In Protection of Whose “Wellbeing”? Considerations of “Clauses and A/Effects” in Athlete Contracts

Contractual agreements have become an accepted part of participation processes for athletes in a variety of sport contexts. Closer readings of these contracts,however, pose several questions regarding organizational intentions and motivations,the conceptualization of athletes as “workers,” and representation parity. In this article, we draw on four types of athlete contractual documents from both select international “amateur” and “professional” sport settings. Our key considerations include athletes’ ownership over their image and identities; medical and health disclosures; lifestyle, behavioral and body choices, and restrictions beyond sport; adherence to organizational philosophy and commitments; and social media and publicity constraints. Our exegesis here encourages sport researchers to deliberate whose “wellbeing” matters most when signing that seductive dotted line.

"You Don't Have to be Filmish": The Toronto Jewish Film Festival

The Toronto Jewish Film Festival is a one-week celebration of Judaism and Cinema that occurs in downtown Toronto, at the Bloor Cinema, early every May. The folkloristic literature on festival notes that these kinds of events are ways that communities and groups celebrate themselves, and although film festivals are frequently excluded from consideration of traditional festivity, I shall demonstrate that such an omission is unfortunate, since like traditional festivity, film festivals, in particular ethnic film festivals, explore the same issues of liminality for the celebrating culture.