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Rebecca T. Alpert. Religion and Sports: An Introduction and Case Studies. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2015. x + 209 pp. $28.00, ISBN 9780231165716.
In this very effective and much-needed book, religious studies scholar Rebecca Alpert convincingly argues that religion must be part of the interdisciplinary sports conversation. Through a case study exploration of what she calls "the interconnections" between sports and religion, Alpert aims to introduce students to the growing scholarly field of religion and sport.
This book is intended as a text for university courses in religion and sports. To this end, after discussing scholarly perspectives on sport and religion, and the relationship between them, Alpert presents a series of case studies designed to engage the student and instructor in further discussion about the theoretical issues raised in the substantial introductory chapter.
The introductory chapter is 38 pages long and provides the base for the subsequent chapters, which are collections of case studies organized by theme. She begins by acknowledging the potential for both moral good and moral bad in world religions and in sports (3). Alpert follows this thread throughout her book, asking questions about values in sport and values in world religions. Next, using a conversational tone, Alpert explains that there is no one agreed-upon definition of religion. Alpert charts the movement of scholarly approaches to defining religion, explaining why there has been an overall shift away from searching for an essence common to all religions, toward a functionalist approach, to even more "all-encompassing" (7) approaches. Similar to well-known scholar of religion and sports Joseph L. Price, Alpert settles on Ninian Smart's understanding of religions as being characterized by varying degrees of six dimensions, combined with a "family resemblance" lens. As she concludes: "Smart's tool is useful for mapping religions and understanding them as living, breathing, changing phenomena that may share characteristics but use and express them quite differently" (7).
The rest of chapter 1 introduces four interconnections between religion and sports. These interconnections provide the structure for the book. Each subsequent chapter (or part) consists of case studies on each of these four ways that religion and sport interconnect.
In part 1, Alpert uses two cases to help the reader explore "why people think sports are a religion." In...