Dr Stuart Whigham

This article critically reflects upon the symbolic role of sport in relation to nationalism and national identity within contemporary Scottish society. Drawing upon an ethnosymbolist theoretical approach, the article discusses: a) the mythology associated with Scottish ‘national sports’; b) the existence of independent Scottish teams; and c) the evocation of ancient Scottish history and warfare within the symbolism of Scottish sport. It underlines the import of sporting issues to ongoing theoretical debates regarding nationalism and national identity in contemporary Scottish society, concluding that ethnosymbolism remains an effective theoretical explanation of the nature of contemporary Scottish nationalism.

The aim of this paper is to consider the relationship between sport and identity formation by examining testimonies of 24 British women who attended The Solheim Cup golf tournament in 2019 to support a transnational team made up of professional European women players. Relatively little is known about the effects of transnational sports teams on identity formation, not least because such teams are themselves rare. The Solheim Cup, contested by teams of female professional golfers representing the United States and Europe, is one such example. The data set consists of interviews with women who attended the competition which took place in a period of political uncertainty between the UK electorate voting to leave the European Union and Brexit actually taking place. The paper analyses the women’s views in relation to national identity, European identity, and cosmopolitanism. Although it emerges that most of the women felt more European in the context of a competition involving a team representing Europe and were opposed to the UK leaving the European Union, they could also be described as cosmopolitan as a result of their educational level, social class and experience of living in or regularly visiting foreign countries.

While a growing body of evidence exists around women fans of men’s sport, less is known about women fans’ perspectives and identities in relation to women’s sport, and what is known tends to focus on homogenous representations of sports fans, rather than a diversity of fan types and follower styles (Pope 2017). Building on the authors’ previous appraisals of the Solheim Cup – the biggest event in women’s golf – this paper examines fan performances of women at the 2019 event in Scotland. Twenty-five white women from the UK/Europe were recruited via social media before, during and after the Solheim Cup, with online interviews taking place in the following days. Using performative sports fandom as a framework the authors seek to examine women fan performances at a major women’s sporting event. The analysis of the interviews resulted in three themes around (1) friendship, care, and connection, (2) negotiated fan performances and (3) distinctive fan performances. While it must be acknowledged that this is a homogenous group of fans, it is hoped that this research will add to the understanding of the diversity and complexity of fan identities.

In 2019, Scotland played host to the Solheim Cup, a competition contested by leading women professional golfers representing Europe and the United States. The event was given further political significance by the fact that it took place in the same year as the United Kingdom left the European Union against the wishes of the majority of Scots who had voted in the 2016 referendum on EU membership.  This paper examines the significance of the 2019 Solheim Cup with specific reference to the quasi-mythical status of golf in Scotland and the use of sports events by the Scottish Government and the organisation responsible for Scotland’s tourism strategy, VisitScotland, to enhance the country’s image and attract visitors, particularly from overseas.  Initially, discussion focuses on the historical roots of golf in Scotland, and its quasi-mythical claim to be the ‘Home of Golf’, a key motif in the nation’s sports tourism strategy.  Attention then turns to a critical examination of contemporary sport tourism policy in Scotland, focusing upon the nation’s use of international sporting events as part of this broader strategy.  To this end, we scrutinise the discursive strategies used by Scottish politicians and policymakers in relation to the 2019 Solheim Cup, exploring the extent to which the event effectively tackled the explicit goals of: a) promoting Scottish values; b) demonstrating the nation’s capabilities for hosting sporting events; c) cementing Scotland’s reputation as the home of golf; and, d) tackling socio-economic and gendered inequalities with regards to golf participation in Scotland.

The world of inter-national sport, defined as sport that involves athletes competing for ‘their’ country against athletes from another country (Gleaves and Llewellyn, 2014), is often imbued with notions of national identity and war, although some sports lend themselves more obviously than others to these concepts. For Liston and Kitching (2019, p. 6) however, the sport of golf is unaccustomed to the displays of nationalism that are more commonplace in more combative team sports. This is due to the lack of both direct competition formats and nation versus nation contests in golf, as well as the absence of the physical confrontation that characterises other sports. Golf is generally devoid of flags and nationalistic tendencies and is thus often considered relatively insignificant in inculcating national sentiments, with Steen (2015, p. 349) noting that golf is ‘lacking the passions, physical confrontation and tribal loyalties that underpin mass appeal’. Harris et al (2017) subsequently highlighted how, perhaps unsurprisingly, little research has considered the place of the
nation in relation to golf, with professional golfers playing on global tours defined as ‘borderless athletes’ who transcend national, racial and ethnic borders, de facto sports citizens of the world (Chiba, Ebihara and Morino, 2001). Despite this, Bairner (2003) notes that the sport does have links to identity politics, and there have been instances where professional golfers have taken on cultural significance and become viewed as embodiments of the nation (Kitching and Bowes, 2020; Liston and Kitching, 2019). This paper aims to investigate the print media’s role in connecting golf, this case, women’s, to national identity. More specifically, the paper examines the relationship between golf and national identity, using the 2019 Solheim Cup as a case study and drawing upon the notion of athletes as proxy warriors for their nation. 

Electoral politics is strongly influenced by unfolding events, some of them leading to major shifts in alignment. There has been renewed interest in the ‘floating voter’ in contemporary Europe, not least because of increased electoral support for right-wing political parties. In Scotland, however, the clearest example of realignment is to be found not so much in support for specific political parties, although that should not be ignored, but rather in a shift of sections of the population from UK unionism towards support for Scottish independence, despite the result of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. We explore past contentions from certain authors that the ethno-religious, socioeconomic and political stratification of supporters of the two largest football clubs in Scotland, Celtic and Rangers, may be linked to their personal voting dispositions with regards to the issue of Scottish independence. These past findings are discussed in light of our interviews with fans of Scottish football teams which explore their perceptions of the interconnection between football club support, nationalism, unionism, and political voting in contemporary Scotland.  Our interviewees suggest that the shifting dynamics of contemporary Scottish politics in an era of constitutional evolution has been reflected in shifting political and social affiliations of Scottish football clubs: although the traditional political allegiances of Celtic and Rangers were argued to persist to a degree, consensus emerged that these traditional allegiances have been destabilised by broader political, socioeconomic and ideological developments.  

This article considers the implications for athletes who hold a position as a ‘political symbol’ in the context of the United Kingdom (UK), and specifically Scotland, particularly those who publicly stated their personal political opinions during the periods of the London 2012 Olympic Games and the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. These two major international sporting events were hosted during a period of political upheaval within the UK, evidenced in the return of Conservative-led Westminster governments in 2010, the referendum on Scottish independence in 2014 and the referendum on European Union membership in 2016. English media coverage of the 2012 London Olympic Games revealed a propensity to critically frame ‘Scottish’ athletes, competing in ‘Team GB’, as potential resistors to overt expressions of British nationalism. This centred on Scottish athletes who failed to sing the British national anthem. During the campaign for Scottish independence in 2014, the establishment of the pro-independence ‘Sport for Yes’ group sought to harness sporting issues and personalities in favour of Scottish independence.  In contrast, the pro-union ‘Better Together’ campaign promoted athletes discussing the potential negative impact of Scottish independence on the funding and organisation of Scottish sport. Accordingly, by critically considering the discursive framing of athletes who publicly announce their political positions, this article provides a review of the political significance of such pronouncements amidst a politically fraught UK.

In contemporary British society, discussions of social class have become relatively marginalised in comparison to their historically eminent position within the domains of politics, social policy and, the specific focus of the forthcoming discussion, education.  However, within the specific field of PE and sport, contemporary academic analyses have continued to highlight various class-based inequalities and evidence of social stratification in relation to these areas of education and society (Evans, 2014; Evans & Bairner, 2013; Evans & Davies, 2008, 2014; Horne et al., 2011).  In light of this, this study seeks to explore the extent to which social class and socio-economic status are evident within the provision of PE within 288 English state secondary education schools (11-18 years of age), drawing upon the findings of a large-scale survey of the activities and qualifications offered within the PE curriculum at each sample school.  Using publicly available data on the comparative provision levels of ‘free school meals’ (henceforth FSM) for pupils as an approximate indicator of the relative levels of socio-economic demographics for each sample school, this study seeks to explore how English state schools with contrasting levels of socio-economic deprivation cater for their students within their PE curriculum.  The emergent results revealed some trends in the relative provision levels of certain activities across schools in different FSM quartiles, with activities such as rugby union, rugby league, Gaelic football, tennis, and field hockey demonstrating stratified provision, as was the case for the provision of accredited academic and vocational qualifications in PE and sport.  These complex and nuanced findings are then critiqued by drawing upon a Bourdieusian theoretical conceptualisation of social class, utilising a number of theoretical concepts derived from Bourdieu’s past analyses of education and sport to critically reflect upon the validity of his theoretical claims when applied to this specific data set.

Given the contemporary growth of ‘populist’ political parties and movements in a number of highly-developed democratic states in Europe and North America, there has been a resurgence in academic interest around the various causes for the groundswell of support for political populism. Given this broader political context, this paper explores the interconnection between sport and populist politics in Hungary, with a particular emphasis on the appropriation of sport by ‘right-wing’ populist political actors. In particular, this paper will examine the politics – sport interconnection by discussing Victor Orbán’s, Hungary’s Prime Minister, use of football, and sport more broadly, and the ways in which the Hungarian government have attempted to reinvent a strong nation and national identity through sport and related political populism. These attempts have been influenced by the interaction between forces of Westernisation and the country’s continuing post-communist transition, with the view to (re)inventing the Hungarian nation.

In this essay, we trace the symbolic conundrums of belonging, and of the reconciliation of identities, in the context of Catalan and Scottish sport and politics. Our discussion will commence with a necessarily concise consideration of past academic contentions regarding the national ‘psyches’ which have been argued to shape contemporary notions of identity and politics in Catalonia and Scotland, before turning our attention to the specific role of sport vis-à-vis these ‘psyches’ and the growing clamour for greater political autonomy for each of these stateless nations. Based on evidence drawn from the interaction between sport and politics in the two nations, we argue that secessionism is a liminal field of transformation as it includes what is seen as mutually exclusive sets of relationships (Catalans vs. Spaniards; Scottish vs. British, secessionists vs. unionists/centralists), which at the same time allows subjects to pass from one state to another and occupy them non-exclusively.

This article critically examines the predominant narratives which emanated from party political discourse in relation to the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.  Utilising a methodological approach centring on political discourse analysis (Fairclough and Fairclough 2012), this paper analyses party manifestos and constitutional policy documents produced by the three largest political parties represented in the Scottish Parliament, namely the pro-independence Scottish National Party and two pro-union parties, Scottish Labour and the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party.  The emergent discourse of each party is interrogated by drawing upon pertinent theoretical concepts from previous academic analyses of Scottish nationalism, with particular attention given to those which have deployed modernist and ethnosymbolist theoretical approaches when analysing the Scottish context. This facilitates a critical reflection on the contrasting and nuanced narratives of the Scottish nation’s past and future espoused by each political party vis-à-vis modernist and ethnosymbolist theory, illustrating the ways in which contrasting theorisations of nationalism are empirically tangible within political discourse, and are thus not simply theoretical abstractions.

This article focuses upon two contexts which have arguably received the most academic and media attention with regards to the interconnection between sport and secessionist nationalism, Scotland and Catalonia, given that both ‘submerged nations’ have held public referenda on the topic of independence / secession from the states of the United Kingdom and Spain, respectively. The analysis endeavours to draw parallels between the two contexts in order to critically examine the extent to which similarities and differences are evident in terms of the growth of political nationalism. Finally, the central discussion outlines the extent to which sport contributed to broader political developments in the recent campaigns for the establishment of independent Scottish and Catalan states, focusing upon the actions of prominent sporting personalities and organisations.