Introduction; Louise Platt and Ian R Lamond.- Part I Critical Considerations.- 1.  Problems of Involvement and Detachment: a critical approach to researching live event experiences; Daniel Turner and Elliot Pirie.- 2. A qualitative case study of the 2010 football world cup in South Africa: practical considerations and personal dilemmas; Suzanne Dowse.- 3. Creating Critical Festival Discourse through flexible mixed methodological research design; Allan Jepson and Alan Clarke.- Part II Discursive, Historical and Ideological Perspectives.- 4. The rewards and risks of historical events studies research; Matthew L. McDowell and Fiona Skillen.- 5. Space and memory in the Huashan event; Dominique Ying-Chih Liao.- 6. CDA, Critical Events and Critical Event Studies: How to make sense of critical events in a society of radical change; Nicolina Montesano Montessori.- 7. Using a corpus-assisted discourse studies (CADS) approach to investigate constructions of identities in media reporting surrounding mega sport events: the case of the London Olympics 2012; Sylvia Jaworska.- 8. Examining parasport events through the lens of Critical Disability Studies; Laura Misener, David McGillivray, Gayle McPherson and David Legg; Part III Encountering the Event.- 9. Participatory Research: Case study of a community event; Rebecca Finkel and Kate Sang.- 10. Researching from the inside: Autoethnography and Critical Event Studies; Katherine Dashper.- 11. An ethnographic approach to the taking place of the event; Andrea Pavoni and Sebastiano Citroni; 12. Experience sampling methods in critical event studies: Theory and practice; Jonathan Moss.- 13. The strength of festival ties: Social network analysis and the 2014 Edinburgh International Science Festival; David Jarman