Active People Survey 2

Some of the hightlights from the recent Active People Survey 2, are given below;

'The number of adults in England who regularly play sport has risen by more than half a million over the past two years'.

'The results of the Active People Survey 2 show that the number of men regularly playing sport has risen by 311,000 to 4.04 million, while the number of women completing three sessions of sport each week has increased by 240,000 to 2.81 million'.

'The fastest growth in sports participation has been among people in their twenties'.

Participation has grown fastest in the Yorkshire region, where the regular sports participation rate is 17.3%.!!!!!

For further information on the results see the Active People Survey 2, on the Sport England website.

UK Sport Podcasts

UK Sport Podcasts are available at the following link - UK Sport Podcasts. Some of the subjects covered include 1) the new partnership beween UK Sport and the BAE system 2) Elite Coaching scheme 3) Funding for the 2012 Olympic Games. The facility is regularly updated, and allows easy input into itunes.

Our Sprig Information Blog is now open for members to join and post comments. Use the blog to keep yourself updated with information on new resources, in the Tourism, Sport, Leisure and Hospitality areas. To join the blog email Jo (Web-editor) or Emma (Chair).

Olympics database from Sports-Reference.com

From the International Society of Olympic Historians, this useful and topical database, lists results by each games, by sports and by countries. There are over 110,017 Olympians listed in the database and the About this Site section gives more detail about the site's development.

http://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/

Sport Event - September 2008

“Sport in the City”
Friday 12th September
Glasgow Caledonian University
10:00-16:00

This event is FREE to attend and will be held in conjunction with the SPRIG AGM

The day will include a free tour of the library; the programme is currently being finalised and will be available shortly. Confirmed speakers include the Leisure Studies Association (LSA), HEA HLST, EBSCO and Intute: Social Sciences.

Please email Theresa Summerfield to reserve your place:

Theresa Summerfield
SPRIG Publicity Officer

University of Birmingham
Main Library
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT

0121 414 3409
t.a.summerfield@bham.ac.uk

Just to note a couple of upcoming conferences that may be of interest to SPRIG members and their colleagues.

2008, October 30 - November 1
Conference: Croatia XXI - European Sustainable Tourism in the 21st Century
Venue: Zagreb, Croatia
Website: http://www.croatia-xxi.eu/
Email: mailto:tourismconference@croatia-xxi.eu?subject=Croatia%20XXI%20-%20European%20Sustainable%20Tourism%20in%20the%2021st%20Century%20(October

2008, November 21 - 22
Conference: 2nd Asia-Euro Tourism, Hospitality & Gastronomy Conference 2008
Venue: Petaling Jaya, Malaysia
Website: http://www.taylors.edu.my/news/news_landing.php?id=5&news=26#news
Email: umathevi.m@taylors.edu.my

2009, September 16 - 18
Conference: World Medical Health Tourism Conference
Venue: Phuket, Thailand
Website: http://www.sosmedicaltourism.com/conference.htm
Email: mailto:sosmedical@sosmedicaltourism.com?subject=World%20Medical%20Health%20Tourism%20Conference%20(September

Remember, that the SPRIG Professional Development Award may be able to help towards the cost of attending these conferences. Click here for more information.

SPRIG Seminar 12th July Glasgow

The next SPRIG event and AGM will take place at Glasgow Caledonian University on September 12th 2008. Speakers will be confirmed shortly, but it will be your opportunity to update yourself on sports related information resources. So keep the date free and keep checking the website and blog for more information! We look forward to seeing you.

sports events

The Sport and Leisure Practice section of Intute: Social Sciences has recently been updated to include a new section for Multisport events resources. The events are split into National and International multisport events; the Interntational multisport events section contains resources about the Commonwealth Games and the Olympic Games, including London 2012.

Also of interest is the Intute: Social Sciences recent publication Internet resources for Olympic studies. With the Beijing Summer Olympics taking place in a couple of months and the hosting of the 2012 Olympic Games in London, this is a growing area of popularity for students and researchers. The new Multisport events section aims to support further studies in this area.

In addition, the new section links to the related Sports events management section, which is a sub-heading of the generic Events management section encompassing hospitality, leisure, sport and tourism events as well as generic resources in this upcoming area.

Leisure Studies Association Conference

The Leisure Studies Association is hosting their 2008 conference at Liverpool John Moores University from the 8th to the 10th July with the theme Community, Capital and Cultures: Leisure and Regeneration as Cultural Practice.

For more information about the conference, please click here. If you're interested in attending, but perhaps need extra funds in order to do so, then the SPRIG Professional Development Awards could help. Click here for more information about the awards.

Sport, Revolution and the Beijing Olympics

And continuing on the Olympics theme, you may be interested in a new book recently published by Berg…
Sport, Revolution and the Beijing Olympics by Grant Jarvie, Dong-Jhy Hwang and Mel Brennan is a cultural history of sport in China in the run up to the 2008 Olympics and challenges many Western assumptions. The authors look at the relationship of sport to imperialism and revolution, and examine its significance in both China and Taiwan at governmental and everyday levels (publisher information). For more information see http://www.bergpublishers.com/

Internet resources for Olympic studies

A new A5 subject booklet has been published by Intute: Social Sciences this month: “Internet resources for Olympic studies”. The booklet offers a taster to some of the best online information resources for researching the Olympic Games, which have been selected, evaluated and made available through the Intute: Social Sciences Web catalogue. Categories include history of the games, London 2012, Olympic people, research, event management and contemporary issues in sport.

This is one of eight new titles that are freely available in three different versions for ease of use. Print copies are available to order online; subject to availability. Online versions (PDF for downloading and printing, and html for online access with clickable links) are freely available via the Intute website at: http://www.intute.ac.uk/subjectbooklets.html

Over 24 booklets have been published by Intute in recent years, and everyone is welcome to copy, re-purpose and distribute the booklets for non-profit, educational use with suitable attribution, as the work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence.

Bohemia and the 1912 Olympics

The political dimension of the Olympics is generally well researched and published - there is a fair bit of material on the various boycotts and the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
The issue of what constitutes a country has become a 'hot topic' again with talk of a UK football team for 2012, with Sepp Blatter suggesting that a team of just English players would avoid all the issues (a suggestion which, staggeringly, he made at a meeting held in Gleneagles!!)
Recently I came across an interesting precedent. In 1912, Austria-Hungary had not only two teams from each half of the Dual Monarchy, i.e. Austria and Hungary, but there was also a team from Bohemia, then an integral part of Austria. Not surprisingly this was against the wishes of the Austrians, and I can only guess that it was part of the campaign of Czech nationalists which resulted in the formation of Czechoslovakia in 1918.
I've tried without success to find any material on how Bohemia came to be in Stockholm, and what actions Austria took to try and stop this. It must have caused a considerable stir at the time - it's the equivalent of there having been both a UK team and a Scotland team at Athens 2004.
Can anyone give me a steer on sources for this? This seems a worthwhile area for research as it has the IOC apparently ignoring the clear political status quo in a member country. It would seem to be a precedent for allowing a team from Tibet for example!
Best regards
John

IASI World Congress 2009

The International Association for Sports Information (IASI) are hosting their 13th annual congress in Canberra, Australia, 11-13 March 2009.

The main theme of the conference is "Building and sustaining sport information communities - through connectivity, collaboration and sharing". Session themes are:

• Online collaboration solutions for sport information communities
• Electronic sport information resource sharing
• Digital asset management repositories
• Sport performance analysis applications and technology solutions
• Knowledge delivery, online libraries and archives

Deadlines:

• 1st September 2008: submission of papers and poster abstracts
• 8th December 2008: Full text of papers due

Check the website for registration and accommodation information

The Drug Information Database and 100% ME Programme

The misuse of drugs still remains an issue in sport and below is some information on two web resources that firstly help identify the validity of certain drugs and secondly provide an awareness approach to the problem.
The Drug Information Database (DID) provides an easy to search option which allows you to determine a drugs status on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Prohibited List, whilst the initiative 100% ME Programme is an athlete-centred education and information programme that aims to increase understanding of drugs in the sporting community. This Sport UK sponsored website, includes a wide range of information on doping in sport, the rules and testing process and also an education section where there are lesson plans are available. It also provides links to other sites, news and a selection of video downloads.

Olympics Survey

A nationwide survey carried out by the British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) has revealed that 76 per cent of people questioned are pleased London is staging the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games in 2012.

LA84 Foundation Digital Archive

The LA84 foundation started in 1985 with funding left over from the 1984 Olympic games. Its mission is to increase the knowledge and understanding of sport in young people. One of its current initiatives is to digitise part of its traditional library. This digital archive is split into two sections. The first section contains books and reports, with a strong Olympic bias. It has an impressive range of Olympic reports staring with the Athens games of 1896 up to the Athens games over 100 years later in 2004.
The second section concentrates on Periodicals and Series, again this is largely Olympic based journals but there is also a historical and international element to the information.
All of the digital publications are available at no cost to website visitors, and I will be exploring the website over the next few months and highlighting some of their particularly useful reports and journals

CHME student conference

The Council for Hospitality Management Education (CHME) are running a national student conference, hosted by Sheffield Hallam University entitled "The 2012 Olympics; a hospitality perspective" on Thursday 13th March 2008.

July 2005 saw London win the bid to organise the 2012 Olympic games, with plans for urban regeneration, environmental sustainability and a sporting legacy forming aspects of the ‘Olympic vision’. As we approach 2008 and the Beijing Olympic Games in the summer, this conference embraces the Olympic theme and investigates what the hospitality industry needs to do to fully participate in, and gain from, the spectacle that will be the
2012 London Olympic Games.

The conference will tackle issues around sustainable business growth and skills development; project / contract management; and managing cultural diversity to name a few. The day will start at the UK macro business environment level and move to more of a micro environment in the afternoon. The main sessions will be delivered by key industry leaders and by leading national figures representing the views of those it affects. Confirmed speakers include, Donna Taylor from the London 2012 Organising Committee; Penny Moore from Hospitality Action (the hospitality industry benevolent organisation); and a Robin Johnson from Visit Britain.
Negotiations are on-going with a number of other influential speakers.

Further details are available on the conference Web page:
http://www.shu.ac.uk/research/cihmr/events.html