The End of Sport Podcast The End of Sport

In this episode, Derek and Nathan are immensely privileged to be joined by UCLA historian Robin D. G. Kelley for a discussion of the remarkable and obscene events that took place at the UCLA anti-genocide encampment and an assessment of the encampment movement in the context of the neoliberal university and racial capitalism more broadly. We also talk about the role of sport in protest politics.
Robin D.G. Kelley is Distinguished Professor and Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in U.S. History at UCLA. He honestly does not need any introduction from me, but just to gesture to his impact, he is the author of books including,  Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012); Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original (The Free Press, 2009); Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination(Beacon Press, 2002); with Howard Zinn and Dana Frank, Three Strikes: The Fighting Spirit of Labor’s Last Century (Beacon Press, 2001); Yo’ Mama’s Disfunktional!: Fighting the Culture Wars in Urban America (Boston: Beacon Press, 1997); Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class  (New York: The Free Press, 1994); Into the Fire: African Americans Since 1970  (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996) [Vol. 10 of the Young Oxford History of African Americans series]; and Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression(Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1990). Very recently, he is also the author of an astounding appraisal of the events at the UCLA encampment in Boston Review.
 
The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.

In this special non-sports episode, Nathan speaks to Columbia University graduate student Jon Ben-Menachem about the Columbia University student anti-genocide encampment. The conversation offers a primer for those less familiar with the encampment movement and an insider perspective for those who already are.Jon Ben-Menachem is a PhD candidate in Sociology at Columbia University who researches and writes about political economy and punishment. He was also an active participant in the Columbia University encampment. You can find his discussion of the anti-semitism smear used to defame the encampment here.
 
The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.

David Berri joins all three hosts to unpack a subject that is perhaps as or more relevant than any other in the world of sport right now and also one we have not yet adequately explored on the show: the political economy of women’s sport. We discuss how value is produced and distributed in women’s sport, including the issue of fandom (the market of consumers) as well as questions of labor and exploitation. We also discuss his brand new book (coauthored with Nefertiti Walker who sadly was unable to join) Slaying the Trolls.
David Berri is professor of economics at Southern Utah University where he studies the economics of sport. He is lead author of The Wages of Wins and Stumbling on Wins, sole author of Sports Economics and co-author with Nefertiti Walker of the brand new book Slaying the Trolls: Why the Trolls are Very, Very Wrong about Women and Sports.
Nathan and Derek's forthcoming book The End of College Football: On the Human Cost of an All-American Game is now available for pre-order from UNC Press. Use the code 01SOCIAL30 to save 30% when ordering from the UNC Press website. The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.

In this episode, Derek and Nathan chat with Dr. Madeleine Orr about why any conversation about justice, harm, and sport needs to account for the unfolding climate catastrophe.
Dr. Madeleine Orr is an assistant professor of sport ecology in the Faculty of Kinesiology & Physical Education at the University of Toronto focused on the intersection of sport and climate change. Dr. Orr's most recent book, Warming Up: How Climate Change is Changing Sport just published with Bloomsbury Press focuses on the threat that climate change poses to sport, but offers insight into those dire consequences through in-depth interviews with athletes, coaches, politicians and others to demonstrate the sport industry’s role in global warming.
Nathan and Derek's forthcoming book The End of College Football: On the Human Cost of an All-American Game is now available for pre-order from UNC Press. Use the code 01SOCIAL30 to save 30% when ordering from the UNC Press website.
 
The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.

Nathan is joined by Colleen English and Daniel Sailofsky to dig deep into the concepts of hegemonic and inclusive masculinities and unpack which of these concepts offers a more persuasive and accurate theoretical frame for grappling with gender in critical sports studies.Colleen English is Associate Professor and Chair of Kinesiology at Penn State Berks, where she studies the philosophy and history of sport. She is author of, among other things, the extremely influential article “Toward sport reform: Hegemonic masculinity and reconceptualizing competition.” in Journal of the Philosophy of Sport.Daniel Sailofsky is Assistant Professor of Kinesiology at the University of Toronto, where he studies violence, masculinity, racial capitalism, and sport. He is currently writing Rules of P(l)ay: How Capitalism Produces Violence in Sport (under contract with UNC Press).
 
The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.

**This episode contains discussions of sexual violence**
 
In this episode, Johanna offers an initial analysis of how cisgender, white, and heterosexual sexual assault and predators and sport contribute to the anti-trans movement. Where do we see this happening most clearly? Swimming, which you may have guessed if you’re familiar with the work of Frankie de la Cretaz in this article for the Nation and their episode with us about it, and Johanna’s Guardian piece last summer. She discusses the revelations from Katie Strang’s first article for The Athletic about University of Kentucky’s swim coach, Lars Jorgensen. Two sportspeople – including a former swimmer and trans man - filed a lawsuit against the UKY Athletic Department that it allowed Jorgensen to “foster a toxic, sexually hostile environment within the swim program and to prey on, sexually harass, and commit horrific sexual assaults and violent rapes against young female coaches and collegiate athletes who were reliant on him.” The school’s Title IX office repeatedly discouraged victims to come forward.
The announcement of this lawsuit also comes a few weeks after ICONS (Independent Council on Women’s Sport) organized a lawsuit that included Riley Gaines and 15 other cisgender female college athletes against the NCAA to ban transgender women from all sports. Gaines has been one of Jorgensen’s defenders, as she swam for Jorgensen when she tied with Lia Thomas. Jorgensen, Gaines, and his other supporters show how the anti-trans movement is extremely dangerous to athletes and people of all genders. Solidarity with all survivors of sexual assault and trans people. Remember that transgender people are four times more likely than cisgender people to be victims of violent crimes like rape and sexual assault.
Jorgensen’s lawyer has since announced publicly that they are blaming the rape allegations on “NCAA Woke Philosophy.” By using the accusation of “wokeness,” Jorgensen’s team proves how the movement’s anti-trans actions are deeply connected with their beliefs on racism, misogyny, and more. 
 
 
The End of Sport Podcast is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network, your left podcast community. Find us in great company with over 60 other shows at Harbinger Media Network. As always, if you’re enjoying the show, please feel free to subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and, please, leave us a five-star review as those always help us read a wider audience.