Telling Tales in Sport and Physical Activity

Andrew C. Sparkes, PhD, is a professor of social theory and the director of the Qualitative Research Unit in the School of Health & Sport Sciences at the University of Exeter in Exeter, Devon, England. He earned his doctor of philosophy and bachelor of education from Loughborough University, and his master of arts from Durham University. He has taught qualitative research methods to undergraduate and postgraduate students for 12 years. Extensively published, Dr. Sparkes has developed an international reputation as an expert and innovative thinker in qualitative research circles. Sparkes is the editor of Auto/Biography, a refereed journal of the British Sociological Association Study Group. He serves on the advisory board for Sport, Education & Society and is an editorial board member for the European Physical Education Review, Sociology of Sport On-Line, Agora, and the International Journal of Men's Health.

Surveying the landscape; scientific tales; realist tales; confessional tales; autoethnography; poetic representations; ethnodrama; fictional representations; different tales and judgement calls.