Wednesday, June 17, 2009

CONFERENCE: International Conference on Sport and Society

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON SPORT AND SOCIETY
University of British Columbia
Vancouver, Canada
8-10 March 2010
http://www.SportConference.com/

We are excited to be holding the inaugural Conference in Vancouver - scheduled between the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Games, at the University of British Columbia. The Conference hopes to engage university and international academics to consider broad questions about the connections between sport and society in the exciting context of the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The International Conference on Sport and Society and its companion International Journal of Sport and Society provide a forum for wide-ranging and interdisciplinary examination of sport, including: the history, sociology and psychology of sport; sports medicine and health; physical and health education; and sports administration and management. The discussions at the conference and in the journal range from broad conceptualisations of the fundamental logics of sport, to highly specific readings of sporting practices in particular times and places. The conference and journal focus on four logics of sport: Game Logic; Body Logic; Aesthetic Logic; and Organisational Logic.

As well as impressive line-up of international plenary speakers, the Conference will also include numerous paper, workshop and colloquium presentations by practitioners, teachers and researchers. We would particularly like to invite you to respond to the Conference Call-for-Papers. Presenters may choose to submit written papers for publication in the International Journal of Sport and Society. If you are unable to attend the Conference in person, virtual registrations are also available which allow you to submit a paper for refereeing and possible publication in this fully refereed academic Journal.

Whether you are a virtual or in-person presenter at this Conference, we also encourage you to present on the Conference YouTube Channel. Please select the Online Sessions link on the Conference website for further details.

The deadline for the next round in the call for papers (a title and short abstract) is 9 July 2009. Future deadlines will be announced on the Conference website after this date. Proposals are reviewed within three weeks of submission. Full details of the Conference, including an online proposal submission form, are to be found at the Conference website - http://www.SportConference.com/.

We look forward to receiving your proposal and hope you will be able to join us in Vancouver in March 2010.

Yours Sincerely,

Keith Gilbert
University of East London, London, UK
For the Advisory Board, International Conference on Sport and Society and The International Journal of Sport and Society

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

CFP: NASSS 2009 Conference -- Sport and Bodily Culture in Hard Times

This is the second call for Session Organizers to submit a session to the 2009 NASSS Conference that will be held in Ottawa, CANADA, November 4-7, 2009. The following information appears on the NASSS website and can be accessed by going to: http://www.nasss.org/2009/index.html

The 30th annual conference of the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport (NASSS) will be held November 4-7, 2009 at the Marriott Hotel on Kent Street in Ottawa, CAN. The theme for this year’s conference is “Sport and Bodily Culture in Hard Times.” Those interested in organizing a session should submit a session proposal by June 15th, 2009 to one of the program co-chairs, Geneviève Rail and Nancy Spencer, via the Session Proposal form.

Given the economic downturn and its impact all over the planet, the Program Committee felt that we, as NASSS members, could reflect on the “Hard Times” behind and ahead of us and what they mean for sport and, more broadly, for culture. Hard times impact on the lives of people in so many negative ways. At the same time, they may push us to reinvent ourselves and to rethink the social structures that organize our worlds so that we do not end up in the same catastrophic situation. Since sport is so often appreciated for the values it instills and the leadership it creates, one has to wonder whether drastic changes should occur so that sport could help in developing leaders with different values (e.g., interdependence) who would work to transform our societies and avoid past errors. In a world where increasingly we define ourselves by what we have (e.g., a house, a car, a membership in a club, friends on Facebook, a nice body), should the social dynamics as well as the individual choices that have brought us to Hard Times be renewed? Could we define ourselves and our social worlds differently? How are sport and bodily culture linked to subjectivities and social forces, and how could they be part of an effort to think ourselves/our planet anew? Should we struggle to keep sport and bodily culture just as they are and continue to pursue “business as usual”? What role should we play, as scholars, in asking and answering such questions?

The Program Committee is interested in securing sessions that promote specific or focused content related to the theme (i.e., keep the theme in mind when choosing a session title). However, we also welcome sessions that are not directly related to the conference theme but are consistent in scope. Sessions that enhance interdisciplinary conversations and encourage new ways of thinking about sport and bodily culture are particularly welcome.

For further information, please contact one of the program co-chairs:

Geneviève Rail, Program Co-Chair
Faculty of Health Sciences
University of Ottawa
Email: genrail@uottawa.ca

Nancy Spencer, Program Co-Chair
School of Human Movement, Sport, and Leisure Studies
Bowling Green State University
Email: nspencr@bgnet.bgsu.edu

Call for abstracts: A second call seeking paper and poster abstracts will begin once the list of sessions is complete. The final deadline for submitting paper or poster abstracts will be July 15th, 2009. Look for the “2009 Call for Paper and Poster Abstracts” as well as more details about keynote speakers and conference activities in early August on the NASSS conference website.

Conference Registration: will be available on the conference registration page when the call for papers is issued.

CFP: Contests and Contestations: Bodies and Nation in Canadian History

Call for papers: Contests and Contestations: Bodies and Nation in Canadian
History

Proposals for papers are invited for an edited collection on the body in
Canadian history. We are seeking essays on the body and embodiment broadly
conceived that critically explore the political, social and cultural
contestations over the body and bodies in the Canadian context. The volume
aims to challenge approaches of the body as ahistorical and asocial, and
seeks to position the contested body as another category of analysis towards
understanding Canadian history. As contested spaces, bodies are
historically constructed and inscribed with political, social, and cultural
meanings. In turn, these meanings have come to shape historical
conceptualizations of nation, gender, race, class, and sexuality. Although
often referred to in the singular (as ‘the body’), Canadian history and the
nation have been composed of a multiplicity of bodies and notions of
embodiment that have often been in contest both metaphorically and
literally. This collection aims to bring together aspects of these
histories to explore some of the implications for the nation. We especially
encourage submissions that discuss beauty contests and
nationhood/citizenship as well as critical junctures between Canadian and
transnational/global bodies and ideas of embodiment. Other potential topic
areas include but are not limited to:

· colonialism and the colonial/colonized body or embodied experiences of
colonialization, race, and violence

· gender/sexuality and bodies especially historical notions of femininity
and masculinity in relation to nation/citizenship

· childhood and adolescence/the aging/aged body: as separate themes or
understanding the body historically as temporal space

· cultural representations and performances: burlesque/stripping, artistic
performances, dance, the body as a site of cultural contest and negotiation,
spectacle and the extraordinary body on display (e.g. freak shows, circuses
and midway exhibitions)

· medicine and science: notions of the healthy/unhealthy body or bodies and
nation-building (such as a rethinking of bodies, nation, and the eugenics
movement), cosmetic surgery

· dis/ability: science, technology, and medical intervention, historical
constructions of disability and ability

· bodies/athletic bodies and sports

· productive bodies: bodies at work, industrialization and the body,
workplace bodies and national health, (re) productive bodies and nation-building

The editors will review proposals and authors of accepted proposals will be
invited to contribute to the collection. All manuscripts will be externally
peer reviewed.

Please submit a 300-500 word abstract, working title and brief biography by
September 15, 2009.

Completed manuscripts (6000-8000 words) are due on April 15, 2010.

Please send queries and/or completed proposals in a Word document to:

Patrizia Gentile
Pauline Jewett Institute of Women’s and Gender Studies
Carleton University
patrizia_gentile@carleton.ca