Search results

This study examines the effect of four acculturation strategies (integration, assimilation, separation and marginalisation) on identification with and consumption of American football for the Asian population in the United States. Using Berry's (1990, 1997) bi-dimensional model of acculturation as a theoretical framework, significant differences (based on the four acculturation strategies) between football identification and consumption were found. In addition, this study examines the relationships between acculturation, ethnic identity, identification with, and consumption of, the sport among the Asian population. The results indicate that acculturation plays a significant role in explaining participants' identification with, and consumption of, the sport, whereas ethnic identity does not.

On 2 February 2020, 99.9 million viewers learnt about the Women's Football Alliance (WFA), the largest women's American football league in the United States, when former player Katie Sowers became the first woman to coach in the Super Bowl. In the same month, the WFA announced several corporate partnerships and a new television deal with statements that connected the support for women's American football to advancing gender equity.

This chapter examines the professionalisation of women's American football in the United States through the lens of mediated visibilities. We use the term mediated visibilities, rather than media coverage, to move beyond how journalists are writing about sport (or ‘covering’ sport) and account for the complex ways in which content about women's sport circulates across producers and platforms in the digital media environment. In particular, our analysis examines the opportunities and limitations of digital media in the process of (semi-)professionalisation of women's American football.

The WFA joined the broader ‘momentum’ of women's sport in the United States as both the league's social media platforms and the sponsors aligned their messages with cultural narratives around women's sport to invoke gender equity in promoting women's American football. Moreover, the league positioned the strategy to enhance mediated visibility the sport as an integral step in the process of (semi-)professionalisation. However, the role of the WFA's digital media platforms alone appears to be limited without substantial structural change.

This work critically investigates online fan responses towards the implementation of the affirmative action policy, the Rooney Rule, within English professional football. It explores systemic and structural racism and the history of the Rooney Rule, before analysing football fans' Twitter comments concerning the policy within English football across an 18-month period.

This research utilised a bespoke search programme to identify and analyse Tweets which focused on the Rooney Rule in English football. A total of 205 posts were thematically analysed and a series of codes were created.

The findings illustrated that fans were generally divided over the Rooney Rule. Over half of the participants welcomed counter measures against structural racism although many caveated responses by critiquing the Rule's approach and scope. For others, however, the policy is yet another example of ‘reverse racism’ and ‘political correctness gone mad’. The findings illustrate that there is an undercurrent of hostility towards anti-racist action and a belief that sport is inherently meritocratic and fair.

While much research has focused on examining online reactions to ‘trigger events’, this chapter provides an empirical insight into contemporary football fan responses towards anti-racist action in the ‘beautiful game’. It demonstrates that there are a series of common misconceptions and misunderstandings towards affirmative action policies in sport. Once we become aware of such misunderstandings, we can attempt to remedy them in order to aid the efficacy of anti-racist action.

To examine the ways in which sports-related brain injury (concussion and subconcussion) is both similar to and different from other injuries and to set out a sociological understanding of the injury, its manifestation and management.

There is a broad contextualization of the ‘issue’ of concussion and the processes that have brought this to the fore, an examination of the ways in which concussion has been figuratively clouded from plain view, and an outline of the main contributions of the social sciences to understanding this injury – the culture of risk and the mediating effect of social relationships. The chapter concludes by questioning whether the emergence of concerns over chronic traumatic encephalopathy has stimulated a fundamental change in attitudes towards sport injuries, and if this has had a significant impact on the social visibility of concussion.

The two available sociological studies of the lived experiences of concussion are situated within a broader analysis of the politicization of sports medicine and the emergence of a particular social discourse around sports-related brain injury.

The difficulties emanating from the dominance of a biomedical approach to concussion are discussed along with the need for further research, incorporating a more holistic view of concussion, as a bio-psycho-social phenomenon.

The aim of this chapter is to explore the relationship between contemporary sport, social media, digital technology, and sexuality and to explore the historical context of sport and sexuality, before then outlining the decline of homophobia in recent years. Despite this decline, social media is one area where we still see the manifestation of homophobia.

This chapter synthesizes a range of academic literature to chart how – despite improving attitudes toward homosexuality in sport – abuse and discrimination is still prevalent on social media.

Eric Anderson's (2009) Inclusive Masculinity Theory has been the most useful theoretical apparatus to underpin the changing nature of sport, gender, and sexuality. While this has been used in a variety of sporting contexts, these are primarily focused on gay male athletes in the West. Accordingly, there is a gap in knowledge around the experiences of lesbian, bisexual, and trans athletes, as well as those outside of the Western context.

Although there has been some literature to document discrimination on social media, very little focuses specifically on the manifestation of homophobia. Accordingly, this chapter provides an important contribution by being one of the first to tie together the literature on improved cultural attitudes toward homosexuality while simultaneously focusing on the prevalence of discrimination on social media.

This case is focused on the allegations of corrupt practices within the strategic leadership at the board level of an international sports organization – the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). The theoretical premise is that the practices and decisions of the AFC’s leadership will have a profound impact on the AFC’s performance. However, because the AFC is the continental governing body, the impact is theorized to be far larger, across an entire industry. In writing the case, the authors were guided by upper Echelons theory (UET) (Hambrick and Mason, 1984; Hambrick, 2007; Hambrick et al., 2015), which argues that an organization’s strategic direction is directly influenced by its leader’s values. The authors selected UET for the theoretical framework, as it considered a spectrum of factors from industry, leader characters (values), their choices and the results of their actions. Such a comprehensive theory aligned with the complexities of the AFC and its leadership. In constructing the case roadmap using UET, the authors first adopted an ethnographic methodology. This was motivated by the fact that one of the authors had been embedded for many years as part of the leadership team at the AFC. His career work notes based on direct interactions and observations of these leaders helped in two ways: to identify the complex set of personal characteristics of these leaders (i.e. background, their careers outside football and financial standing) as they originated from 47 different nationalities. UET refers to these as observable factors to better theorize the hidden intentions of their alleged corrupt behaviors. UET identifies this second set of non-observable factors as psychological factors. These two different sets of observations combined helped to theorize their drivers, intentions and strategic decisions (options). For the second methodology, the authors accessed archival, publicly available media news and reports to understand the consequences of their actions to the AFC and the Asian football industry. This completed the final parts of the UET framework (Yamak et al., 2014).

This case relied on information that was widely reported within international media, press announcements by various organizations, published decisions by tribunals and publicly available information on the AFC. All of the names and positions in this case are actual persons.

This case focuses on the role and influence of the AFC as the Asian football governing body. The AFC is a member of the world football governing body – FIFA. With a US$1bn budget, the AFC has a strong impact on the future of football among Asia’s three billion people. Unfortunately, the AFC has been unable to create the value in its sports events or properties that attracts fans and investors. Central to this problem is the issue of corruption and corruption allegations within the AFC, especially with regard to its leadership. This case, therefore, attempts to highlight the various issues, discusses the circumstances around these challenges and brings forth the complexities of leading a truly international organization across 47 countries. Such factors are then tied to the value of the organization’s products or services in the marketplace.

The case is written and designed for a graduate level (MBA) class or an upper level undergraduate class such as corporate strategy, leadership, international management, international marketing, contemporary issues in management, cross-cultural management, sports management and sports marketing. In general, the case will also be a good fit for courses that discuss leadership, organizational strategy, organizational structure, organizational ethics and organizational behavior.

This paper aims to predict a college football team’s competitiveness using physical resources, human resources and organizational resources.

Guided by the resource-based theory, the study used archival data of 101 college football teams. The dependent variable was competitiveness (indicated by win-loss records), the independent variables were physical resources (operationalized as home attendance and total revenues), human resources (measured as coaches’ salary and coaches’ experience) and organizational resources (specified as conference rankings and the number of sports). Kendall Tau correlation and binary logistic regression were used to examine the associative and predictive competitive advantages.

The binary logistic regression model showed an overall percentage predictive correctness of 71.3%, with a Negelkerke R² of 41.1% of the variance of all predictors – with coaches’ experience, total revenues and home attendance being the best predictors of generating competitive advantages that produced superior win-loss records.

The research focused exclusively on physical, organizational and human resources as sources of competitive advantage and not physiological and/or psychological variables.

College football teams aspiring to be competitive may benefit from this study by applying a three-fold strategy of hiring well-paid high performing and experienced coaches who can increase attendance and revenues.

The study was unique in two ways – one, it made clear the positive significance of coaches’ experience as a source of competitive advantage, and second, it highlighted the catalytic effects of revenues and attendance in fueling competitiveness.