Grant Jarvie is Professor of Sport and Leisure Research at Heriot-Watt University, Joseph Maguire is Senior Lecturer in the Sociology of Sport at Loughborough University.

'... show how sport and leisure have contributed to a better understanding of contemporary socialogical themes such as the body, globalization, social space, the environment, consumption, nationalism, and social inequality.' - Leisure Recreation & Tourism Abstracts'They have done their task well and have produced what is arguably the best introduction to the sociology of sport yet published.' - Sociological Review

• Introduction; Chapter 1 Functionalism, solidarity and social stratification; Chapter 2 Interpretative sociology: Rationalisation, cultural pessimism and the search for meaning; Chapter 3 Beyond conventional pluralism; Chapter 4 Classical Marxism, political economy and beyond; Chapter 5 Culture as a war of position and a way of life; Chapter 6 Figurations, power and civilising processes; Chapter 7 Feminist thought and the boundaries of sisterhood; Chapter 8 Fields of power, habitus and distinction; Chapter 9 Beyond modernity and the problems of postmodernism; Chapter 10 Dependency and globalisation: Sport, leisure and global processes; Index;