The End of Sport

In this episode, Johanna and Nathan are joined by historian Asheesh Kapur Siddique to issue blistering critiques about how universities are full-fledged corporations whose number 1 aim is to exploit the labor of graduate students, all faculty (not just contingent ones), and athletic workers—as well as students’ loans—to earn profits. After walking us through his research on how the British empire governed their colonies through paper and archives in the 18th century, we shift to how we are governed inhumanely by our universities: by business people and executives who often have right-wing political and capitalist interests. Asheesh details his phenomenal Teen Vogue piece from May 2021, “Campus Cancel Culture Freakouts Obscure the Power of University Boards,” about how our universities and colleges are run by Boards of Trustees filled with corporatists and not academics, from Harvard’s racist ‘Board of Overseers’ to even supposedly left-leaning Oberlin College. We discuss the people who are most vulnerable to higher ed’s corporatization especially during Covid – from graduate students and contingent faculty, to athletic laborers and even cutting permanently-employed faculty. Asheesh importantly details the huge potential impact of The Chair discourse (sarcasm), and the threats that we all face in higher education if we continue to ignore our exploitation. During our conversation we mentioned pieces on how universities are becoming hedge funds with schools attached, and how universities diverted billions of government CARES Covid funds away from educational support to athletics. Asheesh Kapur Siddique is an Assistant Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is currently working on his book, Rule Through Paper: Archive and Language in the Governance of the British Empire. His work has appeared in numerous academic journals, as well as Teen Vogue and The Daily Beast, Inside Higher Ed, and more. You can find Asheesh via his website here, as well as on Twitter @AsheeshKSi.     For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. __________________________________________________________________________ You can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

In this episode, all three hosts are joined by anthropologist Tracie Canada to interrogate the ways in which familial discourses are deployed in the world of college football to obfuscate exploitative power relations and also the ways in which that rhetoric is reappropriated by Black players to fashion their own forms of kinship and care. The conversation also explores the methodological dimensions of ethnography in the world of power five college football and Tracie's fascinating research findings from her work with Black college football players. Tracie Canada is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Notre Dame. She is currently working on her first book Tackling the Everyday: Race, Family, and Nation in Big-Time College Football. Her work has appeared in Sapiens, Scientific American, and Black Perspectives. Check out Tracie's analysis of Covid and college football for Sapiens here. Check out Tracie's co-authored discussion of race-norming in the NFL concussion settlement as an after-life of slavery for Scientific Americanhere. Check out Tracie's work on how Black college football players care for one another in Black Perspectives here. You can find Tracie on Twitter @tracie_canada.   For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. __________________________________________________________________________ You can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

In this episode, all three hosts are joined by Dr. Erin Hatton to discuss her brilliant intervention Coerced: Work Under Threat of Punishment and how status coercion shapes working conditions in college sport. Erin Hatton is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University at Buffalo and also author of The Temp Economy: From Kelly Girls to Permatemps in Postwar America. Too often, the conversation around exploitation in college sport becomes strictly focused on their lack of access to the free market. This episode moves beyond that paradigm to explore how the power dynamics inherent to college sport as presently conceived are far more coercive, harmful, and exploitative than we often imagine. You can find Erin Hatton's book Coerced here. You can find an article she authored on status coercion in college sport for The Conversation here. You can find her on Twitter @eehatton. Dr. Erin Hatton is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University at Buffalo and author of Coerced: Work Under Threat of Punishment and The Temp Economy: From Kelly Girls to Permatemps in Postwar America.     For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you’re interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

Here is the second part of Johanna’s interview with Dvora Meyers where they talk about America’s role in gymnastics’ abusive history, what (certain) responses to Suni Lee’s gold medal tells us about the sport, and the impact of name, image, likeness (NIL) developments on college gymnastic athletes. Dvora Meyers is a writer and freelance journalist (formerly of Deadspin), and the author of the book The End of the Perfect 10: The Making and Breaking of Gymnastics’ Top Score —from Nadia to Now. Dvora writes prolifically about gymnastics and other sports from political, cultural, and social angles and her work has appeared in The New York Times,The Guardian, The Atlantic, Vice, Defector, FiveThirtyEight and many more. She also has a substack titled Unorthodox Gymnastics, which we strongly encourage people to subscribe to get a roundup of her published pieces, plus additional exclusive analyses made available to subscribers. Pieces mentioned in this episode: “Why it’s Not Surprising that Simone Biles Cheered for Angelina Melnikova” FiveThirtyEight  “Time for the End of the Teen Gymnast” FiveThirtyEight “Suni Lee Doesn’t Owe Her Gold Medal to Anyone” Unorthodox Gymnastics “Women’s Gymnastics is blasting into the future, but its scoring code is stuck in the past.” Defector You can follow Dvora on Twitter!   For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

In part one of a two-part episode, Johanna is joined by Dvora Meyers to talk about the antiquated and problematic roots of gymnastics, systemic racism in the sport, athlete activism, and the ways in which the gaze of observers and fans hurts athletes within the sport and reproduces various forms of harm and exploitation. Dvora Meyers is a writer and freelance journalist (formerly of Deadspin), and the author of the book The End of the Perfect 10: The Making and Breaking of Gymnastics’ Top Score —from Nadia to Now. Dvora writes prolifically about gymnastics and other sports from political, cultural, and social angles and her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, The Atlantic, Vice, Defector, FiveThirtyEight and many more. She also has a substack titled Unorthodox Gymnastics, which we strongly encourage people to subscribe to get a roundup of her published pieces, plus additional exclusive analyses made available to subscribers. Pieces mentioned in this episode: “Why it’s Not Surprising that Simone Biles Cheered for Angelina Melnikova” FiveThirtyEight  “Time for the End of the Teen Gymnast” FiveThirtyEight “Women’s Gymnastics is blasting into the future, but its scoring code is stuck in the past.” Defector You can follow Dvora on Twitter!   For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

On today’s episode, Johanna and Derek are joined by NOlympics LA coalition member and community organizer Jonny Coleman to talk about the LA28 Olympic bid, the powerful people behind the Games, the harms associated with LA28, and how the Olympics may be quite far beyond any possibility of reform. Jonny Coleman is a writer and organizer based in Los Angeles and a member of the NOlympics LA coalition, which was launched in 2017 by the Housing and Homelessness Committee of the LA Chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America. The Coalition has since expanded to include over two dozen partner organizations based in LA and California, as well as a growing transnational movement with dozens of groups around the world. Jonny has published widely on the harms associated with the Olympics in Jacobin Magazine, Knock LA, The Nation, The Appeal, Deadspin, Slate, and many others. Follow NOlympics LA on Twitter!   The piece mentioned by Gia Lappe and Jonny in Jacobin can be found here “Abolish the Olympics.” Check out our episode on the Tokyo 2020 games with Jules Boykoff here “Buying Unicorns with Dogecoin.” For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

In this episode, all three hosts are joined by Kaiya McCullough, a former UCLA soccer player and former member of the Washington Spirit and Wurzberger Kickers, Athlete Ally ambassador, host of the Unfiltered Podcast, co-founder of the United College Athlete Advocates. The first half of the conversation ranges from why college athletes need representation to Kaiya's views on the working conditions in college sport and NIL. In the second half, Kaiya shares her perspectives on athlete protest, the gender dynamics of coaching, and the racist culture of soccer. Check out Kaiya's wonderful "Letter to a Younger Me" here. Listen to her podcast Unfiltered here. Join the United College Athlete Advocates here. Follow Kaiya on Twitter @hiyakaiya. For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

All three hosts are joined by show favorite and Professor and Chair of Politics & Government at Pacific University Jules Boykoff to talk all things Tokyo Olympics, principally why they shouldn't be happening at all. The conversation ranges from why the Tokyo Olympics should have been cancelled in the first place, to overarching problems with the Olympics as an institution, to the racial politics at play in these Games in particular. The discussion also addresses the ethics of the Tokyo Games from the standpoints of fan consumption and athlete participation. Jules Boykoff is author of the recent book NOlympians and the classic Power Games. He has recently written on the Games in countless venues, including the Los Angeles Times, The Nation (with Dave Zirin), and the Washington Post. The terrific piece co-authored by Michael MacDougall and MacIntosh Ross can be found here.

**our apologies for the audio issues at the r beginning of this episode!** On this episode of The End of Sport, Johanna and Derek chat with Naji Ali, producer and host of Crossing the Lane Lines podcast, to discuss the role that swimming has played in his life, the rich aquatic history of the Black diaspora, and the white supremacist history of modern swimming and USA Swimming’s complicity. Naji provides so much detail and nuance about his experiences with racism in and out of the pool and how that continues to influence the wonderful work he does now with the swimming community in San Francisco.   Naji Ali is the producer and host of Crossing the Lane Lines, a podcast that highlights the achievements, struggles, and activism in, on, or near the water for Black folk. The podcast is dedicated to giving voice to the Black Swim community by connecting with coaches, swimmers, authors and activists. Naji is a long distance open water swimmer, who swims year around, without a wetsuit, in San Francisco Bay, as well as the Pacific Ocean. He is also a Total immersion Swim Coach, who specifically teaches Black and Brown children and adults how to swim, at whatever cost they can afford.   You can check out Naji’s interview with Johanna on the Crossing the Lane Lines podcast here.   For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com

For this episode, Johanna interviews two experts from the UK: rugby player and diversity and inclusion leader for the International Gay Rugby and other organizations, Verity Smith, and scholar of trans- and nonbinary sporting inclusion and exclusion, Abby Barras. The discussion focuses on the barriers that trans and nonbinary athletes face broadly and specifically within the UK, what we need to be to ensure that the LGBTQ+ community broadly experience full inclusion on the field, and Verity and Abby’s fantastic efforts to improve inclusion.   In the interview, Verity shares his experiences witnessing the World Rugby Federation ban transgender athletes. He details how the lived experiences of trans and non-binary athletes are very often overlooked when sporting organizations update their policies on inclusion, and why we all need to work together to help reduce barriers to participation.  Abby walks us through her piece in the journal British Mensas’s: Androgyny about the BBC1’s documentary featuring athlete Martina Navratilova. We discuss how ‘mundane transphobia’ helps us understand how Navratilova reasserted her gendered power to control the language, discussion, and public conversation over the women in ways that focused on their bodies and transition stories, and not their humanity and full selves. We end the conversation by articulating how transphobic people use the words ‘fair’ and cheating’ in sport really means as tools for exclusion and oppression, and the superb work that Verity and Abby are doing for Mermaids, which supports and connects transgender, nonbinary, and gender diverse children, young people, and their families to supportive resources.   Verity Smith is a rugby player who holds numerous important roles in his work on gender inclusive and expansive policies in sport, such as the diversity and inclusion leader for the International Gay Rugby, the chief diversity officer for the World Barbarians Foundation rugby club, and as the Trans Inclusion in Sport Youth Worker for Mermaids. You can find him on Twitter @VeritySmith19.   Abby Barras is a researcher at Mermaids and an academic. Her recently submitted PhD explored the lived experiences of trans including non-binary adults in everyday sport and physical exercise in the UK. Her publications include “Hostility to elite athletes is having a negative impact on participation in everyday sport” for The Conversation, and “We just want to be listened to:’ Mundane transphobia in BBC1’s ‘The Trans Women Dispute with Martina Navratilova” for British Mensa’s: Androgyny and others. You can find her on Twitter @abbybarras.   For a transcription of this episode, please click here. (Updated semi-regularly Credit @punkademic) Research Assistance for The End of Sport provided by Abigail Bomba. _________________________________________________________________________ If you are interested you can support the show via our Patreon. As always, please like, share, and rate us on your favorite podcast app, and give follow us on Twitter or Instagram. www.TheEndofSport.com