'Sport' and 'religion' are cultural institutions with a global reach. Each is characterised by ritualised performance and by the ecstatic devotion of its followers, whether in the sports arena or the cathedral of worship. This fascinating collection is the first to examine, in detail, the relationship between these two cultural institutions from an international, religiously pluralistic perspective. It illuminates the role of sport and religion in the social formation of collective groups, and explores how sport might operate in the service of a religious community.
The book offers a...

This fascinating new collection is the first to examine the intersection of sport and religion from an international, religiously pluralistic perspective. In doing so, it taps into a wide range of issues within the history and sociology of sport, including ethnicity, identity, community and social anthropology. The book offers a series of cutting-edge contemporary historical case studies; including, sport and Catholicism in Northern Ireland, and Muhammad Ali and the Nation of Islam, sport and Christian fundamentalism in the US.

What is the nature of athletic performance? This book offers an answer to this fascinating question by considering the relationship between sport, technology and the body. Specifically, it examines cultural resistance to the enhancement of athletes and explores the ways in which performance technologies complicate and confound our conception of the sporting body.

The book addresses concerns about the technological "invasion" of the "natural" body to investigate expectations that athletic performances reflect nothing more than the actual capacity of the untainted athlete. By...