The Psychology of Sports Fans by Aaron C.T. Smith (Routledge) explains the intricate psychological foundations of sports fandom, exploring why sports hold such emotional power across cultures and demographics, and uncovers how sports provide meaning, identity, and community, making them an essential part of human life. Peter Hassmén is our excellent guide to this book, presenting its strengths and weaknesses equally detailed and respectfully, concluding that the sometime lack of scholarly depth affecting for instance the discussion on religion and hooliganism is well compensated for by its accessibility in structure and writing style.

In this paper, Enrique Cubillo proposes the first formal classification of switch-kick locomotion—bilateral alternating propulsion on wheeled platforms—as a distinct locomotor class. To the author’s knowledge, no existing biomechanical, sports science, or physical literacy literature has formally defined bilateral alternating propulsion on wheeled platforms as a distinct locomotor class with necessary and sufficient constraints. The paper documents what appears to be no systematic or formalized switch-kick instruction in global skateboarding pedagogy.

The Swedish Association of Sports Historians (SVIF) publishes a yearbook, Idrott, historia & samhälle (Sports, History & Society) which is a peer-reviewed scholarly journal of sport history, published in Sweden for the Scandinavian market and beyond. The Forum Editor’s choice from the current issue: Taming or Revering Nature? Equestrian Sports as Mirror of Nature Perceptions in the Early 20th Century by Noemi Steuerwald (open access).

All manuscripts must focus on elite athletes navigating the emerging adulthood developmental period and address the unique setting of athletic careers in which EA athletes are nested. Athletes competing at high levels of sport, including but not limited to premier or major professional leagues, professional developmental and minor leagues, and collegiate/quasi-professional athletics, are the primary focus of this Special Issue. Recreational, intramural, or lower-intensity sport contexts fall outside the scope of this Special Issue and will not be considered.

Hosted by Leeds Business School and the Centre for Social Justice in Sport and Society, the symposium is designed to move beyond identifying these inequalities and instead focus on how organisations can respond in practice. The day will bring together practitioners, governing bodies, advocacy organisations and researchers to explore how evidence-led approaches can support more inclusive organisational change. A keynote address will be delivered by Disability Sport Wales, whose work continues to shape thinking around inclusive leadership and governance across sport.

In this session David Meir and Kirsty Mackay will collaboratively outline previous and current policy approaches to reducing physical inactivity. David will share his research findings from his recent Scottish Parliament Fellowship that explored barriers and potential policy solutions to physical inactivity. David will also present recent research findings regarding intersectional inequalities, developing inclusive environments, implementing a systems-based approach to policy enactment and analysing policy through different frameworks e.g., the sociology of luck.

From the game’s early days, college football and a strain of muscular Christianity built a mutually reinforcing culture that taught lessons in America’s dominant religious, gendered, and racial belief systems. In his book The Gridiron Gospel: Faith and College Football in Twentieth-Century America (University of Illinois Press) Hunter M. Hampton analyzes the impact of football on Christian college campuses. Brian Hillman is our reviewer, and although he would have liked to hear more of student voices and views, he still finds Hampton’s effort to be an enjoyable-to-read monograph..

Research webinar featuring Raymond Boyle, Professor of Communications and Director of the Centre for Cultural Policy Research at the University of Glasgow, and Richard Haynes, Professor of Media Sport at the Division of Communications, Media and Culture at the University of Stirling (Scotland). Taking the global sport of Formula 1 (F1) motor racing as a sustained case study, Boyle & Haynes’ recent book Streaming the Formula 1 Rivalry: Sport and the Media in the Platform Age examines how the relationship between the sport and the media has evolved in this new digital environment.

Sports offer entry to culture, history, and intellectual debate for people who enjoy the world of ideas yet find academia inaccessible. Meeting readers where they are, this issue activates humanities research to unpack the hidden histories and surprising depths of sports around the world – from tennis and football to basketball and cricket – unfurling the intricacies of athletes, fans, and the cultures that surround them, providing readers with new understandings of their favorite past-times and conversation starters for their pregame rituals.

Sometime idrottsforum.org contributor Shawn Klein gave a two part lecture series on Jews and Sports for Arizona State University (ASU) Jewish Studies. These allowed him to branch out into topics he has thought about before and also speak to important parts of who he is. The first lecture, “American Jews and Sports Fandom,” was given on January 25 at the Valley of the Sun JCC in Scottsdale, AZ. The second lecture, “What, if anything, is Jewish in Sport?” was presented on zoom on Tuesday March 24, 2026. Both lectures are available on YouTube, with links within.

The 2026 NASSS conference in Calgary centers and explores the importance of time to how we imagine, experience, and make sense of sport and physical cultures. We often measure the body’s performance in increments of time, for instance in the seconds of the 100-meter dash or the basket scored just before the shot clock expires. Sport has a duration: the 90 minutes of a soccer match, for example, or the 80 minutes of rugby union. And sport often has a temporal rhythm, unfolding through seasons and off seasons that structure our investments of time, emotion, and (often) money. Here, time is a resource, and the ability to have and use time for sport or physical activity reflects broader structural inequalities of gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, age, ability, and social class.

idrottsforum’s weekly newsletter gives you the past week’s on-site activities in your mailbox every Monday morning, in the form of a letter with a link to a web page presentation of new publications. Click below to access that page, which also offers you a chance to subscribe to the Monday morning mail in case you’re not already a subscriber. And do friends and colleagues a great favor by telling them about this invaluable and totally free service.

Since 1930, the World Cup has become a truly global obsession, but it has also been a vehicle for far more than football. Yet there has been no comprehensive history of the tournament. Based on fresh interviews and meticulously researched, Jonathan Wilson’s The Power and the Glory: The History of the World Cup (Bold Types Books) will change that. Our reviewer Łukasz Muniowski is overwhelmed by Wilson’s effort – a brilliant book by a brilliant sports journalist that should impress even the most knowledgeable football fanatics.

Stillingen er knyttet til det NFR-finansierte forskningsprosjektet EquiPETE - Co-developing an evidence-based framework for equity, diversity and inclusion in physical education teacher education. Ph.d.-kandidaten, som også kan være masterstudent fra 2026, vil ha en sentral rolle i prosjektets aksjonsforskningsaktiviteter og arbeide innenfor to sammenhengende forskningsområder som omfatter både campusbasert undervisning og praksisopplæring i skolen. Prosjektet er forankret i mixed methods-tilnærminger, og både kvalitative og kvantitative metoder kan derfor være aktuelle i kandidatens arbeid.

In this peer review article, Arto Kuuluvainen examines how sports spectatorship contributes to national identity in the Nordic countries, with a particular focus on the culturally exceptional position of ice hockey in Finland. Using two survey datasets—a comparative Nordic survey from 2022 and Finnish brand-perception data from 2018—the study analyses national pride and satisfaction related to international sporting success, as well as patterns of sports following through media and live attendance. Finland reports the highest levels of sports-related national pride, and ice hockey is the most followed sport in Finland, whereas football dominates in Sweden and Norway.

World Players Institute 2026 (WPI 2026) welcomes abstract and research proposal submissions which align with this year’s theme: ‘Where research takes the field: Informing decision making, bargaining, and practice in sport’. The selection process will heavily favour presentations and proposals which have clear pathways for impact through collective bargaining, advocacy, and policy change. Submissions from postgraduate students, early-career researchers, and scholars from the Global South are welcomed and encouraged.

The third edition of Sport Fans: The Psychology and Social Impact of Fandom by Daniel L. Wann et al. (Routledge) examines the affective, behavioral, and cognitive reactions of fans to better comprehend how sport impacts individual fans and society as a whole. Our reviewer is Steph Doehler, who approaches this psychology textbook from a sociological angle. The book, she concludes, will remain a core text within its field. However, given the claim that this third edition promises a developed gender perspective she laments the paucity of a discussion about the structural realities of sexism, marginalization, and hostility faced by many women fans.

From September 24 to 25, 2026, the international ENSE Forum will take place at the University of Applied Sciences Kufstein Tirol. In times of global challenges – from climate change and social polarization to increasing physical inactivity – sports education is becoming increasingly important as the key to health, wellbeing and connection. The European Network of Sport Education (ENSE) is an international non-profit organization and has been active in the field of sport education in Europe since 1989.

idrottsforum’s weekly newsletter gives you the past week’s on-site activities in your mailbox every Monday morning, in the form of a letter with a link to a web page presentation of new publications. Click below to access that page, which also offers you a chance to subscribe to the Monday morning mail in case you’re not already a subscriber. And do friends and colleagues a great favor by telling them about this invaluable and totally free service.

Hensikten med denne studien av Christopher Dehn of Stig Arve Sæther var å undersøke hvilke faktorer unge ishockeydommere på elitenivå opplever at påvirker utviklingen deres, og spesielt motivasjonen for dommergjerningen, betydningen av erfaringsbasert læring, og betydningen av sosiale nettverk. Studien baserer seg på seks dybdeintervjuer med hoveddommere i norsk ishockey. Resultatene indikerer betydningen av det sosiale nettverket til dommere i en mindre idrett hvor kampene er hyppige og med få ressurser til oppfølging av dommernes utvikling. 

The purpose of this study by Christopher Dehn and Stig Arve Sæther was to investigate which factors young ice hockey referees at the elite level experience as influencing their development, and in particular the motivation for refereeing, the importance of experiential learning, and the importance of social networks. The study is based on six in-depth interviews with head referees in Norwegian ice hockey. The results indicate the importance of the social network of referees in a smaller sport where matches are frequent and with few resources to follow up on the referees' development.

This study seeks to advance understanding of, and contribute to, international policy on increasing and enhancing diversity in sport leadership and recruitment. It is founded on a unique partnership between UNESCO (specifically UNESCO Sport Section) and Loughborough University. The study will also benefit from Loughborough University’s very strong research track record and infrastructure which will ensure the effective delivery of this research (e.g. UNESCO Chair, Women in Sport, Policy Unit).

Neil Archer rethinks the discussion of sport as a cinematic subject in his new book Sport, Film, and the Modern World (Peter Lang Publishing). Arguing for the vitality of the sports film as distinctively ‘modern’ genre, the book looks at its innovative potential to capture twentieth- and twenty-first-century sport in all its complexity. Prominent sport film scholar Seán Crosson is our reviewer, and while not uncritical, he finds that Archer’s book overall offers an insightful analysis of recent work and an ultimately convincing central argument for the importance of sport cinema.

This special issue offers a unique opportunity to contribute to a comprehensive historical perspective that informs future scholarship and practice in the field and lays a foundation for academic research in sport marketing. Submissions are encouraged by researchers at all career stages and from diverse academic fields such as marketing, management, analytics, economics, law, sociology, psychology, communication, and cultural studies. We welcome original research articles, comprehensive reviews articles, historical narratives, and in-depth case studies that may utilize the past and present to illuminate the future of sport marketing.

This Special Issue aims to showcase critical scholarship that examines gender-based violence in the organized sport context across interpersonal, institutional and structural levels. Contributions are welcome to explore gender-based violence directed toward individuals or groups of any gender and may include examinations of unequal power dynamics, gender norms and intersecting systems of oppression. By deepening our collective understanding of this important issue, we aim to identify actionable strategies for advocacy, policy reform and practice that can lead to safer sport environments.