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Sport Film and National Culture

Sport, Film and National Culture

Nov 10 2020 Posted: 10:49 GMT

NUI Galway’s Moore Institute will host a webinar on Sport, Film and National Culture on Thursday, 19 November, at 4pm to mark the launch of a major new volume on this theme edited by Dr Seán Crosson of the University’s Huston School of Film & Digital Media and leader of the Sport and Exercise Research Group in the Moore Institute.

Sport and film have historically been key components of national cultures and societies. The Irish experience is particularly instructive in this respect, evident in the close and enduring association between Gaelic games and Irish identity, and its popular depiction in cinema. As we approach the centenary of Bloody Sunday, Irish cinema has provided one of the most memorable and unsettling depictions – in Neil Jordan’s Michael Collins (1996) – of the horrific events of that day when British forces fired upon players and supporters at a Gaelic football match. This webinar will provide a global focus on this topic, examining the critical role film has played in affirming the relationship between sport and national cultures internationally.

Covering films of all types, from Hollywood blockbusters to regional documentaries and newsreels, Dr Crosson’s new book Sport, Film and National Culture considers how filmic depictions of sport have configured and informed a wide range of distinctive national cultures, societies and identities. Featuring case studies from eleven national contexts across six continents – including North and South America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Oceania – it reveals the common and contrasting approaches that have emerged within sport cinema in differing national contexts.

The webinar brings together a broad range of contributors to this book, who are leading authorities on sport and film, to explore the intersection of these prominent cultural forces internationally.

Chaired by Dr Crosson, contributors to the webinar will include:

Dr Michael W. Thomas, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Ethiopian Screen Worlds, University of London
Dr Grant Wiedenfeld, Assistant Professor of Media and Culture in the Department of Mass Communication at Sam Houston State University
Dr Manuel Garin, Senior Lecturer in Film and Media Studies at Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona
Dr Stephen Glynn, Associate Research Fellow at De Montfort University, Leicester
Dr Jesse Schlotterbeck, Associate Professor of Cinema at Denison University, Granville, Ohio
Dr Ellen Wright, Senior Lecturer in Cinema and Television History, De Montfort University, Leicester
Dr Francesco Buscemi, Lecturer in History of Radio and TV, Catholic University of Milan
Pauline Peixoto Iglesias Vargas, PhD candidate in Physical Education, Federal University of Paraná, Brazil.
Dr Gina Daddario, Lin Rong San Professor of Communication at Shenandoah University in Winchester, Virginia.