1600 Woodland Road
Abington, PA 19001
Biography
Manuel Morales Fontanilla was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia. He has an extensive bilingual teaching and research record in public and private universities both in Colombia and the United States. Morales Fontanilla enjoys spending time outdoors swimming, biking, and playing soccer.
Research Interests
Morales Fontanilla's work sits at the intersection of physical culture, politics, and identity. It draws on his background in history and law and contributes to the fields of critical studies of race and ethnicity, sports studies, gender studies, spatial studies, and social and cultural history in the Americas. His first manuscript, Impossible Roads: Cycling, Difference, and Territory. Colombia, 1930 – 1995 probes the social, cultural, and political importance of competitive cycling in the country from the appearance of the first competitions until its consolidation as a popular mass phenomenon. It uses cycling as a tool to understand how difference is reproduced in relation to the politics of space and identity formation.
Publications
Book Chapters:
2023 “The General’s Vuelta: Cycling and Dictatorship During Colombia’s La Violencia, 1953-1958,” in Sport and the Pursuit of War and Peace from the Nineteenth Century to the Present, edited by Martin Hurcombe and Phil Dine, Oxfordshire: Routledge.
2012 “El Deporte En Bogotá Y El Debate Intelectual De Los Años 20.” En Estudios Socioculturales Del Deporte. Desarrollos, Tránsitos Y Miradas, editado por David Leonardo Quitian, 150-175. Bogotá: Editorial Asciende.
Journal Articles:
2020 “Sports Policy in Colombia,” International Journal of Sports Policy and Politics, Volume 12, Issue 4, 717-729.
Book Reviews:
2020 Rev. of Gods, Games, & Globalization: New Perspectives on Religion and Sports (Macon: GA: Mercer University Press, 2019) By Rebecca Alpert and Arthur Remillard eds. Journal of Sports History, 47: 3 (2020) pp. 296—297.
2014 Rev. of Gender State and Medicine in Highland Ecuador: Modernizing Women, Modernizing the State, 1895-1950 (Pittsburgh, Pa: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2012) By A. Kim Clark. Journal of Latin American Studies, 46: 02, 2014, Pp. 401-402.
Public Scholarship:
2009 “¿Y Si La Bomba Estalla? O Lo Que Creí Que Era El Embrión,” Revista Suma Cultural No 9, Enero-Junio.
2008 “El Deporte en la Bogotá de los 20,” Revista Suma Cultural No 8, Julio-Diciembre.
2008 “El Dorado Una Época Inolvidable,” En Historia Del Fútbol Dorado, Revista Memoria Viva, Archivo de Bogotá, Agosto.
Work in Progress:
Impossible Roads: Cycling, Difference, and Territory, Colombia 1930 – 1995 (Manuscript in preparation).
Education
2018 Ph.D. in History, University of California, San Diego.
2011 M.A. in History, Universidad de los Andes. Bogotá, Colombia.
2010 LL.B. Universidad Nacional de Colombia School of Law and Political Sciences, Bogotá, Colombia.
2005 B.A. in History, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá. Colombia.