The Opening Whistle

In embarking on this learning journey, a heap of sporting cliches spring rapidly to mind. Waiting for the starter's orders ... not wishing to make a false start ... hoping all the training has paid off and that I've turned up ready to play. Please excuse the cliches, as my love of sports - and of sports history in particular - will figure prominently in this blog.

As many coaches have emphasised to me over the years, you only get out of it what you put into it. To gain the maximum benefits from the Learning 2.0 programme, I intend to relate all that I learn to the practice of sports history, to engaging with other sports historians in galleries, libraries, archives and museums (GLAM for short!) and to making sports archives more accessible to those who require them.

I discovered the sports history discipline at an opportune moment. Now more than ever there are researchers interested in sports history. At the same time, more records are being created, and hopefully more are becoming accessible. Traditionally, my role would be to unite researchers and those records, but in this 21st century post-modernist electronic world, I'm not too sure. Facilitator, intermediary, anonymous benefactor? Active, passive, proactive or something I haven't yet considered? Join with me as I discover the world of the Web 2.0 and try to make sense of what these technologies can mean for GLAM sports historians like me.

All the while I hope to use and discuss examples from the collections of State Library of New South Wales. This stunning photo above of a bumper crowd at a representative rugby union match in 1903 (http://acms.sl.nsw.gov.au/item/itemDetailPaged.aspx?itemID=430479) is but the tip of the iceberg!