“A tour de force in identifying and interpreting the wide range of practices and communities behind the continent’s sporting origins.”—Marcos Caetano, Journal of Sport History

“Sports in South America makes a compelling case for historians of sports across the globe to pay attention to local sports cultures. . . . Brown’s continental versus national focus and his ability to uncover practices hidden by Eurocentric definitions of modernity provide a model for historians of Latin America.”—April Yoder, Hispanic American Historical Review

Winner of The Lord Aberdare Literary Prize 2024

“This book offers deep and nuanced insight into the sporting world in South America and is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the intricate dance between sports, globalization, urbanization, culture, and identity. It will guide scholars and aficionados through the early years of South American sports, and will become a classic.”—Christopher Gaffney, New York University

“Matthew Brown’s excellent book on the development of sport in South America before 1930 is not just for sports historians. His pathbreaking study provides significant insights on several sociocultural themes that are central to modern Latin American history—race, gender, neocolonialism, violence, and social discipline.”—Rory M. Miller, author of Britain and Latin America in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

“There is no such thing as a definitive history, but this first history of sports in South America is simply brilliant and unmatched. Matthew Brown has written a reference work for scholars and amateurs.”— Pablo Alabarces, University of Buenos Aires

“This book shows how South America’s preexisting sporting cultures intertwined and shaped global sporting history from 1862 until 1930. Brown’s insightful attention to local and touring sporting practices, experiences, and debates suggest new paths toward the decolonization of sports history.”—Ingrid Johanna Bolívar Ramirez, University of the Andes (Bogotá)