T-Shirts and Directory!

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T-shirts: clearly the most potent of all tools for building group solidarity and cooperation:

Peter has made possible the printing of 25 FSF T-shirts. To get your hands on these handsome garments, send me an email with a shipping address to galarza.alex@gmail.com The cost is $15 plus shipping. I can take paypal payments at the same email address. The shirts are all Large but are 100% cotton and can be shrunk easily.

Also, please fill out the FSF Academic Directory at http://bit.ly/egZNyw Please help spread  the word about the database we are building for academics working in football. It can help foster connections and encourage research across regional boundaries.

Fútbol, Historia, y Política – triunfo en español

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Our first bilingual session was a great success. After some initial audio issues, we had just over 90 minutes of fantastic discussion regarding Fútbol, Historia, y Política. The three chapter authors in attendance were Julio Frydenberg, Rodrigo Daskal, and Mariano Gruschetsky.

Our conversation revolved around one of the central themes of the book: the tensions between public and private logics in Argentine football clubs. We also discussed possibilities of comparative research in Argentine football when the conversation turned towards parallels with Chilean and English football.

The audio for the meeting is available here (for educational/personal use only).

In attendance:
Julio Frydenberg
Rodrigo Daskal
Mariano Gruschetsky
Marcela Mora y Araujo
James Dorsey
Rwany Sibaja
Edward Murphy
Alejandro González
Ben Sawyer
Peter Alegi
Alex Galarza

FSF Feb – Fútbol, Historia, y Política

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The first session of spring 2011 will be held on Thursday February 17th at 1800 (6pm) Eastern time. Here are a few materials regarding the book, Fútbol, Historia, y Política edited by Julio Frydenberg and Rodrigo Daskal.

“‘Fútbol, Historia y Política’ es fruto del esfuerzo de incorporar nuevas cuestiones en el estudio del deporte; y en realidad no hace más que continuar con las inquietudes contempladas por Archetti, quien consideraba al deporte como parte integral de la sociedad, y que nos permite reflexionar acerca de lo social” – Julio Frydenberg

Pagina 12 Review
Presentation at the Universidad de San Martín
Publisher’s page

Short piece on the passing of Eduardo Archetti

Cairo Ultras in Egyptian Protests

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Anti-government protests in Egypt are being driven by young men, including Egyptian ultras writes FSF member James Dorsey. “Soccer fans constitute a well-organized and feared pillar of the marshalling grassroots coalition determined to ensure that President Hosni Mubarak suffers the same fate as Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali who was toppled earlier this month by mass demonstrations.” Full article here.

For more details on Egyptian ultras and the social and political implications of the game in Cairo, listen to David Goldblatt’s The Secret Policeman’s Football: Al Ahly v Zamalek (part 2 of his BBC radio documentary “The Power and the Passion”) and read this multimedia essay by one of the founders of Egypt’s first ultras group.

[Editor’s note: in December 2021, FSF hosted a session with Carl Rommel on this topic.]

Football Panel at American Studies Association – Baltimore

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via Jennifer Doyle:

The call for papers just came out – the conference in the fall (Oct 20-23), and is in Baltimore. I’d like to put together a football panel for this – papers need to fit within the flexible framework of the ASA.  There are rarely panels that take on sports generally at this conference, never mind a specific sport – I think a proposal from footie scholars would fare well in the selection process.  Deadline is January 26th… This is purely selfish, as I’m eager to present my own work on sports in this context (it’s a great conference).

The conference website and proposal criteria are here. Jennifer Doyle can be reached at jennifer.doyle@ucr.edu.

Fall Season Ends with Soccer Empire

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DuboisSoccerEmpireThe first year of FSF ended today in inspiring fashion with a discussion of Laurent Dubois’ Soccer Empire.

Participants: Laurent Dubois, Peter Alegi, Alex Galarza, Andrew Guest, Steven Apostolov, and David Roberts.

The audio of the discussion is available here. (For educational/personal use only.)

Stay tuned for updates on the Spring lineup! We have had an excellent discussion over email about a session on the women’s game and will decide soon on materials and a date. We will also be doing our first FSF session en español when we discuss Frydenberg and Daskal’s Fútbol, Historia, y Política.

Halloween and Dubois

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Happy Halloween! This means that November is upon us and with it, Laurent Dubois’s Soccer Empire. Last month’s meeting was a spectacular success so I am looking forward to closing the Fall season with Laurent’s excellent book. The meeting is now Tuesday November 16th at 2pm, it was moved so that I can attend THATCamp in Chicago.

THATCamp is a digital humanities ‘unconference’ where I will be discussing our  group and how to best foster its growing presence to aid our own research and provide a place to share ideas. I am happy to share that I received a $500 fellowship from the organizers to attend as well as participate in several ‘Bootcamps’ where I will learn a few new ‘hard tech skills’ in web design and coding.

Be sure to acquire Laurent’s book ASAP as the third week of November is not too far away!

Packed House for Goldblatt’s The Ball is Round

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cover)BallIsRoundDavid Goldblatt—the Garrincha of Fútbology—attracted the largest crowd yet at the Football Scholars Forum.

The event, the first of two dedicated to Goldblatt’s encyclopedic The Ball is Round: A Global History of Soccer, included discussion on globalization, politics and capital, and the role of the working class in football’s history. [Episode two is here.]

Thanks are in order to David Goldblatt for sharing his insights and to everyone who participated, including Ben Dettmar, Gordon Stewart, Alejandro Gonzalez, Andrew Guest, Tom McCabe, Tim Vickery, Steven Apostolov, Laurent Dubois, Peter Alegi, and Alex Galarza.

Listen to an audio recording of the conversation below (for educational/personal use only):

The Ball is Round!

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Our second session is on Wednesday October 20th,  at 2:15pm East Coast time. We are splitting The Ball is Round: A Global History of Soccer in two halves so in this meeting we are reading and discussing parts 1-3 (pp. 3-479).

Part one: “Ancients and Moderns: Football and the Invention of Modern Sport, from the beginning to 1914”

Part two: “The People’s Game: Football, Empire, and Industry 1870-1934”

Part three: “The Beautiful Game: Football’s Short Twentieth Century, 1934-1974”

Be sure to RSVP to participate via Skype.

I also wanted to share that I have been accepted at THATCamp in Chicago next month, a conference on the digital humanities that brings together academics, librarians, and technology specialists to work collaboratively on individual projects. The Football Scholars Forum will be the ‘paper’ I give at the conference so I look forward to sharing the results after we end the Fall season with Laurent Dubois.