Review: Reading the World through Sports and Young Adult Literature: Resources for the English Classroom

In lieu of an abstract: In this wide-ranging book, Luke Rodesiler, Mark A. Lewis, and Alan Brown explore and analyse award-winning and acclaimed young adult literature and the ways that teachers of secondary English (students aged 11–18) can use these texts to support classroom instruction and discussion. Their core argument is that sports-related media can be used to teach students about social inequalities and develop their critical literacy skills as many students already have domain-specific knowledge about sports and sporting culture, which can be used to motivate and frame the critical literacy work. The book goes much further than using sports books simply as a carrot for reluctant readers, however, and encourages thoughtful and purposeful discussions that honour students’ existing knowledge and the co-creation of new knowledge, expression, and social action.