The Olimpiada Popular: Barcelona 1936, Sport and Politics in an Age of War,Dictatorship and Revolution

In an attempt to undermine the IOC Games of 1936, organisations linked to the international worker sport movement responded to an invitation from the Comité Organizador de la Olimpiada Popular (COOP) to take part in an alternative Olympics, the Olimpiada Popular, in Barcelona in July 1936. It is estimated that some 10,000 athletes and 25,000 visitors were in Barcelona to celebrate the Olimpiada. Following the Fascist rising, which began in Spanish Morocco on 17 July, and reached mainland Spain the following day, the games had to be abandoned, despite attempts by the organisers to go ahead with a truncated programme. This article will assess the importance of the Olimpiada Popular in the context of the worker sport movement during the inter-war years and its significance with regard to the international campaign to boycott the Berlin Olympics.     

The perinatal period, a window of opportunity for enhancing parent-infant communication: An approach to prevention

The perinatal period, broadly defined, encompasses the time frame from one year before to 18 to 24 months after the birth of the child. This period constitutes a window of opportunity through which parent-infant interaction may be reinforced, offering the possibility of decreasing the risk of family dysfunction. This review article clarifies the relationship between the enhancement of parent-infant interactions and the prevention of child abuse and neglect. It contains a detailed discussion of the capabilities of the newborn and places in perspective the difficulty experienced when parents who were themselves mistreated in childhood struggle to establish a system of communication with their own newborn children. The perinatal intervention program, a program intended to teach new parents the skills of interaction with their newborns, is described and placed into perspective with other perinatal programs which have been reported to be capable of augmenting the capacity for communication. The authors review the research data demonstrating the efficacy of these perinatal parent-infant programs. The paper concludes with a review of effective interventions, a discussion of what can be expected of each, and suggestions for the practical application of the programs during the perinatal period. The authors recognize that no program taken in isolation is sufficient; taken together they have the ability to improve parent-child relations, and they thus constitute a multifaceted approach to the prevention of child abuse and neglect.