Lecture to discuss challenges facing the Olympic brand

The guest lecture, Understanding the Olympics, will be delivered by Professor John Horne FAcSS, Professor of Sport Sociology at the University of Central Lancashire and is part of the Carnegie Conversations series. It will take place at 6pm on Tuesday 22 November at Leeds Beckett’s Headingley Campus.

Speaking ahead of his lecture, Professor Horne said: “As a global social phenomenon the Olympic Games remain unique. It is certainly one of the world’s largest television spectacles, but it takes place within fractured social structures and amidst enormous inequalities that persist and develop over time.

“In this lecture I will explore the way we can shed new light on the Games and the challenges faced by the governing organisations and nations alike. I hope that those involved with organising the Games will recognise the value of the social scientific scholarship available that critically assesses them. This might just provide the insights required to illuminate a way forward for an organisation that currently appears unresponsive to popular sentiment.”

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Professor Horne is Director of the International Research Institute for Sport Studies (IRiSS) in the School of Sport, Tourism and The Outdoors at the University of Central Lancashire and is co-author of Understanding the Olympics, written with Gary Whannel.

The book presents the latest research on the Olympics, including new material on legacy, sustainability and corruption, and introduces the reader to all of the key themes of contemporary Olympic Studies including the history of the Olympics, Olympic politics, access and equity, the Olympics and the media, festival and spectacle, the Olympic economy, urban development and Olympic futures.

Professor Horne is also the founding editor of the ‘Globalizing Sport Studies’ Book Series with Bloomsbury Academic (now with Manchester University Press) and founding co-editor of the BSA Book Series ‘Sociological Futures’ with Routledge). He was appointed as subject expert to the Sport and Exercise Sciences, Leisure and Tourism panel (UoA 26) in the 2014 Research Excellence Framework in 2011, elected as an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences (AcSS) in 2012, and became a Trustee and Deputy Publications Director of the British Sociological Association in 2013. In 2015 he became Vice Chair of the BSA and was elected Vice President and Treasurer of the International Sociology of Sport Association (ISSA), with effect from 2016.

You can follow Professor Horne on Twitter at @soundthehorne