Dr Dave Nadel
Honorary Research Associate, National Centre for Australian Studies
View contact details in Monash Staff Directory
Latest Work
The Australian Game of Football Since 1858
Dr Nadel contributed a chapter entitled “A game goes national”, to The Australian Game of Football Since 1858, edited by James Weston, Geoff Slattery Publishing, Docklands Vic Australia. This is the AFL’s official book released to celebrate the 150 anniversary of Australian Rules Football.
Biography
Dave Nadel lectures in the undergraduate subjects Sport and Society and Australia in a World of Sport. Dr Nadel is a graduate of Monash University where he did his doctorate on The Professionalisation and Commercialisation of Australian Football: 1975-1996, which covered the transformation of the Victorian Football League to the Australian Football League. He is recognised a leading authority on the organisation of Australian Football. He has taught at Victoria University and the University of Melbourne.
Dr Nadel has contributed chapters to two major books on Australian Football, The Australian Game of Football: since 1858 edited by Geoff Slattery, and More Than a Game: an Unauthorised History of Australian Rules Football edited by Rob Hess and Bob Stewart. Other recent publications include “A League of His Own: John Elliott and Ian Collins’ Vision of National Football” in Football Fever: Crossing Boundaries edited by Rob Hess, Matthew Nicholson and Bob Stewart and “A Perverse Fascination with Squalor and Filth: The Demise of Home Grounds in the AFL” in The Imaginary Grandstand: Identity and Narrative in Australian Sport, edited by Bernard Whimpress.
Dave Nadel is a former executive member of the Australian Society for Sports History and a regular contributor to its Journal, Sporting Traditions. His most recent conference presentations include “Tales of Old Richmond : The parallel lives of Jack Dyer and Jim Cairns” presented at Sporting Traditions XVII, the Biennial Conference of the Australian Society for Sports History, Wellington, New Zealand, 2009. “Go and Tell Your Kids the Story of Peter Norman” presented at the Sport Race and Ethnicity Conference, Sydney 2008. “Country and Eastern: the influence of demographic change on football in Gippsland” presented at Sporting Traditions XVI, the Biennial Conference of the Australian Society for Sports History, Canberra, 2007. “The Promise of Romance: an examination of the Australian Football League’s father-son rule” presented at Football Fever: Identities and Allegiances, Victoria University City Campus, 2006.
Research Interests
Dave Nadel’s research interests include Popular Culture; Sports History with a special emphasis on Australian Football; Labour History; Social stratification and social change in the context of Australian politics (class, gender and race) and regionalism in the context of Australian history and sports history with particular emphasis on South West Victoria.
Keywords
Sport, Australian Football, History, Regionalism, Social Change, South West Victoria.
Teaching
Publications
Books Chapters
- A game goes national, in The Australian Game of Football Since 1858, eds James Weston, Geoff Slattery Publishing, Docklands Vic Australia, pp. 78-93.
- A league of his own: John Elliott and Ian Collins' vision of national football, in Football Fever: Crossing Boundaries, eds Rob Hess, Matthew Nicholson and Bob Stewart, Maribyrnong Press, Melbourne Vic Australia, pp. 39-48.
- Controversial key to Power Without Glory, in Frank Hardy and the Literature of Commitment, eds Paul Adams and Christopher Lee, The Vulgar Press, Melbourne Vic Australia, pp. 251-274.
- “A Perverse Fascination with Squalor and Filth: The Demise of Home Grounds in the AFL” in The Imaginary Grandstand : Identity and Narrative in Australian Sport edited by Bernard Whimpress, published by Australian Society for Sport History, Kent Town, S.A, 2001.
- Two Chapters covering 1975 to 1997 in More Than a Game: an unauthorised History of Australian Rules Football edited by Rob Hess and Bob Stewart, published by Melbourne University Press in 1998.
Refereed Journal Articles
- “What is a Football Community?” in Occasional Papers in Football Studies Vol. 1 No.1 (Jan 1998)
- "Aborigines and Australian Football: The Rise and Fall of the Purnim Bears" in Sporting Traditions Vol. 9 No 2 (May 1993)
Other Articles
- “No Football Without Fans” in the Bulletin of Sport and Culture No. 10 (March 1997)
- “Multiculturalism: Reflections and Reservations” in Reconstruction No. 7. (Autumn 1996)
- "Circuses but no bread: Kennett's Special Events strategy" in Reconstruction No 5 (Winter/Spring 1995)
Encyclopedia/Dictionary Entries
- Entries contributed to The Oxford Companion to Australian Sport and an entry to the Australian Dictionary of Biography and also several entries to The Encyclopedia of Melbourne. Dr Nadel has also contributed some entries to Reading the Game: an annotated guide to the literature and films of Australian Rules Football edited by Tim Hogan and published by the Australian Society for Sports History, 2005.
Conferences
Dave has presented papers on Sports Organisation and Sports History with particular emphasis on Australian Football at Sporting Traditions Conferences since 1995. He has also presented at other Sport Studies and Football conferences. His most recent presentations are mentioned in his biography (above).
Reviews
Dr Nadel has had reviews published in the Journal of Australian Studies, Sporting Traditions, The Bulletin of Sport and Culture, The Victorian Historical Journal and Overland.
