There much more to sports than playing games and two West Virginia University professors have pulled together the thoughts of more than 30 commentators in Reversing Field: Examining Commercialization, Labor, Gender and Race in 21st Century Sports Law to explore those issues.

“Along with Professor Anne Marie Lofaso, we have released what we think is an exciting book that will tackle issues in sports law that most people would usually like to see left uninterrogated,” says andre douglas pond cummings. Both are professors in the WVU College of Law.

Reversing Field, published by West Virginia University Press, was generated from discussions held at a 2007 Symposium by the same name hosted by the College’s Sports & Entertainment Law Society and conceived by cummings, who does not capitalize his name.

The College will be host to a launch party and reception for the book on Tuesday (March 29) at 6:30 p.m. in the Marlyn E. Lugar Courtroom at the WVU Law Center. The book launch will feature remarks by WVU Director of Intercollegiate Athletics Oliver Luck; a book signing will follow in the WVU Law Center Library.

Reversing Field invites students, professionals, and enthusiasts of sport – whether law, management and marketing, or the game itself – to explore the legal issues and regulations surrounding collegiate and professional athletics in the United States. This theoretical and methodological interrogation of sports law openly addresses race, labor, gender and the commercialization of sports, while offering solutions to the disruptions that threaten its very foundation during an era of increased media scrutiny and consumerism. In more than 30 chapters, academics, practitioners, and critics vigorously confront and debate matters such as the arms race, gender bias, racism, the Rooney Rule and steroid use, offering new thought and resolution to the vexing legal issues that confront sports in the 21st century.

The book includes a foreword by Dr. John Carlos who competed in the 1968 Olympic Games where he finished third in the 200 meter dash, behind Tommie Smith and Australian Peter Norman. While receiving their medals, Smith and Carlos raised their gloved fists as a silent protest of racism and economic depression among oppressed people in America.

ForeWord Reviews has listed Reversing Field as a finalist in its 2011 Book of the Year Award.

Professor cummings holds a JD from Howard University School of Law; Lofaso holds a JD from University of Pennsylvania Law School, an AB from Harvard University and a DPhil from the University of Oxford.

In addition to cummings and Lofaso, contributors to Reversing Field are: Ronald Althouse, Dr. Julian Bailes, Deborah Brake, Dana D. Brooks, Sherri Burr, Todd J. Clark, David Cornwell, Timothy Davis, N. Jeremi Duru, Leonard J. Elmore, Stacey B. Evans, John Fisher, Bernard Franklin, William B. Gould IV, David C. Hardesty Jr., Jeffrey Hirsch, Floyd Keith, Marlon LeBlanc, Alfred Mathewson, Michael McCann, Cyrus Mehri, Barbara Osborne, Andre L. Smith, Bethany Swaton, Kenneth Shropshire and Dennis Walsh.

-WVU-

bc/03/24/11

CONTACT: Brian Caudill; College of Law
304-293-7439; brian.caudill@mail.wvu.edu

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