This systematic historical and sociological study of the phenomenon of football hooliganism examines the history of crowd disorderliness at association football matches in Britain and assesses both popular and academic explanations of the problem. The authors’ study starts in the 1880s, when professional football first emerged in its modern form, charting the pre and inter-war periods and revealing that England’s World Cup triumph formed a watershed. The changing social composition of football crowds and the changing class structure of British society is discussed and the genesis of modern football hooliganism is explained by tracing it to the cultural conditions and circumstances which reproduce in young working-class males an interest in a publicly expressed aggressive masculine style.

This book traces international developments in the hooligan phenomenon since the Heysel tragedy of 1985. The authors make special reference to the troubled European championships in West Germany in 1988 and look critically at political responses to the problem. The authors used ‘participant observation’ in their research on British fans at the World Cup in Spain, and at matches in Rotterdam and Copenhagen, and capture the authentic voice of football hooliganism in their interviews. In this analysis of patterns of football violence the authors suggest some short-term proposals for restricting seriously violent and disorderly behaviour at continental matches and put forward a long-term strategy to deal with the root causes of hooligan behaviour.

This systematic historical and sociological study of the phenomenon of football hooliganism examines the history of crowd disorderliness at association football matches in Britain and assesses both popular and academic explanations of the problem. The authors’ study starts in the 1880s, when professional football first emerged in its modern form, charting the pre and inter-war periods and revealing that England’s World Cup triumph formed a watershed. The changing social composition of football crowds and the changing class structure of British society is discussed and the genesis of modern football hooliganism is explained by tracing it to the cultural conditions and circumstances which reproduce in young working-class males an interest in a publicly expressed aggressive masculine style.

When this book was first published the study of sport had been largely neglected by sociologists. The contributions to this volume bring the sports field, the leisure centre and everyday leisure activities to a more central position within the sociological enterprise. Whether amateur or professional, sport contributes to wider relations of power, privilege and domination and this debate represents an important phase in the sociology of sport and leisure.

When originally published in 1991 this was the first book to tackle the UK policy process of sport and to provide a political science analysis of some of the key issues facing sports administrators today. The volume identifies the parties involved: central government, local government, the Sports Council, the Central Council of Physical Recreation, and the individual sports governing bodies. It examines their effect on sport’s policy and administration through an analysis of three important current sport issues – football hooliganism, drug abuse among athletes and sport opportunities and facilities for school children.

In the past, sport, particularly football, has been defined as a male domain. Women’s interest stereotypically ranges from gentle tolerance to active resistance. But increasingly, women are proudly identifying themselves as supporters of their teams, and have become highly desirable audiences for sport organizations and merchandisers. Football provides a unique site at which to examine the complex interplay between three theoretical areas: identity formation and maintenance, commercialization of cultural practices, and gender hegemony. This book explores how women experience their fandom, and what barriers exist for the female fan.

Now that’s what I call a history of the 1980s tells the story of eighties Britain through its popular culture. Charting era-defining moments from Lady Diana’s legs and the miners’ strike to Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage and Adam and the Ants, Lucy Robinson weaves together an alternative history to the one we think we know. This is not a history of big geopolitical disasters, or a nostalgic romp through discos, shoulder pads and yuppie culture. Instead, the book explores a mashing together of different genres and fan bases in order to make sense of our recent past and give new insights into the decade that defined both globalisation and excess. Packed with archival and cultural research but written with verve and spark, the book offers as much to general readers as to scholars of this period, presenting a distinctive and definitive contemporary history of 1980s Britain, from pop to politics, to cold war cultures, censorship and sexuality.

This book provides an illuminating perspective on alcohol use, drawing on approaches from both anthropological research and historical sociology to examine our ambivalent attitudes to alcohol in the modern West. From anthropological research on non-Western, non-modern cultures, the author demonstrates that the use of alcohol or other psychoactive substances is a universal across human societies, and indeed, has tended to be seen as unproblematic, or even a sacred aspect of culture, often used in a highly ritualised context. From historical sociology, it is shown that alcohol has also been central to the process of state formation, not only as a crucial source of revenue, but also through having an important role in the formation of political communities, which frequently are a source of existential fear for ruling groups. Tracing this contradictory position occupied by alcohol over the course of history and civilisation, States of Intoxication sheds light on the manner in which it has produced the very peculiar modern perspective on alcohol.

We explore why the idea of the criminal class came into being. Starting with garrotters lurking in dark Victorian alleyways, the fiend Jack the Ripper stalking London’s streets to the menace of violent gangs, the ‘Scuttlers’, Peaky Blinders, and Liverpool’s High Rip, all the way through to 1970s joyriders, 1990s ravers, and the modern drug trade that brings guns and knives to our streets. It describes the actions taken to control the hard-core group – increasingly harsh punishments, executions, floggings, long prison sentences and the ways that society learns about crime, dangerous areas, and the people who habitually offend against society. How do we know what dangers apparently lurk in the inner cities? What part did the newspapers, authors and social investigators play in sensationalising some crimes, and were they right to do so? The book compares real-life criminals (and their lives) with fictional accounts, such as the Artful Dodger, Pinkie in Brighton Rock, and the scenes that social investigators such as Henry Mayhew dragged back from the criminal rookeries to entertain and frighten respectable people. Perhaps most importantly, the book shows which groups have been targeted as the criminal classes, particularly the young, as well as ethnic and racial minorities, and concludes by asking, “Who are the new criminal classes likely to be?“

The Kaleidoscope of Gender: Prisms, Patterns, and Possibilities provides an accessible, timely, and stimulating overview of the cutting-edge literature and theoretical frameworks in sociology and related fields in order to understand the social construction of gender. The kaleidoscope metaphor and its three themes—prisms, patterns, and possibilities—unify topic areas throughout the book. By focusing on the prisms through which gender is shaped, the patterns which gender takes, and the possibilities for social change, the reader gains a deeper understanding of ourselves and our relationships with others, both locally and globally. Editors Catherine Valentine, Mary Nell Trautner and the work of Joan Spade focus on the paradigms and approaches to gender studies that are constantly changing and evolving. The Sixth Edition includes incorporation of increased emphasis on global perspectives, updated contemporary social movements, such as #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo, and an updated focus on gendered violence.