Beyond boundaries? 'Race', ethnicity and identity in sport

This special issue of IRSS was conceived in the wake of the conference ââ"šÂ¬Ã‹Å“Sport, Race and Ethnicity: Building a Global Understandingââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢, which was staged by the University of Technology Sydney from 30 November to 2 December 2008.1 That symposium was a sequel to ââ"šÂ¬Ã‹Å“Race and Sport: Building a Global Understandingââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢, held at the University of Iowa in 2006,2 though with the addition of ethnicity as a key theme. A third such conference, ââ"šÂ¬Ã‹Å“Beyond Boundaries: Race and Ethnicity in Modern Sportââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢, was held in Barbados 15ââ"šÂ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å“18 July 2010, hosted jointly by the University of West Indies, Cave Hill and George Mason University, Washington, DC.3 These symposia began with a focus on questions around race and sport, but have since engaged explicitly with race and ethnicity ââ"šÂ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å“ the assumption being that both are integral to understandings of identity, commonality, difference, diversity, and discrimination in sport and society. This dual engagement of race and ethnicity widens the scope of analysis, but it also presents challenges, such as contention over what these descriptors are said to represent, and their complex and often contradictory relationship. The articles herein, when taken as a whole, provide the reader with an opportunity for reflection upon sport and societal structures, norms, values, narratives, discourses and symbols in the context of what might be termed ethno-racial studies.