The Politics of the Male Body in Global Sport: The Danish Involvement

Danish sport has been associated with Europe and the World; not least through I.P. Muller and Niels Bukh and the Danish Gymnastics revolution with its emphasis on male aesthetics and hygiene in the first half of the twentieth century. At the same time, Denmark has stood apart from Europe in the early moments of its history of sport with the rural revolution of the farming communities as a statement of political independence and assertion. However, during the German occupation of Denmark, Danish sport was part of a European collaboration which characterized a number of the occupied countries not least in the Nordic area. After the Second World War, Denmark embraced international body cultures with other European nations in particular Eastern martial arts. Denmark too, as part of trends in the European region and the world, became caught up in sport as a powerful contemporary political statement.

This book was previously published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.

Hans Bonde is a professor, Ph.D. and D.Phil in history, at the Department of Exercise and Sport Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. He is Leader of the Danish Research Education Program in Sport Sciences (http: //reps.ku.dk/). In 2007 the Danish version of his book Football with the Foe was awarded the prize as The Danish History Book of the Year.