This book introduces the fundamentals of sport sociology and social issues in sport for students of PE and coaching. It provides an accessible, jargon-free foundation for understanding the relationships between sport, education and wider society that puts into context the reader's applied studies in PE and coaching.

Richard L Light is Professor Emeritus at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, and Honourary Professor at the University of Sydney, Australia, where he teaches physical education pedagogy and sport sociology. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Technology Sydney and Southern Cross University, and Visiting Professor at Waseda University, Japan. He is an international leader in research on, and the development of, athlete and student-centred coaching and teaching in which he situates learning within larger cultural and institutional contexts.

Steve Georgakis teaches at the University of Sydney, Australia, in the pre-service physical education teacher education program. His doctoral study was in the history of sport, but over the last two decades he has focussed on teaching and research on Game Sense and other student-centred, inquiry-based approaches to teaching physical education and coaching sport. He also teaches sport sociology.

1 The origins of sport

2 Sport sociology

3 Sport as education vs Sport as business

COMMENTARY 1

Professionalism vs Amateurism in New Zealand Club Rugby

4 The commodification of sport

5 The globalisation of sport

COMMENTARY 2

Indigenous Australians' transitioning into the NRL and AFL

6 Sport, health, and sponsorship

7 Media-Sport

COMMENTARY 3

The influence of media-sport on Australian

children

8 Sport and gender

COMMENTARY 4

Disrupting hegemonic masculinity in high-school rugby

9 The anti-social foundations of lifestyle sports

Nick Maitland

COMMENTARY 5

Waves for wellbeing and surfing in middle age

With Nick Maitland

10 Transnational athlete migration