African Soccerscapes — 2010 · 
How a Continent Changed the World’s Game
By Peter Alegi
“Nobody understands the background to African soccer better than the Italian-American historian Peter Alegi. This World Cup is his moment. His African Soccerscapes crams daunting erudition, gleaned over many years of study of African football, into under 200 pages of history.”
Financial Times
“Alegi’s concise and ingenious book is a timely reminder about the impact African players have had on global football and an affirmation of Africa’s mounting stature as a football powerhouse. . . . Alegi writes in a language that is accessible to non-specialists and casual readers. . . . For academia, instructors teaching undergraduate courses about global sports or sports in Africa could assign the book or selected chapters to students, who most likely will appreciate the material for its informative strength, brevity, and lucidity.”
African Studies Quarterly
“(Alegi’s) latest book, African Soccerscapes: How a Continent Changed the World’s Game, is a must-buy. An astutely comprehensive overview of over 150 years of soccer in Africa, it contains many engrossing examples of just how much the sport has always been more than just a game across the African continent. . . . I cannot recommend this book highly enough.”
Marvin Close — author of More Than Just a Game: Football v Apartheid
From Accra and Algiers to Zanzibar and Zululand, Africans have wrested control of soccer from the hands of Europeans, and through the rise of different playing styles, the rituals of spectatorship, and the presence of magicians and healers, have turned soccer into a distinctively African activity.
African Soccerscapes explores how Africans adopted soccer for their own reasons and on their own terms. Soccer was a rare form of “national culture” in postcolonial Africa, where stadiums and clubhouses became arenas in which Africans challenged colonial power and expressed a commitment to racial equality and self-determination. New nations staged matches as part of their independence celebrations and joined the world body, FIFA. The Confédération africaine de football democratized the global game through antiapartheid sanctions and increased the number of African teams in the World Cup finals.
In this compact, highly readable book Alegi shows that the result of this success has been the departure of huge numbers of players to overseas clubs and the growing influence of private commercial interests on the African game. But the growth of women’s soccer and South Africa’s hosting of the 2010 World Cup also challenge the one-dimensional notion of Africa as a backward, “tribal” continent populated by victims of war, corruption, famine, and disease.
Peter Alegi is an associate professor of history at Michigan State University and the author of Laduma! Soccer, Politics, and Society in South Africa. He is an editorial board member of the International Journal of African Historical Studies and book review editor of Soccer and Society.
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184 pages • 6 × 9 in. • Distribution Rights: All Americas & Pacific Rim • Paperback: 978-0-89680-278-0
Reviews
- African Studies Quarterly, Vol. 11, Issue 4; Summer 2010
- Library Journal; May 15, 2010
- The Observer (UK); May 30, 2010
- Financial Times (UK); May 29, 2010
- The New York Times Goal blog; May 10, 2010
- The Sunday Independent (South Africa); April 18, 2010
- The Two Unfortunates Blog; March 30, 2010
- Pitch Invasion: Exploring the Global Game; March 8, 2010
In Series
Downloads & Resources
- Cover
- Author
- Alegi blog: Football Is Coming Home
- USA Today Interview with Alegi (
- BBC World Service, Jan. 2010, “Africa Kicks,” Documentary with Alegi Interview
- Washington Post book mention
- Alegi Interview in L'Actualité (Quebec)
- Alegi Interview in Books: L'actualité par les livres (France)(Quebec)
- The Guardian (UK) book mention (reproduced in The Hindu, India‘s National Paper)
- The New York Times (5/24/10) Alegi comments
- Alegi Quoted in Sports Illustrated
- The Chronicle of Higher Education Notes African Soccerscapes in World Cup Feature
- Time Magazine World Cup Feature & Alegi Interview
- Walfadjri. . . L'Aurore (Alegi Interview)
- Los Angeles Times (Alegi Quoted)
- The New York Times (6/9/10) Alegi interview
- June 10, 2010—NPR, “All Things Considered,” Alegi Interview
- Major League Soccer Interview with Alegi, June 2010
- New York Times June 21, 2010 Alegi Interview re: World Cup Coaches
- More Than Just a Game blog
- France 24 TV: International News 24/7
- July 10, 2010 New York Times Interview with Peter Alegi
- July 11, 2010 New York Times Interview with Peter Alegi
- Alegi Radio Interview on Radio France International
- KPFK, “Spotlight Africa,” (30 minute, 52 sec. mark)
- WBEZ "Worldview" (Chicago); Alegi Interview
- BBC Radio 5 (June 5, 2010 radio broadcast)
- China Radio International (June 11, 2010 Alegi interview)
- Talk Radio 702 (South Africa)
- KPFK (Pacifica Radio), “The People's Game,” June 27, 2010
- Puma video, Journey of Football
- Prologue
- Table of Contents
- Chapter One: "The White Man's Burden", Football and Empire, 1860s–1919
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