This article provides a critical overview of the viability of the "supercrip" iconography as an appropriate representation of Paralympic athletes. It focuses on its validity as a vehicle for the empowerment of individuals with impairments both within the context of elite sport and broader society. This type of representation may be seen by the able moral majority as enlightened. However, supercrip narratives may have a negative impact on the physical and social development of disabled individuals by reinforcing what could be termed "achievement syndrome"-the impaired are successful in spite of their disability. The authors will focus on the implications of the use of language and images embodied in supercrip iconography, relying on examples of two European Paralympic awareness campaigns disseminated through mainstream media.

Over the last two decades the Paralympic Games have gained a high public profile. As a result there has been an ever increasing commercial marketplace for aerodynamic and feather light racing (wheel)chairs as well as biomechanically and ergonomically responsive prostheses that have helped create a legion of cyborg bodies that is manifest in the image of the sporting supercrip. Mobility devices that enhance performance have also created a divide between different impairment groups and also amongst ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ nations. This article highlights the development of a technocentric ideology within the Paralympic Movement that has led to the cyborgification of some Paralympic bodies. It questions whether the advances in technology are actually empowering disabled athletes.

In recent years the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), the institution responsible for the administration, organization, and management of the Paralympic Games, has reshaped the landscape of sport for the disabled. This article argues that the IPC has marginalized the practice community, notably the International Organizations of Sport for the Disabled. By wrestling away control of the classification systems developed by these organizations, the IPC has transformed them to such an extent that they fail to provide opportunities for equitable sporting practice and the result has been a threat to the ideology of Paralympism. We illustrate this by examining two classification systems that are currently used within Paralympic Sport: the integrated functional system employed in the sport of swimming and the disability-specific system used within athletics.

In the professional game of Rugby Union the elimination of injury to players has become a paramount performative, and therefore financial, concern. The recognition that professional contact sports entail the potential for significant injury is becoming increasingly evident in the disciplines of sports medicine and the sociology of sport. Among the complex of factors that comprise the habitus of a rugby club will be the expectation and accommodation of factors relating to injury. This article makes conceptual distinctions between pain and injury. Much of the extant literature of pain and injury uses qualitative interview techniques to good effect. This article uses the methodology of participant observation to offer a more felicitous social understanding of pain and injury in a distinctive sporting context. Ethnographic research was undertaken at Pontypridd Rugby Football Club in Wales over a period of two years. This approach enables an increased diachronic understanding of pain and injury within this particular sporting context and how the personal and social experience of these phenomena are transformed through the process of professionalization.

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Boron (B) is a naturally occurring element that is found in the form of borates in the oceans, sedimentary rocks, coal, shale, and in some soils. Borates are released naturally into the atmosphere and aquatic environment from oceans, geothermal steams, and weathering of clay-rich sedimentary rocks. B is also released to a lesser extent from anthropogenic sources. B concentrations in air range from <0.5 to 80 ng/m3 with an average of 20 ng/m3, and in soils from 10 to 300 mg/kg with an average of 30 mg/kg. Concentrations of B in surface freshwaters are typically <0.1-0.5 mg/L; much higher concentrations are measured in a few areas, depending on the geochemical nature of the drainage catchment. B accumulates in both aquatic and terrestrial plants, but it does not appear to be biomagnified through the food chain. No observed effect concentrations (NOECs) for aquatic invertebrates tend to be in the range of 6-10 mg B/L with lower values of 1-2 mg/L for community studies. No effect concentrations for fish in natural waters are around 1 mg/L, although lower values have been recorded in reconstituted water. Comparing no effect concentrations with the general ambient environmental levels indicates that the risk to aquatic ecosystems from B is low. In a few B-rich areas, natural levels will be higher; however, there is some indication that organisms may be adapted to the local conditions. B is an essential micronutrient for higher plants with interspecies differences in the levels required for optimum growth. In general, there is a small concentration range between deficiency and toxicity; however, toxicity owing to excess B is much less common in the environment than B deficiency. Levels of B in aquatic plants growing in areas receiving B-rich runoff from irrigated fields are higher than dietary concentrations, which cause effects on the growth of young birds in the laboratory; however, the bioavailability in the field of such plant-accumulated B is uncertain.

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