Mark Perryman explores what Andy Murray and the Lions tell us about sport’s impact on national identity “ The imagined community of millions seems more real as a team of eleven named people” – Eric Hobsbawm Eric Hobsbawm’s acute observation concerning the impact of sport on national identity has been carted out so often that […]
One year on: why sport matters for the left
Jun 25th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.Of course how fast an individual can run, how far they can chuck an object, how high they can jump hardly matters at all in the greater scheme of global justice and human rights. But that isn’t what is being claimed on behalf of sport here. Rather it is the grand emotional narrative sport can […]
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The democracy of cycling
Jun 20th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.”Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race.” HG Wells The most infamous quote on cycling from modern British politics remains hard right Thatcherite Norman Tebbit’s unhelpful advice to the 1980s unemployed to ‘Get on your bike’.’ So suggesting that two wheels are […]
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Do you speak neoliberalism?
Jun 12th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.The latest installment of the hugely ambitious After Neoliberalism Manifesto from the politics and culture journal Soundings has just been published. Geographer Doreen Massey is the author. In her contribution she makes a key argument that has an increasing currency on the Outside Left, that to construct a radical politics a vital starting point is […]
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State of Play: Euro 2013, Football and Palestine
Jun 4th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.In the autumn of 2011 Philosophy Football met Honey Thalijeh, then captain of the Palestine Women’s Football team. Inspired by what she told us about what football meant to her country we promised that when Euro 2013 opened in Israel we would be in Palestine. From 5-18 June Israel hosts the second biggest international team tournament […]
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The Spirit of ’43
May 14th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.Mark Perryman from Philosophy Football explores a year when the tide turned against Fascism Ken Loach’s recent film Spirit of ’45 brilliantly celebrates the triumphant mood that delivered a Labour Landslide election victory at the end of World War Two and the establishment of both the Welfare State and nationalised public utilities. What is made […]
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Kick, Run & Think books
Apr 24th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.Mark Perryman from Philosophy Football offers a selection of the best football, running and sports politics books of the quarter In England there’s no sportswriter quite like Dave Zirin. He writes about sport from the Left with such passion and style that readers will never spot the join. An American, the bias is unsurprisingly towards […]
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Spring books into action!
Apr 16th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.MARK PERRYMAN from Philosophy Football reviews the best reading of the quarter. As the Thatcher funeral hoopla fades away and the focus shifts to the likely rout of the Con-Dems in the 2 May local elections the political landscape outside the Westminster bubble in the next few months is likely to be further shaped by […]
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They thought it was all over
Mar 19th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.As England prepare for a World Cup Qualifier double-header Philosophy Football’s Mark Perryman reviews the decline and fall of a Football Nation Never mind the debate over the dodgy third goal in ‘66, was it or wasn’t it over the line. The most famous piece of commentary in English footballing history ‘some people are on […]
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Wear your colours for Emily’s centenary
Mar 4th, 2013 by Mark Perryman.04.06.1913 One hundred years ago the Epsom Derby was disrupted by perhaps the most famous protest at a sporting event in history. Britain at the time was bitterly divided. The early Trade Unions and others striking against poverty wages and appalling working conditions. The cause for Ireland’s Freedom was attracting support on both sides of […]
