watchword in ongoing debates on the ‘legacy’ of the Olympic Games, and it deeply penetrates discourses on social justice and cultural change on a local, national and global scale. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change.
