CONTESTING RACE AND SPORT
In the decade since Kevin Hyltons seminal book Race and Sport: Critical Race Theory was published, racialised issues have remained at the forefront of sport and leisure studies. In this important new book, Hylton draws on original research in contemporary contexts, from sport coaching to cyberspace, to show once again that Critical Race Theory is an insightful and productive tool for interrogating problematic social phenomena.
Inspired by W. E. B. Du Bois statement that the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the colour line, this book sheds a critical light on the way sport perpetuates racism, while identifying opportunities to challenge its insidious presence. Exploring and explaining the ways in which notions of race are expressed and contested at individual, institutional and societal levels, it addresses key topics such as whiteness, diversity, colourblindness, unconscious bias, identity, leadership, humour and discourse to investigate how language can be used as a device for resistance against racism in sport.
Contesting Race and Sport: Shaming the Colour Line is vital reading for all sport studies students, academics and those with an interest in race, ethnicity and society.
Kevin Hylton is Head of the Research Centre for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, UK and Professor of Equality and Diversity in Sport, Leisure and Education in the Carnegie Research Institute for Sport, Physical Activity and Leisure at Leeds Beckett University, UK. Kevin has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and books, including Race and Sport: Critical Race Theory (2009); Atlantic Crossings: International Dialogues on Critical Race Theory (2011); and Sport Development: Policy, Process and Practice (2001, 2008, 2013). Kevins research interests focus on diversity, equity and inclusion in sport, leisure and education. Kevin sits on the Editorial Board of the International Review for the Sociology of Sport and the Journal of Global Sport Management and is Co-editor of the book series Routledge Critical Perspectives on Equality and Social Justice in Sport and Leisure. Kevin is Patron of the Equality Challenge Unit, and Patron of Black British Academics.
CONTESTING RACE AND SPORT
Shaming the Colour Line
Kevin Hylton
First published 2018
by Routledge
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2018 Kevin Hylton
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Names: Hylton, Kevin, author.
Title: Contesting 'race' and sport : shaming the colour line / Kevin Hylton.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017042941 | ISBN 9781138885400 (hbk) | ISBN 9781138885417 (pbk) | ISBN 9781315715476 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Racism in sports. | Discrimination in sports. | Sports--Social aspects.
Classification: LCC GV706.32 .H949 2018 | DDC 306.4/83--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017042941
ISBN: 978-1-138-88540-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-88541-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-71547-6 (ebk)
I would like to thank my partner, Pia, and my family for their support and love over the period of writing this book. Milli, Lukas and Lauren, as you embark on the next part of your journeys make each step count.
Thank you to Simon Whitmore and the team at Routledge Taylor and Francis for inviting me to write this book and for making another space for critical work in sport and leisure. In particular, my work on Critical Race Theory and that of others in the UK and beyond has benefitted from these opportunities to share with global audiences.
I would like to also thank academic colleagues and those involved in studies that contributed to the writing of this work. I am grateful for the contributions of key contacts and interviewees throughout which has been invaluable. The additional support of the National Offender Management Service for its contribution to is much appreciated (now Her Majestys Prisons and Probation Service).
Thanks as always to colleagues at Leeds Beckett Universitys Institute for Sport, Physical and Leisure, and my Research Centre for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Leeds Beckett. In particular, Emeritus Professor Jonathan Long, Dr Tom Fletcher and Dr Stefan Lawrence for your reflexivity in our academic pursuits that I considered further in Chapter 3.
I hope this work reflects and continues all of our conversations.
I am almost always aware of race, alert to its power as an idea, sensitive to its nuances in the world.
Arthur Ashe (1993: 138)
Du Bois (1994: 1) famously announced that the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line. His words have not gone unheeded in sport and it is argued here that race continues to be one of the most significant problems of the twenty-first century. There are relentless accounts of racism in sport that continue the relevance of these words within and without its domain. Yet Du Bois idea of the veil hints at more than these overt manifestations of odious behaviours, it points to more subtle, systemic and structural racialised forms of oppression that require concentrated levels of critical consciousness to isolate, explain and disrupt.
Du Bois speaks of a double consciousness that he became aware of as a result of being Othered at a very early age. The outcome of early traumatic events led to him recognising that he was viewed differently by those racialised as White in the public domain. He argued that they drew on negative racialised behaviours, tropes and characteristics that delineated his identity from the majority White community just as Shuford (2001) more specifically describes race as a construct for defining and locating people through imposed racialised categories, and for the allocation of resources. The veil signifies a position of racial consciousness for many that reveals the significance of race in sport and society and the insidious nature of racism (Bell 1992)
For Du Bois, a veil hung between him and the dominant whiteness that he experienced. It was emphasised by the privileges and supremacy of whiteness and those with the power to Other him. Living within the veil offered security and purview from which to observe and strategise how to navigate the racialised society outside. The veil also emphasised the racialised fractures found more generally across society where sport is but one contested domain (Winant 2004; Carrington 2013). Further, Du Bois (1994) striving to become an African