Get Caught up in the 2014 World Cup

Did you know that soccer is the most popular sport in the world? We’re super-excited about the World Cup in Brazil, so between games we’re reading all about one of our favorite sports.

And don’t miss our collection just for kids with soccer fever.

 

How Soccer Explains the World: an Unlikely Theory of Globalization
by Franklin Foer

Soccer is much more than a game, or even a way of life – it’s a perfect window into the cross–currents of today’s world, with all of its joys and sorrows. Soccer clubs don’t represent geographic areas, they stand for social classes and political ideologies. And unlike baseball or tennis, soccer is freighted with the weight of ancient hatreds and history.

 

 

Finding the Game: Three Years, Twenty-five Countries, and the Search for Pickup Soccer
by Gwendolyn Oxenham

In the United States, it’s “pickup.” In Trinidad, it’s “taking a sweat.” In Brazil, it’s “pelada” (literally “naked”). It’s the other side of soccer, played away from the bright lights and manicured fields – the game for anyone, anywhere.

 

 

The Kingfisher Soccer Encyclopedia
by Clive Gifford

Not sure what’s going on? This book covers soccer’s rules, skills, fans and the media, coaches and tactics, and profiles of the top players and teams – from the first soccer games to today’s money-spinning global industry.

 

 

Why Soccer Matters 
by Pelé, with Brian Winter

Soccer. Football. The beautiful game. The world’s most popular sport goes by many names, but for decades, fans have agreed on one thing: the greatest player of all time was Pele. Now the legendary star, ambassador, and humanitarian shares a global vision for what soccer can accomplish.

 

 

 

Vasermil
DVD [2011]

Named after the local football stadium in the town of Be’er Sheva’ in southern Israel, Vasermil tells the story of three teenagers who live in the same tough neighborhood, each pinning their hopes on football as a way out. But in order to win, Shlomi, Adiel and Dima will have to learn to play as a team and overcome their differences.

 

 

Soccer in Sun and Shadow
by Eduardo Galeano, translated by Mark Fried

In this witty and rebellious history of world soccer, Eduardo Galeano searches for the styles of play, players, and goals that express the unique personality of certain times and places.  Galeano takes us to ancient China, where engravings from the Ming period show a ball that could have been designed by Adidas to Victorian England, where gentlemen codified the rules that we still play by today and to Latin America, where the “crazy English” spread the game only to find it creolized by the locals.

 

 

Outcasts United: the Story of a Refugee Soccer Team that Changed a Town
by Warren St. John

The story of a refugee soccer team, a remarkable woman coach and a small southern town turned upside down by the process of refugee resettlement. It’s a tale about resilience, the power of one person to make a difference and the daunting challenge of creating community in a place where people seem to have little in common.

 

 

The Big Fix: the Hunt for the Match-Fixers Bringing Down Soccer
by Brett Forrest

In February 2013, the director of Europol, the European Union’s law enforcement agency, made the shocking announcement that 700 international soccer matches had been fixed since 2008, including World Cup qualifying and exhibition matches, with a Chinese criminal syndicate pulling the strings.

 

 

 

Rudo y Cursi
DVD [2009]

From the rural banana plantation to the big city stadiums, brothers Rudo and Curse are bitter rivals. Whisked away to Mexico City by a talent scout to play for the big league, they quickly achieve fame. But when Rudo descends into a quagmire of gambling debt and drug abuse, and Cursi is distracted by beautiful women and a second career as a pop singer, will they forget their goal to build a home for their mother?