Regional restructuring of industrial sport: The case of elite hockey player production in British Columbia

Although ice hockey has been characterized as a “people's sport,” since the 1980s neoliberalism has stimulated elite hockey to take on industrial characteristics, driven by: the commodification of sport; a growing scale of hockey performance; the branding of teams and cities; a strategic coupling with media; and the privatization of training and facilities. In British Columbia, elite hockey players are being produced in new regional settings. Formerly, many elite players came from smaller resource-hinterland towns offering strong local support. With neoliberal commodification of the sport, the Lower Mainland has emerged as the main centre of elite player production in British Columbia. This has occurred very rapidly as costly private training programs located mostly in larger metropolitan areas have become the main source of young players aspiring to elite status. High-performance training companies and private hockey academies offer costly routes to elite player status, with new class relations that exclude low-income families. A range of internal and external scale economies lead to these new facilities being concentrated in larger conurbations, particularly in Greater Vancouver.     

Borderless sport? Imagining and organising bicycle racing in Belgium, 1869–1914: between transnational dynamics and national aspirations

From the 1860s onwards, the new sport of bicycle racing engendered transnational flows of ideas, practices and performers. However, national actors and sensitivities always remained present. In interaction with these transnational flows they shaped national identity in this sport, as the Belgian case shows. Belgium was a site of cross-border interaction for racing from early on. Nevertheless, actors like the Belgian cycling press or national cycling union also continuously tried to construct a ‘national’ racing culture. French and British influences were especially crucial here, as Belgian actors were continuously torn between both in determining their position in the amateur–professional question or in the International Cycling Association. France and Britain thus functioned as ‘significant others’ in the shaping of ‘national’ Belgian racing, a process often complicated by the transnational activities of other, commercially motivated actors like cycling tracks or racers themselves. In competition, too, the discourses of the Belgian press on racers Hubert Houben and Robert Protin celebrated their ‘small nation’ and its success against and differences from its bigger neighbours. The Belgian orientation on French racing eventually became dominant, and proved to be crucial to the resurrection of the sport in Belgium after a period of crisis around 1900.     

The folding of sport space into carceral space: On the making of prisoners’ experiences and lives

Sport and exercise are prominent activities in the daily routines of prisoners around the world, yet the spatial significance of these activities in carceral environments has not been deeply investigated. With a focus on the experiences of former federal prisoners in Canada, this paper addresses this scholarly gap by bringing together emerging trends in the literatures on sociology of sport, sports geography, and carceral geography to investigate the complex social meanings of prison sport and exercise. Specifically, we explore the folding of sports space into carceral space, often with the effect of reinforcing violent and exclusionary situations, but which also helps construct alternative spatial and temporal realities. Indeed, our overarching theoretical analysis considers how prisoners use sport to produce space in ways that assert a limited degree of agency over their daily lives and temporarily transcend their unpleasant conditions of confinement. By drawing from diverse theoretical frameworks and literatures, we advance novel arguments about the socio‐spatial significance of sport in prisons and raise some important questions for further research.     

Representing Doi Moi: history,memory and shifting national narratives in late-socialist Vietnam

In late-socialist states, what are the drivers of shifts in national narratives and how can a focus on the museum method reveal the way state institutions construct national myths and nationalist ideologies? This paper addresses these questions by focusing on a behind-the-scenes ethnography of an exhibition celebrating 30 years of Doi Moi – the economic reform period in Vietnam that commenced in 1986. Focusing on the museum as method – the process of documenting how curators deliberate over labels, objects, photos and so forth – the paper analyses how national narratives are authored and transformed through curatorial exchanges and expert forums. By focusing on how aesthetics and achievement provide a foundation for inclusive interpretative strategies that integrate official histories alongside personal memories, this paper reflects on the alienating effects of official histories in state institutions and the strategies by which people appropriate these to reclaim their past.     

The sporting world and the human heart: Ireland, 1880–1930

ABSTRACT

In the years between 1880 and 1920, tens of thousands of Irishmen and women played sport in Ireland. Some lived to play, others dabbled as they desired; some devoted their lives to one sport, others sought to participate in as many sports as they could. This article examines what motivated people to join the expanding world of clubs and associations, of matches and races. It assesses why they joined the particular clubs and associations that they joined, or played the particular games that they played. Further, the article explores how such choices were defined (or refined) by such factors as the influence of ideology and tradition, class and gender, commerce and geography, education and employment. Ultimately, it considers the extent to which the sporting choices of people were shaped by the straightforward pursuit of pleasure.     

Hegemony Contests: Challenging the Notion of a Singular Canadian Hockey Nationalism

ABSTRACT

Sports media, athletes, and the public alike have framed Canadian professional men’s hockey as an important symbol of the nation as a whole, while scholars have devoted considerable energy to pointing out that this celebrated hockey symbol tends to marginalize those in Canada who are not white, male, straight, and/or able-bodied. Yet various linguistic, racial, and ethnic minorities play and celebrate hockey in Canada, and indeed use hockey to express their own subordinated nationalisms. Their styles of play and the meanings they bring to the game have issued counter-hegemonic challenges to white, male, Anglo-Canadian hockey hegemony. Exploring the “hockey nationalisms” of Indigenous, Québécois, Acadian, and Central/Eastern European populations as case studies, this article argues for a reconsideration of Canadian hockey nationalism from below.     

Ideological others and national identifications in contemporary Poland

Sexual minorities in Poland are excluded from the traditional understanding of “Polishness” premised on conservative, Catholic values. This article examines how ethnic Polish citizens who identify as non‐heteronormative navigate their relationship to “Polishness” at a moment of heightened nationalism. Through 31 interviews with Polish sexual minorities, I show that while national identification is a struggle for some sexual minorities, others work to reframe what “Polishness” means to them. I argue for further research examining the ways that stigmatised members of the ethnic majority—what I term ideological others—understand and navigate their relationship to national identity. The study contributes to the literature on everyday nationhood and national identity by attending to national identification among stigmatised members of the ethnic majority.     

Public and private: national identities in a Scottish Borders community*

Abstract. This paper is an exploration of national identities among sports people in a community in the Scottish Borders. This group experiences a split in their identities. Publicly, they are ascribed an ambiguous national identity by the surrounding national communities. Privately, and among fellow community members, they unambiguously assert national identity. This paper examines the way this split is managed, arguing that the performance of public ambiguity is expected, but is supported by the private performance of nationality. National identity is analysed specifically as a performance, and sport is the context in which this performance takes place.     

Water,skin and touch: migrant bathing assemblages

This paper offers a contribution to cultures of urban water research through household ethnographies conducted with 16 participants who migrated from Burma to Sydney, Australia. We draw on a strand of corppreal feminism and offer the concept of bathing assemlbages to interpet how watery skin encounters provide clues to how participants washed themselves in their ‘home’ country may presist, transform or stop. Our analysis maps how dimensions of the self (ethical, gender, class, ethnic, national faith and others) are constituted by, and generative of, the felt intensities of watery encounters through different bathing assemblages. This paper illustrates how bathing practices are shaped as much by emotional and affective intensities as by reasoned activity. We show the utility of corporeal feminism not only for theorising subjectivity, but also for household sustainability politics.     

NARRATORS OF THE ARCTIC: IMAGES AND MOVEMENTS IN NORTHLAND NARRATIVES

While the use of public policy to construct a Canadian identity has been established in the literature, what is less well understood is whether national identity, once established, might shape Canadians' feelings about these same public policies. This article examines the extent to which citizens' national identities influence their pride in Canada's social security system, and how this relationship may be changing over time. Using data from the International Social Science Programme's 1995 and 2003 National Identity Modules, the article argues that citizens' national identities help explain the contours of social security attitudes in Canada, and that this relationship persists despite significant policy change in the field. Additionally, the paper suggests that political actors may successfully increase public support for their social security policies by “framing” them in ways that appeal to citizens' definitions of Canada.     

Globalisation and Singaporean transmigration: re-imagining and negotiating national identity

Within the context of globalisation that confronts the world today, I aim in this paper to illustrate one particular state's attempts at constructing a `nation' amidst efforts to encourage its citizens to globalise, actions which are ostensibly, or at least, potentially, contradictory; and to analyse how these citizens who became transmigrants construct and negotiate their sense of `nation' and national identity. Specifically, my empirical questions centre on Singaporean transmigrants working in China. I ask the following questions. What happens to the sense of national identity among Singaporeans and their relationship with the `nation' when confronted with transnational conditions? What are the forces that impinge on the on-going construction of community and (re)construction of national identity amongst Singaporeans? What are the implications for a young state in its attempts at nation-building? This paper examines how the Singapore state continually attempts to establish the boundaries of the nation-state through hegemonic, policy and strategic actions. From the perspective of individuals, transnational location enhances their sense of national identity rather than its demise, leading to assertions of `Singaporeaness' and rootedness. I present empirical evidence that physical presence in a territory is not a necessary condition for a feeling of nationhood, and examine how Singaporeans maintain this sense of national identity through their everyday actions.     

Regional Exchange Rate Indexes for the United States

In this paper we construct exchange rate indexes for the nine U.S. Bureau of the Census regions. The results indicate there are nontrivial differences between them and an identically created overall U.S. exchange rate index. The national index is cointegrated with only two of these regional indexes, and in a Granger sense, it is causing one regional index. In addition, our results indicate that two of the regional exchange rate indexes are interchangeable with the national index. These results show that researchers investigating how exchange rate changes affect regional exports or regional economic growth should be cautious in making inferences based upon a national exchange rate index.     

(Troubling) spaces of mountains and men: New Zealand's Mount Cook and Hermitage Lodge

In this paper we trace one pervasive expression of hegemonic New Zealand national identity that developed around the sport of mountaineering from the 1880s, culminating in Sir Edmund Hillary's historic first climb of Mount Everest in 1953. The image of the masculine mountaineering hero, developed on and around New Zealand's highest peak, Mount Cook, is, however, inherently unstable, and we focus on two sites of potential disruption. First, we examine the experiences of white mountaineering women on Mount Cook. These women both embraced the masculinist identity of hero and destabilized it. Women's mountaineering points to the active and complex construction (rather than simple reproduction) of imperialisms, nationalisms and masculinities. Second, we examine the role played by the Hermitage Lodge situated at the base of Mount Cook. Narratives about mountaineering too often ignore the huts, lodges, the places of staying behind. The roles performed by women (and some men) who never had the opportunity and/or the desire to climb but instead 'kept the home fires burning' and supported the efforts of others can be examined as a way of productively challenging the entrenchment of national identity around the masculine mountaineering hero.     

‘Brazil,Tell Me How It Feels’: Soccer,Music, Narcissism,and the State,or Mascherano’s Failure

During Brazil's 2014 World Cup finals, Argentine fans popularized a chant that stated “Brazil, tell me how it feels”. The chant became viral, and produced a Brazilian response, “Argentina, me diz que se sente”: both discussed relationship of rivalry by joking at the other's expenses. But it was surprising that the chant was based on the melody of a very old song from the American rock band Creedence Clearwater Revival, recorded in 1969, possibly before the birth of those who sang the melody in Brazil (“Bad Moon Rising”, a very popular song recorded many times). This paper discusses several topics derived from that fact: the relationship between popular music and football chants; the uses of popular music and global pop at the World Cups from 1962 to our days; the self-presentation of the “local” (national) fans before a globalized media scene; and, last but not least, the role of sport icons and heroes for the fans but also for the construction of national epics (the icons and heroes invoked in the chants included, obviously, both Maradona and Messi, two of the most important football heroes from the ‘80s until today). The core idea is to show how contemporary football culture must be described and interpreted in the continuous intersection of local texts -and fans’ practices- and global events.     

Sport,National Identity and Public Policy

Abstract. The paper examines the use made of sport by governments to help manage identity. It begins with an exploration of the relationship between sport and ethnic culture and continues with an analysis of the ways in which sports can be used to aid the state and achieve its objectives of legitimacy, territorial integrity, and citizen commitment. This introduction is followed by an examination of the particular problems of identity faced by Canada, Ireland and Britain and the sports policies adopted by the governments of the countries is evaluated. It is concluded that while sport possesses a powerful symbolism that can be exploited on occasion to great effect, the malleability of sports symbolism often undermines its capacity to exert a lasting effect on national identity.     

Mapping coexistence in Italy: Reshaping the cartographic feelings of the plural nation

Rarely considered from the perspective of ordinary citizens as opposed to institutional actors, national maps have been primarily deconstructed as abstract tools of power that express nationalist agendas. This paper offers an alternative examination of the map as a performative tool of national pluralism. In tune with the most recent conceptualizations of everyday forms of nationhood, I explore multiple creative auto-cartographies of Italy as experiential images for investigating the coexistence of several senses of nationhood and cultural diversity. To this end, I combine an inductive visual content analysis of nearly three hundred remappings of Italy, uploaded online by readers of a popular national newspaper, La Repubblica, with a visual semiotic reading of six samples. Here, the playful idea of remapping the nation becomes a catalyst to produce or resist a sense of belonging to the nation, while eliciting a wider spectrum of feelings with regard to internal and external perceived meaningful others. This paper concludes that the different ways in which ordinary people map the nation have to be taken seriously, as they show evidence that these readers absorb and decode, but also resist or challenge, different mainstream discourses regarding the idea of nationality, coexistence, and cultural diversity.     

Whither Britishness? English and Scottish people in Scotland*1

Abstract. National identity, and especially what being British means, appears to have become more problematic in recent years. Our research on national identity over the last decade suggests that people regularly construct Britishness in quite diverse ways. This article focuses on ‘territorial’ identity and points to the limits of conventional survey work on national identity. It also explores how different conceptions of Britishness are developing within Scotland and England. Differences also emerge within the group of Scots‐born nationals, as well as English‐born migrants in Scotland, as the latter come to reassess how they construct Britishness, given the new context in which they find themselves. To assume one uniform, explicit meaning of Britishness is, in short, highly problematic.     

拔河源自楚地考据

拔河作为一项游戏和运动,其历史之悠久,流行之广泛,是其他许多运动项目所不及的。然而, 关于拔河运动的发源地,至今未有定论。本文联系韩国文化与楚文化的关系,并考据中日韩三国大型拔河运动的形式、特点与功能,认为这项古老的运动源自我国荆楚大地的襄阳、江陵一带。楚国的“牵钩”,作为楚军配合水战的一种军事技能,不仅具备了后来韩日等国拔河运动的要素,也是世界上最早用文字记录下的拔河运动,后世的拔河即由此演变而来。     

Gandhi and le gandhisme: Writing Indian Decolonisation and the Appropriation of Gandhi 1919–48

This article considers developments in French sport in the period 1998-2002, with particular emphasis on the social representation of performances by the nation's elite athletes in international competitions. It opens with the victory of the home side in the France 98 football World Cup and closes with the defeat of the national team in the 2002 edition of that same competition. The various attempts made both before and after France 98 to use sport as a means of promoting social inclusion and national solidarity, particularly as regards hitherto alienated young males from ethnic minorities (especially those of North African origin), are considered against this background. In order to place such developments in context, attention is also given to changes in patterns of sports participation and spending among the general French population. The article concludes with a brief survey of some recent intellectual critiques of this newfound national enthusiasm for sports.     

Listing and protecting culturally significant events: intangible cultural heritage and policy considerations for hockey broadcasting in Canada

ABSTRACT

Listed events are policies enacted by states to protect the free-to-air rights of specific television and radio broadcasts that are identified as being of particular national significance. Some states (including the UK, Belgium, and Argentina) have begun to adopt these listed events policies, typically regarding significant national sporting events. We re-conceptualize listed events as a practical means by which to protect the intangible cultural heritage of states – an issue addressed by international institutions such as ICOMOS and UNESCO. Furthermore, we engage in a critical analysis regarding both the merits and potential problems involved in the possibility of Canada adopting listed broadcasting events policies, specifically involving hockey broadcasts.