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"Sport and Politics in Africa" published on by Oxford University Press.

The 2012 European football Championships in Ukraine and Poland is only just another example of the connection between sport and politics. A positive effect of placing the Championships in Ukraine is that a more intense debate on the democratic deficit in Ukraine has emerged. That we should welcome. On the other hand, this can also lead to a situation where the regime in Ukraine benefit from the Championships, not least after the Championships have started and the general public becomes more interested in the games than in the political situation. Without doubt, sport can be used not only as means for political awareness but also as means for redirecting the severe political circumstances from the political scene to the football pitch, where the political objections are turned into athletic prowess among the football teams. Of course, it does not mean that the political problems have disappeared. They are still right in front of us, even when we are watching the games. And, as always when we are watching sport, we are also watching politics.

Sport is frequently considered to be an aspect of popular culture that is, or should be, untainted by the political. However, there is a broad consensus among academics that sport is often at the heart of the political and the political is often central to sport. From the 1936 Olympic Games in Nazi Germany to the civil unrest that preceded the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, sport and politics have remained symbiotic bedfellows. The Routledge Handbook of Sport and Politics goes further than any other book in surveying the complex, embedded relationships between sport and politics. With sections addressing ideologies, nation and statehood, corporate politics, political activism, social justice, and the politics of sports events, it introduces the conceptual foundations that underpin our understanding of the sport-politics nexus and examines emergent issues in this field of study. Including in-depth case studies from North America, South America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, this is an essential reference for anybody with an interest in the social scientific study of sport.

Die Fußball-WM der politischen Symbolik Eine bei der Hymne schweigende iranische Mannschaft; englische Fußballer, die sich zum Anpfiff gegen Rassismus niederknien; Dänen, die in schwarzen Shirts trainieren, der Farbe der Trauer; die DFB-Elf, die sich den Mund zuhält; zahlreiche arabische Zuschauer*innen mit "Free Palestine"-Zeichen – so viele politische Gesten wie bei dieser WM gab es … ""Sport and politics don't mix", oder etwa doch?" weiterlesen

Der Beitrag informiert über die in der VR China laufenden Vorbereitungsmaßnahmen zur Durchführung der Asien-Spiele. Verwiesen wird auf die hohen Investitionskosten für die Errichtung der Sportstätten etc., die angesichts der Wirtschaftskrise und der Finanzierungsprobleme und trotz des Appells an die patriotische Spendenbereitschaft der chinesischen Bevölkerung die Spiele zu einem ökonomischen Wagnis werden zu lassen. Überdies wird die enge Verbindung von Sport und Politik betont, da die chinesische Propaganda die Durchführung der Asien-Spiele in der VR China als Beweis für die Wiederherstellung von "Frieden und Stabilität" im Lande interpretiert. Folgerichtig sind für die Spiele umfangreiche Sicherheitsmaßnahmen geplant. (BIOst-Gsh)

This paper serves to demonstrate the manner in which body practices both reflect and, in turn, subtly shape the political contexts and purposes within which they occur. While governments may pay particular attention to how different body practices, such as sports and dance, could be means to advance their political objectives, they can never readily control the ambiguity, complexity and irony that is generated by the performing bodies of social actors. The ethnographic context for this discussion is the performing practices and political discourses on sports and dance in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania in the 1990s. The colonial way of doing sports in Tanzania and Eastern Africa required another structuring of time and space different than many of the traditional games. By means of the moralistic ideology of athleticism, schoolboys should have learned the basic tools of imperial command: courage, endurance, assertion, control and selfcontrol. However, the emergence of different dance societies indicates that the colonisation of body practices was not a straightforward process in which people responded without resisting. While the tribal modes of dance continued to attract most women during the British colony, there emerged several dance societies stressing modernity and multi-tribalism. The dance is a crucial demonstration of what Michael Taussig has termed 'mimesis'. Mimesis is explicitly tied to the body, and through mimesis people can dramatise and negotiate understandings of themselves and of others. This paper draws on historical material as well as extensive fieldwork in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania between 1992 and 1997. ; CC-BY