Attitude of Iranian Female University Students to Sport and Exercise

Women's sport has always been a challenging subject in Muslim countries and Muslim women have had to face various constraints regarding their participation in sport and exercise, which also influence their attitudes to sport. This study aims to explore the attitude of Iranian female university students toward sport by survey method (N?=?1,120) and qualitative interviews (N?=?50). The results indicate that the majority of the participants have negative attitudes to sport, and accordingly they do not practice it. Various macro-, meso- and micro-level factors were found as perceived barriers. From the results it can be concluded that the media as a tool for raising awareness to providing role models and shaping the social values of mainstream society does not take a positive role in order to develop the culture of women's sport, and to change the attitude of female students and their social environments to sport in Iranian society.     

On the Transformative Potential of Community Land Trusts in the United States

Growing interest in non‐capitalist ownership models raises empirical questions about the political implications of such models. In this paper we ask: are non‐capitalist property ownership models inherently politically transformative? A study of community land trusts (CLTs) based in Minnesota illustrates that alternative property models do not necessarily produce transformative political outcomes. Interviews of those involved in CLTs revealed that they most often engage in affirmative politics, rather than challenging structural problems. Seeds of transformation were evident in these CLTs as well, however, and we explore these moments through four lenses of transformation in order to see the potential building blocks toward other worlds. To this end, we highlight changes in participant subjectivities, collective relationship building, the cultivation of community control, and the subversion of power hierarchies. While these moments offer pathways toward greater transformation, this study reveals the necessity of intentionally transformative practice in alternative ownership models.     

Spatial Causality: A Systematic Review on Spatial Causal Inference

The growing interest in causal inference in recent years has led to new causal inference methodologies and their applications across disciplines and research domains. Yet, studies on spatial causal inference are still rare. Causal inference on spatial processes is faced with additional challenges, such as spatial dependency, spatial heterogeneity, and spatial effects. These challenges can lead to spurious results and subsequently, incorrect interpretations of the outcomes of causal analyses. Recognizing the growing importance of causal inference in the spatial domain, we conduct a systematic literature review on spatial causal inference based on a formal concept mapping. To identify how to assess and control for the adverse effects of spatial influences, we assess publications relevant to spatial causal inference based on criteria relating to application discipline, methods used, and techniques applied for managing issues related to spatial processes. We thus present a snapshot of state of the art in spatial causal inference and identify methodological gaps, weaknesses and challenges of current spatial inference studies, along with opportunities for future research.     

Connection between the Legal Knowledge and Social Background of Sports Coaches at Iranian Universities

This study investigates university coaches' knowledge about their legal duties toward their athletes, as well as the connection between the level of their legal knowledge and their educational, social and economic background. The results are presented according to three major dimensions: deficiencies in the coaches' training system, in their knowledge concerning their legal responsibility and the coaches' social recognition regarding their profession. The findings indicate that the coaches' training in Iran has a lot of weaknesses, including the neglect of legal issues, the consequence of which is that the Iranian university coaches do not have sufficient knowledge about the legal issues in general and they are not aware of their duty toward their athletes in particular. In Iran coaching is not considered as a prestigious occupation; in terms of social status coaches belong to the lower middle class.     

Follow the Thing: Data

This research starts its journey from a video that failed to be published during the 2009 uprising in Iran. By following data outside the common trajectories of data circulation in the global North, this paper offers new geographical and data imaginations neglected by the universalised understandings of data and its political economy. Consequently, data’s behaviour as a thing is thoroughly investigated in the “follow the thing tradition” by scrutinising data as a commodity, its meanings and its associations. Using actor-network-theory, the paper highlights data’s open and contested character as well as the breakdowns throughout its journey. Following an uncirculated video via its traces sheds light on data’s agency in evoking different assemblages and spatialities. It also reflects on the epistemological importance of not treating the Southern data as exceptional and calls for a theoretical landscape that does not leave many realities of data out in its homogenised universal narrative.