Book review: Sporting heroes of the North

Mike Huggins, University of Cumbria, reviews the book 'Sporting Heroes of the North', edited by Stephen Wagg and Dave Russell (Northumbria Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-904794-29-5).

The histories of sport in the north of England, despite the multiple problematics associated with the region's variously defined geographical, economic or cultural boundaries, have received significant attention in recent years, beginning with Jeff Hill and Jack Williams' pioneering collection, Sport and Identity in Northern England (1996). Dominant themes have included regional and local identity, regional consciousness, sport and civic culture, sporting heroes, class, gender and ethnicity, alongside much discussion of what ‘northern-ness’ and ‘being northern’ might entail in terms of the character, values and aspirations of its inhabitants. This collection, in part the result of a one day conference organised by Professor Tony Collins at Leeds Metropolitan University in May 2007, touches on all these themes and more, meshed round the concept of sporting heroism. The editors are to be congratulated on putting together a readable and fascinating collection of 11 papers, linked together with a strong, clear and very useful introduction, articulating its purpose and providing a context. They set out to ‘place a range of individuals within the contexts of the social classes, communities and gender groups which spawned them and to deal imaginatively and critically with ideas of the social worlds that historically have constituted “up North”’. (viii)