For an archive of information concerning the activities of the Sport History Unit, please click on News

 

The Sport History Unit is one of several discipline groups associated with the Sport and Culture Group in the School of Sport and Exercise Science at Victoria University. The Unit was established in 1999 and is devoted to research and teaching activities related to the field of sport history.

The activities of the Sport History Unit include: 

• Teaching undergraduate sport history subjects in the Bachelor of Applied Science and Bachelor of Sport and Recreation Management degrees.

• Supervising postgraduate students (PhD, MA and Honours) undertaking sport history research.

• Conducting research projects and consultancies in the area of sport history.

• Publishing refereed and non-refereed material related to sports history, and presenting this material at national and international conferences, seminars and symposiums.

• Collaborating with other academics and institutions interested in promoting the study of sport history.

Full-time staff, current sessional staff, and current postgraduate students involved in sport history activities at Victoria University make up the membership of the Unit. Alumni of the University with an interest in sport history are also affiliated with the group. Members of the Sport History Unit (in alphabetical order) are as follows:

 

Dr Richard Baka

Senior Lecturer, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Phone: +61 3 9919 4358.  Email: Richard.Baka@vu.edu.au

Richard has been a staff member at Victoria University since 1979.  In this role he teaches a number of undergraduate subjects including 'Olympic Studies' and 'The Australian Sport and Fitness Delivery System', as well as supervising postgraduate students. His main area of sport history research is related to the Olympic movement, especially Australia at the Winter Olympic Games in addition to comparative sport research with an historical bent. He is currently on the Executive Board of the International Society for Comparative Sport and Physical Education and he is an Associate of the Australian Centre for Olympic Studies.

Dr Gregory de Moore

Co-Network Director of Training, Cumberland Hospital Campus, Parramatta, NSW

Former doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: Gregory_De_Moore@wsahs.nsw.gov.au

Greg is a psychiatrist and recently completed an award-winning PhD with the Sport History Unit at Victoria University entitled 'In From the Cold: Tom Wills - A Nineteenth Century Sporting Hero'.  A book arising from the thesis was published as Tom Wills: His Spectacular Rise and Tragic Fall (Allen & Unwin, 2008), and was subsequently short-listed for a number of awards, including the prestigious Manning Clark Cultural Awards.

Click here to access a pdf of Greg's thesis from the Victoria University library. 

Click here to see the sleeve of Greg's book. 

Click here to see the media release.

 

Ms Katherine Haines

Doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: katherine.haines@live.vu.edu.au

Katherine is completing a PhD on women's Rugby League in Sydney during the 1920s. She was recently awarded an Australian Postgraduate Award and the Victoria University Priscilla Choi Scholarship, and in 2009, the Tom Brock Bequest Scholarship. She also researched, wrote and produced the ABC Radio National Hindsight program, The Greatest Game, which was broadcast in March 2009. 

Dr Rob Hess

Associate Professor, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Phone: +61 3 9919 4062.  Email: Robert.Hess@vu.edu.au

Rob has been a member of the Sport History Unit since 1999.  He is currently co-academic editor of the International Journal of the History of Sport, executive editor of the Bulletin of Sport and Culture and reviews editor of Sporting Traditions.  He is also the honorary historian of the Mentone and St Bede's Old Collegians Amateur Football Club.  Rob recently served several terms as the Publications Officer of the Australian Society for Sports History, and the editor of Sporting Traditions.

Click here to see a list of Rob's publications.

Ms Caroline Leach

Former Honours student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email:  Caroline.Leach@live.vu.edu.au

Caroline has recently completed a Bachelor of Applied Science (Human Movement) Honours degree with the Sport History Unit in the School of Sport and Exercise Science at Victoria University.  The title of her honours thesis was ‘Press Coverage of Women Playing Charity Matches of Australian Rules Football in 1943’.

Dr Chelsea Litchfield

Staff member, School of Human Movement Studies, Charles Sturt University

Former doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: Chelsea.Litchfield@live.vu.edu.au

Chelsea is an associate lecturer with the School of Human Movement Studies at Charles Sturt University and has taught at a sessional level in a variety of subjects at Victoria University, including ‘Sport, History and Culture’ and ‘History of Sport’. Chelsea holds a Bachelor of Applied Science – Physical Education (Honours), and completed her doctoral degree, entitled 'Sexual Diversity: Inclusiveness in Women's Club Level Sport' at Victoria University.

Dr Matthew Klugman

Lecturer, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Phone: +61 3 9919 5979.  Email: Matthew.Klugman@vu.edu.au

Matthew began teaching sports studies at Victoria University in 2008. He has published a number of articles on the passions of Aussie Rules football fans, and is also working collaboratively on a number of projects, including: the history of images of the indigenous Australian Football League (AFL) player Nicky Winmar pointing to his skin; establishing a sustainable membership base for the Western Bulldogs; straight-identifying footy fans who eroticise footy players; and a comparison of AFL fans in Melbourne and soccer fans in Rome. Other research interests include sport and religion, sport and emotions, psychoanalytic understandings of sporting excess, and the cultural history of blood exchange and gift relationships.

Dr Akhtar Nawaz

Deputy Director General (Tech.), Pakistan Sports Board

Former doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: akhtarganjera@hotmail.com

Akhtar completed his doctoral degree, entitled 'A Comparative and Historical Analysis of Elite Sport Programs In Australia and Pakistan, 1947-2007' at Victoria University in 2008. He is currently the Deputy Director General (Tech) of the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB), responsible for the preparation and participation of Pakistan contingents in the Olympic, Commonwealth, Asian and South Asian Games. He also conducts national training camps in all sporting events at the provincial and federal headquarters of the PSB.

Dr Jacquelyn Osborne

Lecturer, School of Human Movement Studies, Charles Sturt University

Former doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: josborne@csu.edu.au

Jackey is a lecturer in the psycho-social dimensions of sport and exercise in the School of Human Movement Studies at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst, Australia.  She has also taught sessionally at Victoria University in sport history and philosophy.  Jackey holds a Bachelor of Applied Science (Physical Education), a Diploma of Education, a Masters of Arts by research.  She recently completed a doctoral degree at Victoria University in sport history.  Her thesis examined sport and games in the early Irish tales.

Mr Tim Shellcot

Former sessional staff member, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: T.Shellcot@wrfl.asn.au

Tim holds a Bachelor of Exercise Science and Human Movement, and a Bachelor of Applied Science (Honours - Human Movement). His honours thesis, titled 'Press Coverage of Sport in Melbourne: A Content Analysis of the Age, 1925-1975', was completed in 2005. Tim is currently employed with the Western Region Football League.

Click here to see a pdf copy of his Honours thesis.

Ms Kathryn Sinclair

Former Honours student, sessional staff member, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email:  Kathryn.Sinclair@live.vu.edu.au

Kathryn holds a Bachelor of Applied Science (Human Movement) and a Graduate Diploma of Education.  She also completed an honours degree with the Sport History Unit in the School of Sport and Exercise Science at Victoria University in 2010.  The title of her Honours thesis was ‘"Who Won? Who Cares?": Media Coverage of Women Playing Australian Rules Football in Melbourne During 1947'.

Dr Rachel Winterton

Former sessional staff member, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Former Doctoral student, School of Sport and Exercise Science, Victoria University

Email: Rachel.Winterton@live.vu.edu.au

Rachel holds a Bachelor of Exercise Science and Human Movement, and a Bachelor of Applied Science (Honours - Human Movement). Her honours thesis, titled 'For "Duty and Pleasure": The Development of Competitive Swimming in Victoria, 1900-1908', was awarded the 2005 Australian Society of Sports History Honours Dissertation Prize, and the 2006 ACHPER Undergraduate Student Award of Distinction. She recently completed a doctoral degree with the Sport History Unit at Victoria University, examining the characteristics of competitive swimming in nineteenth century Melbourne.  The thesis is entitled ‘"Feats of Fancy" and "Marvels of Muscle": A Social History of Swimming in Late Colonial Melbourne'.

Click here to see a pdf copy of her Honours thesis.

Click here to access a copy of her PhD thesis from the Victoria University Library.

This website page was last updated on 05 April 2012