Upcoming Sports Events

SafeClub was officially launched on 25th June 2009 with the support of the NSW Department of Sport and Recreation. Over 40 people representing sport from across NSW attended the luncheon launch to hear how SafeClub makes safety easy for community sport. A presentation from SafeClub’s Jane Nethery and Kristy Abbott included an overview of the program and the research evidence while Michelle Hanley from Football NSW covered the benefits of SafeClub from a sport perspective. Sports from across NSW are now signing up to partner with SafeClub to make their sport safer.

If you missed the launch and would like information on SafeClub click here.
 


Sunshine Coast Launches Girls Rugby League Competition 

On Sunday, 10 May, ARL Development and the Sunshine Coast Gympie Rugby League will launch their inaugural U15's and U17s Girls Competition at the Beerwah Bulldogs JRL (Roberst Road, Beerwah) between 10am and midday. The Launch will involve Under 15 teams from Caboolture, Bribie Island, Coolum and Beerwah whilst the Under 17s will involve Nambour, Bribie Island and Beerwah.

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Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience

Inspiring Youth Cricketer Jack Manning-Bancroft has helped University of Sydney Students get underway a mentoring program linking Indigenous year 9 and 10 school students from with mentors from across all university faculties. The underlying philosophy of AIME is to empower young indigenous people through positive role modelling and relationships, building self esteem and resilience, encouraging schoolattendance and progression to tertiary education.

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Refugee Youth Soccer Development Program

This innovative program seeks to assist young refugees in their immigration and integration to Australia through sport. Check out their website for more information.


 

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Upcoming Research

The third round of focus groups and fieldwork has been completed and a General Summary is being collated. Thanks to The Southport School, AB Paterson College, Rockhampton Girls Grammar School, Sapphire Coast Anglican College, Wagga Wagga Christian College, Al-Faisal College Auburn, Football United and the Burwood and Mosman Cubs for their participation. Preparation for further focus groups with parents, coaches and PDHPE teachers is underway.

 
Journals
Social Positioning and the Construction of a Youth Sports Club
This article uses the concept of social positioning to explore the construction of a youth sports club by young people, their parents and coaches. The year-long ethnography of Forest Athletics Club (FAC) identified two athlete positions of Samplers and Beginning Specializers. Four parents’ positions were identified, those of Non-Attenders, Spectators, Helpers and Committed Members. One coach position was the Committed Volunteer. Each of these positions was interdependent. Particular expectations, practices and values were attached to these positions. It is argued that the club operates according to multiple agendas and that FAC is a complex and dynamic social phenomenon that is practised differently by the three groups of key players.
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'Keeping It Real': Subcultural Media and the Discourses of Authenticity in Alternative Sport
 This article examines the consumption of alternative sport's subcultural media. Our research is situated in the context of `post' CCCS subcultural research which has explored how the media and the market are central to the authentication of popular cultural practices. Qualitative audience research was conducted with windsurfers from the UK and skateboarders from the US, examining the meanings that the niche magazines have for the participants of those alternative sports in the construction of their sporting identities. We focused on participants' readings of magazine advertising images, exploring their discourses about `authentic' identity and status in their subcultures, particularly through their complex and `creative' readings of the meanings of images and brands. Our empirical research suggests that the magazines played an important role in providing and circulating cultural knowledges, but also were an avenue for the participants to display their subcultural capital. We map the interpretive frameworks used by both groups to discuss `authentic' discourses of their sports.
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Embedded Expectations, Embodied Knowledge and the Movements That Connect: A System Theoretical ...

...Attempt to Explain the Use and Non-Use of Sport Facilities

In this article I propose another way of studying the use and non-use of sport facilities. I argue that sport facilities embed expectations observable to individuals who are forced to meet these expectations or not. I also claim that our choices concerning the use or non-use of a sport facility are grounded in our embodied knowledge, a knowledge that is not easy to make conscious. My last claim is that movements connect the embedded expectations and embodied knowledge and eventually mediate changes in both these structures.
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Risky Behaviours among Young Elite-Student-Athletes: Results from a Pilot Survey in South-Eastern...
....France

Since the end of the 1980s, ‘youth risky behaviours’ have become a major issue for public health. The relationship between these behaviours and sporting activity is well-documented but still controversial. This article examines some sociological hypotheses related to this relationship, with data from a pilot survey conducted on a sample of 458 elite-student-athletes (ESAs) aged 16–24, gathered and trained in specialized public centres. We found a significant relationship between motives to do sport and ‘risky behaviours’: ESAs who considered sport as a convivial leisure were more prone to use cannabis, while ESAs who mingled sporting and extra-sporting achievements together were more likely to engage in risky behaviours on the road, possibly because they transposed values from the sporting field (speed, competition) into the ‘real world’. Moreover, sporting activity may provide opportunities for drug use with peers as well as incentives to use drugs in order to cope with the anxiety induced by high-level competition. Thus ‘recreational’ drugs may be used as ‘integrative’ drugs.
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Sports Participation and the ‘Obesity/Health Crisis’: Reflections on the case of young people ...
...in England

There has been growing concern in recent years about the emergence of a supposed ‘health crisis’ — in the form of an ‘obesity epidemic’ — among young people, one of the maincauses of which, it is assumed, is their declining levels of involvement in sport and physical activity. This brief paper offers some critical comments on the taken-for-granted relationship between these two emergent ‘crises’ and argues that, in contrast to popular opinion, young people are, in fact, doing more sport and physical activity than at any other time in the past, but that this process has co-occurred, and continues to co-occur, with increasing levels of obesity and overweight. In order to begin to adequately explain these co-occurring processes, it is argued that we need to examine young people’s lives in their total context, while noting, in particular, the continuing significance of broader social processes and the networks of relationships in which they are involved.
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Investigating Indicators for Measuring the Health and Social Impact of Sport and Recreation Programs

...in Australian Indigenous Communities 

A project was undertaken in 2002 on behalf of the Australian Sports Commission to identify potential indicators of health and social outcomes from sport and recreation programs in Indigenous communities in Australia. The project consisted of three stages: 1) a literature review to identify specific indicators of potential relevance in the Indigenous Australian context; 2) discussions with key members of three Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory to identify community expectations and experiences of sport and recreation programs; and 3) consultation with relevant stakeholders to determine the potential usefulness and appropriateness of the indicators identified in the first two stages. A number of indicators are proposed for immediate testing and refinement, while others are recommended for future development.

BSC

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High School Athletic Participation and Adolescent Suicide: A Nationwide US Survey
Suicide is the third leading cause of death among US adolescents aged 15-24, with males incurring higher rates of completion than females. This study used hierarchical logistic regression analysis to test whether athletic participation was associated with lower rates of suicidal ideation and behavior among a nationally representative sample of over 16,000 US public and private high school students. Net of the effects of age, race/ethnicity, parental educational attainment, and urbanicity, high school athletic participation was significantly associated with reduced odds of considering suicide among both females and males, and reduced odds of planning a suicide attempt among females only. Though the results point to favorable health outcomes for athletes, athletic participation was also associated with higher rates of injury to male athletes who actually attempted suicide.
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Slim Bodies, Eating Disorders and the Coach-Athlete Relationship:

A Tale of Identity Creation and Disruption

This study explores the experiences of a former elite swimmer, Anne (a pseudonym), whose career was interrupted and finally terminated by disordered eating. The work is grounded in the need to tell Anne’s story in relation to compliance within a culture of slenderness and norms, and the role of the coach within that culture. Using interpretive biography, the data illustrate how the creation of strong athletic identity led to a vulnerable sense of self, which, when disrupted, critically contributed to the development of an eating disorder. They also indicate how the prevailing discourse fed the disorder through ongoing surveillance and disciplining of the self. Finally, suggestions are made about drawing lessons from Anne’s story with regard to re-interpreting the traditional coach-athlete relationship.

BSC

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Daughters of Islam: Family Influences on Muslim Young Women's Participation in Sport
This article examines the significance of family influence on young women from minority (Muslim) communities who have participated in a combined sport and education programme designed to encourage access to further and higher education. The study explores how family expectations about the roles of young women affect the participants' responses to the programme. The research examines young women's understanding of their parents' views in relation to their participation in the programme and their broader aspirations for their daughters' adult lives in the family, education and employment domains. The young women's accounts of their family members' views on minority life in Britain, and the influence this might have on their own opportunities and experiences, are also considered. The research was conducted in partnership with a graduate female Muslim Sport and education development worker and with young female participants (n = 7) in the sports programme, all of whom were actively involved in the design, implementation and analysis of the study.
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