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Routledge International Handbooks
Routledge Handbook of Tennis: History, Culture and Politics
Tennis is one of the world’s most popular sports, as levels of participation and spectatorship demonstrate. Moreover, tennis has always been one of the world’s most significant sports, expressing crucial fractures of social class, gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity - both on and off court. This is the first book to undertake a survey of the historical and socio-cultural sweep of tennis, exploring key themes from governance, development and social inclusion to national identity and the role of the media. It is presented in three historical developments; culture and representations; and politics and social issues, and features contributions by leading tennis scholars from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The most authoritative book published to date on the history, culture and politics of tennis, this is an essential reference for any course or program examining the history, sociology, politics or culture of sport.
- GenresSports
500 pages, Hardcover
Published February 12, 2019
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May 27, 2020
Shortlisted for the North American Society of Sports History Prize for the Best Edited Collection in Sports History, 2020.
As more than one of the contributors to this impressive and important overview of the state of tennis note, for a sport so widely played and so popularly supported, it has a surprisingly small amount of scholarly research. To a large degree we are dependent on a small body of critical work (there is an awful lot written about tennis, as there is many other sports – but not much of it scholarly and with a critical, as in evaluative, edge), most recently a lot of which has been the result of Rob Lake’s energetic efforts to build research networks. His network building may be seen in the array of contributors that he has assembled for this field-defining collection.
Although built around three principle groupings – historical approaches, cultures & representations, and politics and ‘social issues’ – much of the collection as a very strong historical awareness, although this is a little weaker in the third section than first two. Alongside this awareness there is in many pieces close attention to the continuity-change dialectic, grounding even many of the most contemporary focused analyses in an historical outlook. In doing so, the authors have disrupted the all-too-pervasive presentism of much writing about sport – both scholarly and popular: this is not to say that all have done so, but that the overall tone of the collection is one of an historically informed, critical disposition. I’m not sure however that these handbooks are intended to be read cover to cover as I have done here; I have several others and have treated them as reference books to delve into for specific issues – but might have to rethink my approach. I have a real sense of having a comprehensive sense of the game and of the scholarship (at least the Anglophone scholarship) around it.
A small number of the essays are versions, updates and adaptations of previously published pieces, although overall this is new work, with a solid multi-disciplinary grounding in the social sciences and humanities, so while predominantly historical and sociological there is strong work also from material culture analysts, cultural studies, literary and fine arts analyses and similar areas. There are several stand out pieces. At the top of my list Suzanne Rowland’s analysis of late 19th and early 20th century tennis dresses, that notes that while they are heavier than we’d expect to be comfortable in current styles, there are notable design features in cut and form that mean that women players may have been much more mobile than we’ve assumed. This is an excellent case of looking again at old claims and considering material culture leading to a need to rethink some of the assumptions about women’s athleticism. Other major contributions include José Alamillo’s exploration of tennis US Latinx communities, building on the profile and experiences of Richard (“Pancho”) González and Rosie Casals to unpack a more complex story than we might assume, overlaying ‘race’ and class in a nuanced analysis. This is alongside some impressive ‘recovery’ work, especially dealing with women’s tennis experiences. A real strength of the collection is the complex and nuanced image of tennis as gendered, and especially the situation of women in the game.
There are, of course, significant gaps (it would be nigh on impossible to give a comprehensive global view). Mahfoud Amara’s discussion of tennis in the MENA countries is welcome – but aside from it and valuable essays on Argentina, India and Czech Republic there is little in the way of national analyses from outside the North Atlantic nexus of the USA and northern and western Europe. This is disappointing, especially the silences on almost all of Africa, eastern Europe, central & South America, Russia and East Asia – and I suspect to a large degree reflects at least the English language scholarship on the sport. The Routledge Handbooks are intended to be both a state of the play assessment of a field or issue, as well as acting as a comprehensive overview of that field of study. Taken in that light, these silences show how sparse the research on tennis is, reinforcing the observation many have made about the paucity of scholarly research. As impressive as this is then as a state of the art assessment it also shows how much more needs to be done.
Even with those gaps, however, this is a major contribution to the field that pushes scholarly study of tennis to new levels.
As more than one of the contributors to this impressive and important overview of the state of tennis note, for a sport so widely played and so popularly supported, it has a surprisingly small amount of scholarly research. To a large degree we are dependent on a small body of critical work (there is an awful lot written about tennis, as there is many other sports – but not much of it scholarly and with a critical, as in evaluative, edge), most recently a lot of which has been the result of Rob Lake’s energetic efforts to build research networks. His network building may be seen in the array of contributors that he has assembled for this field-defining collection.
Although built around three principle groupings – historical approaches, cultures & representations, and politics and ‘social issues’ – much of the collection as a very strong historical awareness, although this is a little weaker in the third section than first two. Alongside this awareness there is in many pieces close attention to the continuity-change dialectic, grounding even many of the most contemporary focused analyses in an historical outlook. In doing so, the authors have disrupted the all-too-pervasive presentism of much writing about sport – both scholarly and popular: this is not to say that all have done so, but that the overall tone of the collection is one of an historically informed, critical disposition. I’m not sure however that these handbooks are intended to be read cover to cover as I have done here; I have several others and have treated them as reference books to delve into for specific issues – but might have to rethink my approach. I have a real sense of having a comprehensive sense of the game and of the scholarship (at least the Anglophone scholarship) around it.
A small number of the essays are versions, updates and adaptations of previously published pieces, although overall this is new work, with a solid multi-disciplinary grounding in the social sciences and humanities, so while predominantly historical and sociological there is strong work also from material culture analysts, cultural studies, literary and fine arts analyses and similar areas. There are several stand out pieces. At the top of my list Suzanne Rowland’s analysis of late 19th and early 20th century tennis dresses, that notes that while they are heavier than we’d expect to be comfortable in current styles, there are notable design features in cut and form that mean that women players may have been much more mobile than we’ve assumed. This is an excellent case of looking again at old claims and considering material culture leading to a need to rethink some of the assumptions about women’s athleticism. Other major contributions include José Alamillo’s exploration of tennis US Latinx communities, building on the profile and experiences of Richard (“Pancho”) González and Rosie Casals to unpack a more complex story than we might assume, overlaying ‘race’ and class in a nuanced analysis. This is alongside some impressive ‘recovery’ work, especially dealing with women’s tennis experiences. A real strength of the collection is the complex and nuanced image of tennis as gendered, and especially the situation of women in the game.
There are, of course, significant gaps (it would be nigh on impossible to give a comprehensive global view). Mahfoud Amara’s discussion of tennis in the MENA countries is welcome – but aside from it and valuable essays on Argentina, India and Czech Republic there is little in the way of national analyses from outside the North Atlantic nexus of the USA and northern and western Europe. This is disappointing, especially the silences on almost all of Africa, eastern Europe, central & South America, Russia and East Asia – and I suspect to a large degree reflects at least the English language scholarship on the sport. The Routledge Handbooks are intended to be both a state of the play assessment of a field or issue, as well as acting as a comprehensive overview of that field of study. Taken in that light, these silences show how sparse the research on tennis is, reinforcing the observation many have made about the paucity of scholarly research. As impressive as this is then as a state of the art assessment it also shows how much more needs to be done.
Even with those gaps, however, this is a major contribution to the field that pushes scholarly study of tennis to new levels.
Displaying 1 of 1 review