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Short abstract

This paper reflects on ethnographic research that traces the emergence of a so-called concussion crisis in sports. This popularised imagining provides important insights into crises, particularly how law, science, media, and regulatory practice are constitutive elements.

Long abstract

Narratives about a concussion crisis in sport can be traced to the early 2010s, particularly in the United States. As such concerns have travelled globally in public and scientific discourses, men’s collision sports feature centrally within these framings. This paper reflects on ethnographic research that traces the emergence of the concussion crisis, drawing attention to how popularised imaginings of the harms associated specifically with traumatic brain injury provide important insights into crises generally. Our findings illuminate not only how law, science, media, and regulatory practice are constitutive elements in shaping the concussion crisis, but also how gendered and racialized inequities come to underpin them. We suggest they provide important insights for thinking about construction and maintenance of crises, including when and how they become distinguished as such. These dynamics become clearer when considering who is not included in concussion crisis narratives, including, for example, survivors of domestic, interpersonal, and state violence. As concussion crisis narratives are no longer as prominent in the United States and elsewhere, we conclude by considering what happens to those recognised—and not recognised—as victims of a crisis after it has passed.