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My early research work was in the areas of French history and society and I still retain an interest in France under the Third Republic (1870-1940) and the Second World War. More recently, though, I have been working on the analysis of French nationalist discourses, imagery and iconography with particular reference to historiography and sports writing. I am also especially interested in the construction and representation of national, regional and group identities as mediated by European football journalism as well as in contemporary issues in French and English football cultures (e.g. identity, gender, fandom, popular writing).

Football Studies

I am fortunate to have recently worked with colleagues Liz Crolley and Ralf Jeutter in a football culture research cluster. Our first joint project, a paper on imagery in French, German and Spanish football writing, was presented to the 'Fanatics' conference hosted by the Manchester Institute for Popular Culture during the Euro 96 European football championships and was commissioned to appear as a chapter in a book edited by Adam Brown, a respected leading figure in football studies and member of the Government's Football Task Force. The piece was so well received that we were encouraged to develop our ideas further resulting in the publication of a journal article on football and national stereotypes. This article is a snapshot of a much larger research project studying the representation of identity in European sports media discourse recently published as Football, Europe and the Press: Imagined Identities? (Frank Cass, 2002). My work undertaken with Liz now also includes a project on Spanish identities in the European press and an article on the evolution of French and English football writing. Additionally, we are further developing our own interests: Liz, for instance, has worked on book chapters on fandom in Spain, Latin American football and on gender issues in Liverpool while I have written pieces on French football culture , on the popular British football book market and on Manchester City FC.

 

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