Pacific Region Cross-Cultural Currents
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PAGE 10 b INTERNATIONAL SPORTS STUDIES CONFERENCE Sport and the Pacific Region Cross-Cultural Currents SAMOA was the host nation for the South Pacific Games (25 August– 17 September 2007) and the National University of Samoa (NUS), located in the capital city of Apia, was part of the Official Games Village. NUS, WITH the support of major sponsors and partners, including the School of Human Movement, Recreation and Performance at Victoria University (Australia), will also host its inaugural international sport studies conference from 1–3 October 2007. Conference ORGaniSinG COMMittee THE BroaD theme of the conference Narelle BEDforD is ‘Sport and the Pacific Region: National University of Samoa Cross-Cultural Currents’, although Rob HESS papers dealing with more specific themes Victoria University and topics are welcomed. The full ANDreW MinoGue program for the conference is listed at Samoa Association of Sport and National Olympic Committee http://www.staff.vu.edu.au/RobHess/. SuZie SchuSter What follows is a selection of the edited National University of Samoa abstracts from the conference. Sport and the Pacific Region: Cross-Cultural Currents 28 PAGE 11 National UniverSit Y of SaMoa APia, SaMoa 1–3 October 2007 ABstraCts AND DELEGates Cross-Cultural Currents edited by Rob Hess KEYNote Address RichardUniversity of Technology, Sydney Cashman RICHARD CASHMAN is an Adjunct Professor in the School of Leisure, Sport and Tourism and Director of the Australian Centre of Olympic Studies at the University of Technology, Sydney. In 2006 he published The Bitter-Sweet Awakening: The Legacy of Sydney 2000 Olympic Games and he is completing a book (with Simon Darcy) on the impacts of the Sydney 2000 Paralympic Games. He has published extensively on the history of Australian and Asian sport, and some of his recent research includes work on the branding of Australian cricket. A former president of the Australian Society for Sports History and former editor of the journal Sporting Traditions, his address at the International Sports Studies Conference in Samoa is entitled ‘“Swimming with the Big Boys”: Global Games in the Asia-Pacific’. PAGE 12 b INTERNATIONAL SPORTS STUDIES CONFERENCE Narelle Bedford Peter Burke National University of Samoa RMIT University How Sporting Accidents or Trans-Pacific Football: Disputes Have Assisted in Austus Football During the the Development of Law in Second World War the Pacific Sport HIStorY is littered with SAMOA, AuStrALIA and many other failed attempts at creating hybrid codes Pacific nations share a common legal of football. During the Second World tradition and system. Court cases which War, local footballers in Melbourne arise from sporting endeavours have competed against military servicemen assisted in the development of the legal from the United States in a hybrid game system since the 1800s. In this paper, called ‘Austus’. This code, combining a small selection of historical court features of Australian and American cases arising from sporting accidents football, emerged following the ‘invasion’ or disputes will be featured, with a of Australia by many thousands of particular emphasis on the facts of each servicemen from the US. The game case. It will be shown, for example, how was established in response to pleas for a yachting accident in 1897 helped in the military assistance from the Australian development of contract law, how golfing government. As the paper makes accidents likewise assisted in negligence clear, Austus was invented against a law, and how the sport of kings, or background of increasing tension and horseracing, has greatly promoted the outbreaks of violence and bloodshed legal doctrine of natural justice. This between servicemen from Australian linkage between sport generated court and the US, as attempts were made cases and the development of law can be to foist the Australian game upon the expected to continue into the future. For American visitors. Australian sponsors instance, a current case from a Fiji-based were keen to expand the game, increase rugby dispute and its impact on internet sporting contact with the US and promote domain name rules will also be discussed. Australian football. Like most hybrid As sport assumes an increasingly codes, however, Austus quickly faded important place in modern society, and as despite the enthusiasm of the founders to sporting disputes or accidents inevitably expand the game. Although perhaps just continue to occur, this link can be relied a curio in football history, an examination upon to be sustained for many years to of Austus raises a series of issues about come. the development of Australian football and provides an opportunity to dwell upon the fate of other such hybrids. The key questions revolve around the fact that Australia’s sporting traditions and games were British in origin, so why was there a sudden shift to find a trans-Pacific playing field and why did the code ultimately fail? Sport and the Pacific Region: Cross-Cultural Currents 28 PAGE 13 • What challenges and prospects lie Simon Milne ahead for such an approach? School of Tourism and Hospitality and New Zealand Tourism Research Institute, • What is a potential research agenda Auckland University of Technology, and that can underpin the development of such an approach. Geoff Dickson THE PAPER builds on recent work School of Sport and Recreation and conducted by the New Zealand Tourism New Zealand Tourism Research Institute, Research Institute for the European Auckland University of Technology Union and South Pacific Tourism Organisation on the review and Tourism, Sport and development of national and regional Economic Development in tourism strategies in the region. The paper relies on three methodological the South Pacific: Towards approaches: analysis of secondary a Regional Approach material including strategy documents, interviews with key stakeholders, and a THE LINKS between tourism, sport and web-survey of attitudes towards regional economic development are of increasing tourism strategy development. interest to policy makers around the world. Governments at all scales are creating strategies to leverage the undoubted benefits that can stem from the effective development of sport-led Andrew Minogue tourism activity. The South Pacific is no Samoa Association of Sport and National Olympic Committee exception to this trend — with a number of nations in the region beginning to The South Pacific Games: pay more attention to the sports sector as a tool to build destination awareness, Sport, the Island Way enhance community and cultural attributes, and generate economic THE SoutH Pacific Games were returns. This paper begins with a review first held in 1963 in Fiji and then of the role that sport-related activities approximately every three years until the play in current national tourism policies 1970s when they moved to a four year in the South Pacific. The focus then cycle. The XIIIth edition of the Games shifts to the 2003–13 Regional Tourism has just been completed in Samoa; with Strategy for the South and Central Pacific. the XIVth edition scheduled for 2011 Given the regional nature of much policy in New Caledonia. From that time the development in the South Pacific, and Games will be known as the ‘Pacific the multi-national context within which Games’, to better reflect the inclusion of participants from the Northern Pacific much of the region’s tourism development region. In Samoa there were over 4500 and sporting events take place, the athletes and officials representing a following key questions are asked: number of nations and territories in 33 • Can the links between tourism, sport and sports. The size of the Games has been economic development be strengthened growing steadily but they may be checked through a regional approach? in future years, as a maximum of 28 sports PAGE 14 b INTERNATIONAL SPORTS STUDIES CONFERENCE has been imposed in an attempt to keep steady, and in some cases, dramatic, the hosting of future games within reach decline. In response, the government of as many island nations as possible. of Pakistan constituted the National In this paper, the numerous unique Sports Committee in 1967, and through features of these Games will be analysed, the Pakistan Sports Control Board including governance, participating began to formulate policies arising from entities and involvement of international the recommendations of a number of and regional sporting organisations. conferences and committees that were Another aspect that will also be covered overseen by military personnel who is the attempts to bring sponsorship were officials of the Board. Based on and commercial considerations into the an analysis of these recommendations, Games to ensure its continued economic this paper seeks to outline the reasons viability. The major lessons to be learnt for the decline of international sporting from the Samoan experience will be in achievements for Pakistan, and assesses the future use and viability of expensive to what degree any subsequent policy venues constructed to host this event. changes have been responsible for limited successes that have been attained in recent times. The complex relationship between politics, religion and the military not only provides the contextual basis Akhtar Nawaz for this discussion, but generates some worthwhile aspects of international and Rob Hess comparison for South Pacific nations. Victoria University Lessons From Pakistan: Historical Influences on the Dawn Rasmussen Development of Elite Sport National University of Samoa in an Islamic State The Development of Sport THE ISLAMIC nation of Pakistan came into existence when it gained in Samoa: The Role of independence from Britain in 1947. Women and Education Initially, the Pakistani government failed to formulate any specific policies THE DEVElopMENT of sport in relating to the administration of sport, Samoa began in the mid-nineteenth and, instead, relied on ancient sporting century when British and New Zealand traditions to maintain its culture of immigrants settled in Samoa. Organised sports, games and recreations. Despite the sport was played mainly by the European lack of direct government involvement, and part-European residents.