Scrutiny and sport...

Well, it wasn't as bad as I feared. The meeting with the supervisor went well and helped clarify a few things - as well as sharpening up my proposed area of investigation. So I'm feeling pleased. Now I just have to rewrite my outline - more for myself than anything else - as well as make a start on a first chapter, which I will be assessed on at the end of the academic year (one of the LSE requirements).

I failed to mention another seminar I attended at the end of last week. Last Thursday, David Goldblatt was presenting one of his chapters from his forthcoming book (next September) on football. In particular he read us a chapter that dealt with the development of Latin American football in the context of contemporary globalisation. He was mainly concerned with the situation in Argentina and Brazil, but reference was made to other parts of the region in the question and answer session. I was quite interested to hear whether there has been any change in Venezuela since Chavez's new government-sponsored TV station; is football being shown more now, in comparison to the national sport of baseball which, I presume, predominates on the private TV stations?

The chapter is from a book that Goldblatt is publishing on world football, but it's going to miss the World Cup fever period. Not that he's fussed. Over a beer afterwards he told me that he's still got some work to do on it and he wants the volume to last, rather than have it only half-finished by the time the World Cup opens next summer.