This study examines media discourses of the naturalized athletes of the South Korean men’s national ice hockey team. Building on the conceptual frameworks of imagined community, ethnic nationalism, and previous studies on athlete migration and naturalization, we further an understanding of the process of deconstruction and reconstruction of South Korean ethnic and national identity. We use Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis to explore how South Korean media legitimized the naturalization of foreign athletes without Korean ancestry and suggest three themes found from the discourses. First, the discourses highlighted the significance of the South Korean team’s Olympic success, which provided a legitimate reason for the recruitment of foreign athletes. Second, the naturalized athletes were described as “saviors” who possessed superior careers, physicality, and playing skills. Lastly, the media complimented the naturalized athletes’ acculturation to Korean culture by emphasizing their commitment to the nation. We argue that by forming and distributing discourses that favored the naturalization of athletes, Koreans have expanded the boundary of Koreanness. We discuss, then, the expansion of Koreanness in relation to the notion of flexible citizenship in the era of neoliberal globalization.

In this study, we aimed to understand the formation of cultural assets within diasporic families through participation in ethnic sport. Yosso’s Community Cultural Wealth framework guided the study. An interpretive qualitative approach was employed to examine Korean diasporic families in the United States whose children are involved in Taekwondo, a Korean ethnic sport. Data were collected through interviews and observations. Our analysis revealed the development of four forms of Community Cultural Wealth: linguistic, familial, navigational, and resistant capitals, along with the newly identified transnational capital. These forms were developed and nurtured through learning ethnic language, cultural practices and heritages, bonding with families, building cultural ownership, and developing self-confidence and self-protection skills. We propose advancing the use of the Community Cultural Wealth framework in sport management and offer implications for optimizing the use of ethnic sport to create more inclusive and diverse spaces for diasporic communities’ sport participation.

This study offers a critical discourse analysis of media representations of coach Sarah Murray, the first foreign, the first female, and the youngest head coach of the South Korean women's national ice hockey team at the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics. We focus on the South Korean media, which framed and manipulated coach Murray's credibility, especially the caliber of her coaching, while constructing a familial tie and restating the global hierarchy between North America and South Korea in the sport of ice hockey. We suggest how the media (re)produced denotative/connotative meanings of the recruitment of Coach Murray and her leadership through determinant moments by engaging a discussion of the discourse that both constructed coach Murray as subordinate to male figures and affirmed whiteness as the center of the global context.

This paper proposes the application of Yosso’s Community Cultural Wealth (CCW) framework, rooted in the critical race theory (CRT), as a transformative lens for sport-based youth development (SBYD) research. Moving beyond traditional deficit-based models, which often depict youth as problematic or at-risk, CCW emphasizes recognizing and building upon the cultural strengths and assets of marginalized youth. We begin by reviewing the development of theoretical applications within the youth development, positive youth development (PYD), and SBYD literature to highlight the criticisms against conventional deficit-focused approaches. CCW offers an asset-oriented lens by offering six forms of capital—aspirational, linguistic, familial, social, navigational, and resistant—that are typically overlooked in mainstream frameworks. We illustrate how these forms of capital can reposition SBYD programs as spaces for cultivating resilience, identity, and social justice while addressing systemic inequities. By incorporating CCW with participatory research methods and critical theories, such as intersectionality and CRT, researchers can broaden the theoretical and methodological scope of SBYD. This paper concludes by suggesting practical implications for program design, organizational advocacy, and policy development, advocating for culturally responsive, community-led initiatives that prioritize the active engagement and empowerment of marginalized youth. In sum, CCW provides the “why” for critical SBYD research and practice.

Despite a growing body of scholarship exploring university–organization collaborations in the sport for development (SfD) field, there has been limited consideration of the experiences of practitioners and partnering organizations in these partnerships. The purpose of this study was to examine their experiences when partnering with academic institutions, programs, scholars, and/or students, with a specific focus on research and evaluation partnerships. Interviews were conducted with 22 participants working at 20 SfD organizations in the United States. Findings were organized into six main categories (e.g., motivations, factors that facilitate or impede collaboration, collaboration outcomes). A conceptual process framework for university–organization collaboration emerged from the data. This study is one of the first in the SfD field to examine practitioners’ perspectives of university–organization collaborations centered on research and evaluation activities. The findings help advance the SfD field, identifying the various factors at play as these partnerships are formed, activated, and sustained.