Tackling
Rugby Myths
Rugby and New Zealand Society 1854-2004
 Edited by Greg Ryan
The All Blacks' 'failure' to win the 2003 Rugby World
Cup led many devotees to question old certainties and the current direction
of the 'national game' in the age of professionalism. Central
to these debates has been a sense that the continuity and invincibility
of New Zealand rugby has been somehow eroded, mirroring similar changes
within society as a whole.
This book examines many aspects of rugby in New Zealand since about
1854, showing how rugby and identity have been bundled together for
over a century, with both nation and game endowed with qualities of
egalitarianism, innovation and rural pragmatism that have been promoted
on the world stage. It tackles some of the very real myths surrounding
this image of the game, disentangling assumptions from historical fact
and coming up with some interesting angles on rugby's past.
Contents
Preface
Introduction
1 'To Uphold the Honour of the Province': Football in Canterbury
1854-1890
2 Rural Myth and Urban Reality: All Black and NZ Rugby 1884-1938
3 'A Tendency to Roughness': Anti-Heroic Representations
of NZ Rugby Football 1890-1914
4 The Invention of 1905
5 The Paradox of Maori Rugby 1870-1914
6 Anthropological Football: Maori and the 1937 Springbok Tour
7 Demonstrable Virility: Images of Masculinity in the 1956 Springbok
Tour
8 Moira's Lament? Feminist Advocacy and the 1981 Springbok Tour
9 The End of an Aura: All Black Rugby and Rural Nostalgia in the Professional
Era
10 The End of 'Our' National Game? Romance, Mobilities
and the Politics of Organisation
11 Nostalgia and Resistance: The Changing Face of Rugby
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Contributors
Frazer Andrewes, Terry Austrin, Caroline Daley, Charlotte Hughes,
Camilla Obel, Len Richardson, Greg Ryan, Geoff Vincent
About the Editor
Greg Ryan lectures in history at Lincoln University
and is the author of The Making of New Zealand Cricket 1832-1914 (Routledge 2004).
Publication details
ISBN 1 877276 97 9, paperback, 230 x 150 mm, 256
pp, $39.95
Otago History Series
Release: April 2005
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