This book presents journeys of sixteen Indigenous Australian athletes from their first touch of a‘footy’ to the highest levels of Australian football and rugby league, conceptualized as a processof learning.

Part I: Introduction.- 1. Indigenous Australians and Sport.- 2. Sport, Experience, the Body and Learning.- 3. The Study.- Part II.- 4. Alvin: ‘It’s Our Life’.- 5. Max: ‘Dad Wanted Me to Try a Lot of Different Sports’.- 6. Toby: ‘Bring Your Own Flavour’.- 7. Carl: ‘Geez—I’m Not Too Bad at This Caper’.- Part II: Discussion.- Part III.- 8. Danny: ‘Rugby League’s a Religion for Aboriginal People’.- 9 Ryan: ‘Having Good Relationships with People Who Believe in You and Believe in Your Ability’.- 10. Bernie: ‘I Knew What I Wanted and I Was Willing to Do Anything to Get It’.- 11. Zac: The Road Less Travelled.- Part III: Discussion.- Part IV: What These Stories Tell Us.- Introduction to Part IV.- 12. Laying the Foundations of Expertise.- 13. Transitioning into the Culture of Professional Sport.- 14 Locating Learning in the Bigger Picture.- 15. Conclusion and Implications.

This book presents journeys of sixteen Indigenous Australian athletes from their first touch of a ‘footy’ to the highest levels of Australian football and rugby league, conceptualized as a process of learning. The authors challenge simplistic explanations of Indigenous success in Australian football and rugby league, centered on the notion of the ‘natural athlete’. The book traces the development of Indigenous sporting expertise as a lifelong process of learning situated in local culture and shaped by the challenges of transitioning into professional sport. Individually, the life stories told by the participants provide fascinating insights into experience, culture and learning. Collectively, they provided deep understanding of the powerful influence that Aboriginal culture exerted on the participants’ journeys to the top of their sports while locating individual experience and agency within larger economic, cultural and social considerations. Stories of Indigenous Success in Australian Sport will be of interest to students and scholars across a range of disciplines including Indigenous studies, physical education, education, sport management and sociology.

“The research presented in this engaging and important book provides invaluable understanding of the meaning Australian football and rugby league holds for Indigenous Australian athletes and its inseparability from Aboriginal culture. Guided by the important and profound Indigenous methodology of Dadirri, Indigenous Stories of Success in Australian Sport, this book provides deep insight into what enables Indigenous Australians to thrive in sport by embracing our humanity and capacity to be exceptional and by offering us hope rather than entrenching despair. It also suggests the potential that taking this approach to understanding Indigenous Australians holds across a wide range of issues that include but are not limited to sport.” (Chris Sarra, University of Canberra, Australia, National Rugby League (NRL) Commissioner and Founding Chairman of the Stronger, Smarter Institute)“A fascinating, well written, entertaining and significant study, Indigenous Stories of Success inAustralian Sport is a timely and perceptive personal understanding of Indigenous experiences in both the AFL and NRL. Light and Evans provide rare insights into considering the importance that sport plays within Indigenous communities. A very welcome addition to Indigenous sports literature.” (John Maynard, University of Newcastle, UK) “The narratives of the outstanding sportsmen in Indigenous Stories of Success in Australian Sport are immensely interesting, beautifully written, neatly structured and provide fascinating insight into the development of elite Indigenous sportsmen and the role Aboriginal culture plays in it. This book is more than a chronicle of Indigenous success in sport. It is an incisive, and original exploration, and critique, of a country with a proud history of sporting prowess. It also presents a passionate plea to sports administrators, educational leaders, and policy makers, to ‘listen to culture’.” (Angus Hikairo Macfarlane, University of Canterbury, New Zealand)

Identifies tensions between an Indigenous culture of sport and the culture of professional, elite level sport in Australia Challenges the restrictive nature of the dominant methodology used to study the development of sporting expertise Helps coaches to cultivate creativity, flair and game sense in their team members