This volume gathers work from a wide range of disciplines - anthropology, cultural studies, geography, history, law, sociology, and post-colonial studies - to explore the paradoxical processes of emulation, resistance and transformation that are at work in the global diffusion and development of "sport" and body cultures.

Introduction: From Asian Sports to Sport in Asia Katrin Bromber, Birgit Krawietz and Joseph Maguire 1. Anthropological Perspectives on Sport and Culture: Against Sports as the Essence of Western Modernity Ingrid Kummels 2. Civilising Bodies: Somatic Engineering in China Denise Gimpel 3. Sport in Japan in the Early 21st Century: An Interpretation Lee Thompson 4. The Memory of Colonialism and Imagined Unification: Two Distinctive Natures of South Korean Sporting Nationalism in the 21st Century Jung Woo Lee and Joseph Maguire 5. Representing True Laos in Post-Colonial Southeast Asia: Regional Dynamics in the Globalization of Sport Simon Creak 6. The Debate on 'Revival' and the Physical Culture Movement in Western India (1900-1950) Namrata R. Ganneri 7. Martial Arts Iranian Style: Zurkhane Heavy Athletics and Wrestling Contested Birgit Krawietz 8. The Development of Mountaineering in Republican Turkey Funda Akcan and Nefise Bulgu 9. The United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Bahrain as a Modern Sport Hub Katrin Bromber and Birgit Krawietz

Joseph Maguire is Professor of Sociology of Sport at Loughborough University.

Birgit Krawietz is Professor of Islamic Studies at the Free University of Berlin.

Katrin Bromber is a researcher at the Zentrum Moderner Orient (ZMO).