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Public health policy and interventions seek to arrest declining physical activity rates in childhood. Two prominent settings for intervening in childhood physical activity are schools and the home. This paper critically examines how these two spaces are constructed in a way that leads to different physical activity outcomes for children in their early primary years. We draw on child-centred ethnographic fieldwork conducted with a cohort of Year 1/2 (5–8 years) students in a public primary school in Australia over a six-month period, and as well as on Bourdieusean concepts of field, capital, and habitus. The results show that many participants perceived the home to be a much safer environment for physical self-expression compared to physical education and the school playground. The way these spaces are constructed leads to the privileging of certain physical activity habitus (PAH), while some children must manage a divided habitus across these settings, which can increasingly create internal tensions over time. We conclude with a call to utilise theoretically informed approaches to better understand the complex processes occurring across the spaces, and to utilise this insight to develop more nuanced efforts to engage children in physical activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Air travel is a key factor in Super Rugby and can have a negative influence on players' performance and well-being. The aim of this study was to identify the current practice to reduce the effects of air travel and to understand the rationale behind these interventions. "Travel managers" from eight Super Rugby teams were interviewed and answered a questionnaire. A qualitative description was performed to identify common themes and differences between participants' answers. To protect the privacy and identity of the participants, all data have been de-identified and represented as two fictionalised amalgams (Bob and Peter). The rationale behind each intervention appeared to be based on a mix of anecdotal, practice and, occasionally, literature, confirming that scientific findings are not always easily translatable to applied settings. Two different approaches, clinical (Bob) and holistic (Peter), were identified. Even if both characters acknowledge that travel variables are too many to control, it appears that team culture and practices are perceived as important as biological interventions in controlling the negative effects of travel on players' performance and well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the positive role of sport in building social cohesion and the accrual of social and cultural capital for many young Pasifika men. In the process, we also critique the disciplinary discourse, underpinned by bio-racism and commodification, which is enacted on the bodies of Pacific Island men in the context of post-colonial, neoliberal, Australia. This results in over-representation in the rugby codes, manual labour, the security industry, and in prison. Of specific interest to this paper are the ways in which certain spaces, and the means to occupy them, become naturalised. This naturalisation serves to obscure the actual regulatory, and at times exploitative, function of sports; instead positing them as exemplars of individualism and self-governance. In positioning neoliberalism as the reengineering, rather than simply the deregulation, of the state, sports such as rugby enact considerable disciplinary power over the bodies of a minority ethnicity. We refer to this diversion from conventional working class employment opportunities as 'sportfare'. Qualitative data for this paper has been drawn from several independent studies engaging with Pasifika communities in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been suggested by some authors that, given the relationship between dependence and vulnerability to exploitation, a shift in coaching away from surveillance and control and towards autonomy-supportive behaviours by coaches will be conducive to athlete welfare. This paper utilizes an ethnographic approach, underpinned by the theoretical position of the later writings of Foucault, to understand the autonomous practices of athletes in a Japanese university rowing club. Of particular interest are the ways in which the relative absence of the coach contributes to athlete autonomy. The long-term sport-education of these Japanese university rowers results in an enduring subjectification that no longer requires the intervention of any coach. At the same time, these Japanese rowers still actively and autonomously engage in practices of the self, expressed in non-strategic, interactional ways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Established in 2012, 'the Seekers' are a football club in Melbourne, Australia. Initially set up to provide social recreation for various refugees and asylum seekers, the Seekers have more recently entered a team in the mainstream league competition. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, this paper considers how football facilitates forms of social inclusion for team members, both in relation to the action of the sport and the political and social context of Australian society more broadly. In many ways the field of sport is highly contested as players engage with the mainstream; however the solidarity forged through playing creates the possibility for moments of social inclusion in other ways. The capacity of sporting interactions to facilitate social inclusion for male team members is vexed, though there is evidence to suggest that, in the correct conditions, sport can contribute to an individual's capacity to access employment and educational opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2005, Football Federation Australia (FFA) launched its latest attempt to create a professional men's soccer football league in Australia, the A-League. The new competition aimed to distance itself from the old National Soccer League, which was based around ethnically affiliated clubs and in doing so appeal to a bigger, more mainstream, market. The formation of the A-League also coincided with Australia's alignment with the Asian Football Confederation for World Cup qualification and related championship play. Ambitious thinkers within FFA envisaged soccer football providing a vehicle to facilitate economic, cultural and political linkages into Asia in what has been termed the 'Asian Century'. However, while teams boosted their rosters with international players, there was a noticeable lack of players from Asia. In this paper we focus on Japanese international Shinji Ono, a marquee signing for the Western Sydney Wanderers (WSW) in 2012, who arguably became the first 'Asian' sporting celebrity in Australia. Hs impact on the A-League is considered both for fans of the WSW and in the marketing of the league more generally. Affectionately known as tensai (genius), Ono embodied characteristics that marked him as uniquely Japanese and captured the imagination of Australian football fans as few other players have. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public health initiatives around obesity have generally worked well for middle class Australians and New Zealanders. This message has not had the same impact in Anglo working class areas and certain CALD communities, especially Māori and Pasifika, where obesity rates remain highest. This paper employs qualitative data from interviews with eighty-five Māori and Pasifika migrants to Australia to explore attitudes to food purchasing and consumption behaviours and associated health risks. It is evident the individual, medicalised approach to improving obesity rates has not been effective and there needs to be a new culturally responsive structural approach. This would require governments to prioritise population health over existing relationships with commercial food manufacturers – especially in relation to spatial domination of commercialised fast food outlets in low socio-economic status districts and in the areas of sports and education sponsorship. We also explore the assumptions of evidence-based health policy more generally, providing a critique of who is represented and served by the commercial solicitation and management of health research. This includes what constitutes ‘evidence’, who is conducting and funding the research, who appraises and compares the data and how is it interpreted and employed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the beginning of 2013 two independent cases made the headlines of Japanese newspapers. The first case involved the suicide of a high school student that was allegedly triggered after he received several beatings from his basketball coach for failing to perform well enough. The second case involved fifteen female judoka, including competitors in the London Olympics, who filed a letter with the Japanese Olympic Committee complaining of violence by two coaches, including the head coach of the women's team. Both these cases caused a national debate about the practice oftaibatsu(corporal punishment) in sport in Japan. This article is based on the outcomes of focus groups that were conducted with students at ten universities from across Japan in 2013. In particular, we examine the ways in which students’ normalised acts of violence from coaches, accepting them as necessary forms of discipline and, in many cases interpreting such acts as indicative of caring coaching and kindness. Further, we consider the responses of students, which suggest that these forms of corporal punishment are necessary in producing a uniquely Japanese form of identity. The complex relationship between sport and education in Japan suggests that attempts to change the ways in whichbukatsudōoperate, including coach/athlete relationships, is problematic and may require major reconsideration of the role of sport in education. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The intersection of sport and education is a potentially powerful site for the production of class and gender. This paper examines how the relationship between sport and education can also serve to (re)produce ideas about ‘race’. Drawing on research conducted during my time as a coach of the first XV rugby team at an elite private school in Australia, I consider how whiteness creates the ‘other’. In particular I highlight how, despite their absence, the Pacific Island ‘other’ is (re)produced through stories that coaches share during training. These stories revolve around the themes of the ‘natural’, fear and violence and commodity. As themes they resonate with a larger meta-narrative that informs dominant ‘white’ culture on Pacific Islanders in Australia. Such stories have the power to shape students’ subjectivities, both of themselves and Pacific Islanders. Deconstructing the white-stream narrative identifies sport settings in education as important pedagogical sites where ‘race’, class and gender are learned. As such, there is a need to utilise critical pedagogical approaches in the education of sports coaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The last 20 years has seen a great increase in Pacific Islander migration to Australia and also a subsequent rise in the number of Australians from Pacific island backgrounds. Perhaps one of the most visible spheres where this migratory phenomenon can be witnessed is in the massive over-representation of Pacific Islanders in both rugby codes. This paper examines the effects of professionalisation and the Super Rugby expansion into a ‘non-rugby’ state and subsequent efforts of the Victorian Rugby Union (VRU) to develop ‘home-grown’ talent, namely through its Pacific Island Programme. Whilst a minority sport in Australian Rules football centric Melbourne, rugby has grown considerably over the past decade, primarily because of the influx of players, especially junior ones, from Pacific Island backgrounds. The VRU has recognised this by developing a variety of rugby programmes focusing on the outer suburbs of Melbourne (away from its traditional base in the private schools) in response to the settling patterns of Pacific Islanders and their involvement in the game. This paper considers how such focus on Pacific Islander talent facilitates pathways to elite and professional rugby opportunities and thus contributes to the creation of the rugby labour migrant. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In Australia and New Zealand recognition of Polynesians is almost exclusively defined by their physicality. Sought after for size and strength on the sporting field, excellence in sport is arguably regarded as a life goal in itself. This paper will examine how this situation arose and the implications for Polynesians living in Australia. For a working-class community struggling with rapidly diminishing job opportunities and a high cost of living, sport is increasingly regarded as the only avenue out of poverty. With comparatively low rates of educational achievement keeping many in 'blue collar' jobs, there are consequences for health and health literacy, particularly with regard to obesity-related illness and premature mortality from otherwise preventable diseases. This paper will discuss the findings of two studies: an ethnographic project exploring the rugby life histories of 15 Polynesian men in Melbourne and qualitative interviews with 67 Polynesians in Sydney and the Hunter region about their perceptions of health and lifestyle. It will argue success in sport is inextricably bound up with cultural pride and identity. The sporting domain therefore has the potential to allow a migrant minority a 'voice' in other areas of civic engagement. In this way, rather than a sporting career coming at the expense of an education, participation and achievement in sport should provide a background to improving culturally targetted programs around improving outcomes in education and health awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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When Australian diver Matthew Mitcham produced a world-record score with his final dive from the 10m platform to win the gold medal at the Beijing Olympics, he did so as the ‘only openly gay man at the Olympics’. This paper examines the Australian print media's narrative of Mitcham leading into, during and after the Games. In the hetero-normative world of Australian sport, the normative narrative carries four storylines: performance, national identity, masculinity and significant relationships. Combined, these storylines resonate with audiences and have the potential to create the vortex of publicity required to launch an athlete into the world of sponsorship and celebrity. Initially, with few exceptions, the media fails to write the masculinity and significant-relationships storylines about Mitcham and he fails to gain sponsorship. However, free of the narrative conventions and constraints of an Olympic games, it is the very same media that proceed to write in the missing narratives post-Olympics and act almost as activists on Mitcham's behalf. The result is Mitcham's transformation into a marketable, popular sporting celebrity: sitting comfortably in both mainstream and LGBT culture and sport, a role model for young same-sex-attracted people, and a voice of experience about homophobia and issues of sexuality in sport. Leading into the London Olympics, stories about Mitcham contribute to an alternative masculine narrative that becomes available for young sportsmen and women to consider. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

When Hideo Nomo exploited a contractual loophole to transfer from Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) to Major League Baseball in 1994, he provided the catalyst for change in the relationship between individual players and teams in Japan's number one sport. Nomo's ‘defection’ changed player/team attitudes as emphasis shifted from one of mutual trust to one based heavily on contracts. The Japanese version of sportsmanship until that point had been one that relied on the loyalty of players to a paternal and protective owner. The mutual trust established through a combination of loyalty and obligation was not unique to baseball, rather it should be seen as a reflection of many aspects of Japanese culture. By the turn of the century, baseball in Japan has changed greatly and this is especially so for not only labour relations in NPB but also High School Baseball. In 2007, it was revealed that 7921 high school players had been given illegal financial assistance causing a scandal that had repercussions throughout Japanese society. This paper investigates the implications of this change, particularly on NPB. The analysis extends to consider the broader effects this event had on baseball, especially within the Japanese education system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]