The End of Sport Podcast

Episode 158: On Sport and Genocide

In one of our most important episodes to date, we present a keynote panel called "Can there be sport at a time of Genocide? Solidarity, Community, and Palestinian liberation" held at the annual meeting of the North American Society for the Sociology of Sport (NASSS) on November 1st, 2024. The panel was organized by Chen Chen and co-moderated by Derek and Nathan. 
Panelists included Dr. Sophia Azeb (UC Santa Cruz), Charlotte Phillips (Palestinian National Women's Football Team), Omar Dreidi (NBA Agent and Athletes for Ceasefire), Dr. Kat Pijetlovic (Catholics School of Law and Palestinian Football Association), Rebecca O'Keeffe (Irish Sport for Palestine) and Dave Zirin (The Nation and Edge of Sports). 
Illuminating the role that athletics can and do play in times of what many observers have characterized as genocide, it is important for those interested in sport to reflect on the ways in which sport and sporting cultures work to legitimize, normalize, and in some ways operate in complicity with the ongoing systematic destruction of an entire people, social infrastructure, and cultural apparatus. What is the role of academic communities in building international and intersectional solidarities as a pathway to dismantling Empire? Where do scholars of sport, sport studies and athletes fit in the critique and challenge to settler colonialism from Turtle Island to Palestine? How and to what end can solidarities be built amongst scholars and athletes? In this panel, we address these important questions and attempt to answer perhaps the most pressing of them all for our organization: what does sport (and the study of sport) mean during genocide?
 
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.

Episode 157: The Caitlin Clark Effect

Nathan is joined again by Frankie de la Cretaz, one of our favs, to dig into the impact of Caitlin Clark on the WNBA. We begin with a discussion of the economic and cultural landscape of the league pre-CC before delving into what it means to suggest that she has 'saved' the league and all of the many controversies that have accompanied her first season, principally the way in which it has literally endangered Black and queer players and fans.
 
Frankie de la Cretaz is a writer focused on sports, gender, queerness, and race, including the recent Andscape pieces “The Indiana Fever vs. Connecticut Sun WNBA game made me feel unsafe” and “The coverage of Caitlin Clark is reinforcing the trope of the queer villain”. They are the co-author of Hail Mary: The Rise and Fall of the NFL from Boldtype Books. Frankie's work appears everywhere, including The Nation, Sports Illustrated, The Daily Beast, and Teen Vogue.
 
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.

Episode 156: Heterodox Takes on Football with Chris Kluwe

Derek and Nathan are joined by former NFL player Chris Kluwe to delve into his heterodox perspectives on football, including his positions on gay rights and inclusion in the sport, athlete activism, and the inherent dangers of football as a sport, especially for young people.
Chris Kluwe is a former NFL punter who played for the Seattle Seahawks, eight years with the Minnesota Vikings where he set numerous team records, and Oakland Raiders. He also played for and attended UCLA for college. He is also the author of the collection Beautifully Unique Sparkleponies and the novel Otaku.
 
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.

Episode 155: Steven Thrasher Speaks Back

Derek and Nathan speak to Dr. Steven Thrasher about his activism against the genocide in Gaza and the McCarthyist repression he has been subjected to in response by both the state and his employer. We also delve into his work on Covid and his newest book project.
Steven Thrasher is the inaugural Daniel H. Renberg Chair of social justice in reporting (with an emphasis on issues relevant to the LGBTQ community) and an assistant professor of journalism at the Northwestern Medill School of Journalism. He is also author of The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide and the forthcoming book The Overseer Class: Representation as Repression. 
 
If you are an academic, journalist, or health professional, please consider signing this letter of support for Steven in light of the targeting happening at Northwestern. 
 
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.

Episode 154: Football is Killing US School Kids

In this episode, Nathan is joined by John 'Jabo' Burrow and Kathleen Bachynski to talk about the horrific run of football-related deaths at US schools. Nathan explains what has transpired before jumping in with Jabo to discuss his reactions and how they relate to his own experiences in and observations of football. Then Kathleen joins to help relate the current issue to her research in No Game For Boys To Play about the history of youth football and public health. The three then try to dig deeper into the social, cultural, and political implications.
John “Jabo” Burrow is a former offensive lineman at Vanderbilt University who retired during his successful career as a starter due to the consequences of head injury and incredibly astute analyst of the harms of football. Kathleen Bachynski is Assistant Professor of Public Health at Muhlenberg College and author of the definitive book on the history of public health and youth football: No Game For Boys To Play: The History of Youth Football and the Origins of a Public Health Crisis.
 
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.

Episode 153: Olympic Depravities with Dave Zirin and Jules Boykoff

Dave Zirin and Jules Boykoff return to the show to discuss the experience of covering one of the most eventful Olympics ever. We discuss their most lasting takeaways from the Games, things you had to be there to understand, how these Olympics compared to past experiences, and all of the other newsworthy stories you might imagine, from questions of Palestine solidarity to the triumph of Imane Khelif and everything else in between.
Dave Zirin is sports editor at The Nation, host of The Edge of Sports podcast, and author of eleven books including The Kaepernick Effect, Brazil's Dance with the Devil, and Welcome to the Terror Dome. Jules Boykoff is Professor of Politics and Government at Pacific University and author of six books about the Olympics including most recently What are the Olympics For?, The 1936 Berlin Olympics, NOlympians, and Power Games.
 
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.

Episode 152: The Wide World of Concussions with Stephen Casper

Stephen Casper joins Derek and Nathan to explore the history of concussion and interrogate the various conflicts of interest and ethical permutations that allow a particular form of health harm that has been largely understood for a century to nevertheless continuously be framed as uncertain.
 
Check out this New Yorker story drawing on Stephen's research about the history of head injury in sport here. For Stephen and Nathan's letter sent to Illinois here. Also check out what Stephen and Nathan wrote with Jay Smith on college athlete academic freedom here. Finally, read what Stephen and Nathan wrote with Jay Smith on the history of amateurism in college sport here.
 
Stephen's article on how the sports world learned to ignore head injury here. Stephen's co-authored article on gender, violence, and head injury here. Stephen's article on the vernacular history of head injury 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.

Episode 151: Olympic 'Gender Verification' Meltdown

In this emergency episode, Nathan is joined by friend and colleague Celeste Orr (in person!) to deconstruct the rightwing meltdown over the defeat of Italian welterweight boxer Angela Carini by Algerian Imane Khelif. The discussion situates the controversy by tracing the history of gender verification, delving into the science of sex, gender, and sport, and recounting the similarly racist treatment of Caster Semanya. We then move on to explore why the incident proved so 'controversial' in the current context of surging global fascism and what the implications are both politically and for the experiences of trans people.Celeste Orr is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Wendy J. Robbins Professor in Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of New Brunswick. Their research focuses on intersex studies, disability studies, and queer studies, among other broad areas, and they are the author of the 2022 book Cripping Intersex with UBC 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.

Episode 150: Coercion and Agency in College Sport with Dr. Wayne Black

Dr. Wayne Black joins Derek and Nathan to discuss his research program studying college athletics and debate key questions around coercion, agency, and how to move beyond the current system of exploitation and harm.Dr. Wayne Black is an Assistant Professor of Sport Administration at the University of Cincinnati. His research centers on understanding athletics' role and meaning in United States higher education. His work has centered economic policy, needs security and athlete activism within the Division I college athletics setting. He competed on the wrestling team at Mount St. Joseph University where he earned NCAA Division 3 All-American status and finished 8th in the country in the 141 pound weight class.
 
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.

Episode 149: What Are The Olympics For?

Jules Boykoff joins Derek and Nathan to discuss his new book What Are the Olympics For? The conversation delves into both the fundamental problems that beset the quadrennial athletic spectacle and the forms of resistance and protest that it is spawned, as well as how all of these issues manifest specifically in the context of the upcoming Paris Games.
Jules Boykoff is Professor and Chair of Politics & Government at Pacific University and is one of the preeminent public scholars of the Olympics. He is author of the books The 1936 Berlin Olympics: Race, Power, and Sportswashing, and Power Games, among countless others. What Are the Olympics For?, Boykoff's most recent book, offers a succinct primer that examines the evolution of the Olympics from its somewhat humble beginnings to its current globalized mega-event form. The digestible short-form book highlights the contentious challenges and harms that have accompanied this expansion, and the ways in which the racial capitalist structure of the Olympics has, and continues to, harm athletes and local communities while stimulating calls for radical reform.
 
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.