They have invited over the US-based sports journalist Dave Zirin who will be speaking in London for the first time since the 2012 London Olympics (above), with Tony Collins, author of Sport In Capitalist Society, Heather Wakefield, of Unison, Nick Davidson the biographer of the anti-fascist football team St Pauli, and Michelle Moore an activist promoting equality in sport.
Zirin is an institution on the left, and someone to which we have no counterpart in Britain. He is the sports correspondent of The Nation. He appears regularly on radio and television. In a political culture where radical ideas are pushed to the margins, and where sport has a public importance far greater than here (in part because it is seen as apolitical), with humour and by the sheer force of his personality Zirin makes an audience for the left.
His books include Brazil’s Dance With The Devil, What’s My Name Fool?, A People’s History of Sports in the United States, Bad Sports: How Owners Are Ruining the Games We Love and, with John Wesley Carlos, The John Carlos Story.
The event will be held on Saturday 20 December, 3.30-5.30 at the Rich Mix Arts Centre, 35-47 Bethnal Green Road, London E1 6LA. You can book online here.