Stephen Townsend is researcher and lecturer of critical sociocultural issues in sport at the University of Queensland School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences. He holds a PhD in sport history from the University of Queensland. His current research examines sociocultural aspects of sports concussion, with a particular focus on understanding how Australians construct and communicate knowledge about sporting brain injuries. He has previously written about racial issues in sport, protest and the civil rights era in the USA, and constructions of athlete identity in the media.
Experience
2023–present
Lecturer, University of Queensland
2022–present
Senior Research Project Officer, University of Queensland
2019–2021
Associate Lecturer, University of Queensland
Education
2019
University of Queensland, Doctor of Philosophy
Publications
2022
'Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted’: searching for the value of metrics and altmetrics in sociology of sport journals', International Review for the Sociology of Sport
2021
‘“Tragedy of the Punch Drunk”: Reading Concussion in Australian Sporting Newspapers, 1803 – 1954’, Frontiers in Sport and Active Living
2021
The Playmakers: The History of Basketball Queensland, Basketball Queensland
2019
‘Clay vs. Ali: Distant Reading, Methodology, and Sport History.’, Journal of Sport History
2018
‘“Where Cassius Clay Ends, Muhammad Ali Begins”: Sportspeople, Political Activism, and Methodology.’ , The International Journal of the History of Sport
2018
‘Remembering the Rejection of Muhammad Ali: Identity, Civil Rights and Social Memory.’ , Sport in History
2017
‘From “Pitifully Ignorant” to the “People’s Champion”: Shifting Perceptions of Muhammad Ali in the Louisville Defender, 1964–1971.’ , Register of the Kentucky Historical Society
2015
‘A Bird’s-eye View of the Past: Digital History, Distant Reading and Sport History.’, The International Journal of the History of Sport
2013
‘Wicked Wikipedia? Communities of Practice, the Production of Knowledge and Australian Sport History.’ , The International Journal of the History of Sport
Grants and Contracts
2018
History of Basketball Queensland
Role:
Principal Investigator
Funding Source:
Basketball Queensland and The University of Queensland