FOOTBALL AS A PROCESS OF IDENTIFICATION |
Glasgow
Football clubs form identities. There are the Jewish clubs, Tottenham and Ajax, who historically have had large numbers of Jewish supporters and whose supporters have become known as yids. In this instance there is a level of Jewish identification that exists between a Spurs or Ajax supporter and the idea of being Jewish, that is by supporting Spurs or Ajax one becomes aware of the club as being ‘Jewish’ and adapts subconsciously to that idea in order to conform to the idea of the club. The football club’s identity is created by its fan base which then becomes part of the identity of the club on a deeper level which then forces a club’s future supporters to adhere too. This is the basis of the identification process of football in which an individual identity is subjugated to a collective idea of identity.
For example after a series of goalkeeping errors by Artur Boruc against Northern Ireland in a world cup qualifying match legendary Polish keeper Jan Tomaszewski insisted that Boruc was being punished by God for starting a religious war in Glasgow. Boruc, from Catholic Poland plays for Celtic, a club with a strong Catholic identity. Boruc frequently makes the sign of the cross whilst playing against Celtic’s Protestant rival club, Rangers. Both Glasgow Celtic and Glasgow Rangers become two symbolic outlets for the deeply ingrained sectarian religious identities of Scotland. They make visible the divisions in society by becoming easily identifiable semiotic devices for the conflict.
This relates to a system theatrical identification; literature, theatre, poetry, the arts in general all act as ways for us pose ontological questions to ourselves. Specifically they work through the examination of roles and events that then cause us to consider our identity and how it changes over time. For example Shakespeare’s ontological questioning in Hamlet is naturally different from Beckett’s in Waiting for Godot. In football though we have a subjugation of questions of identity, for the purity of a moment of collective anonymity as a spectator who is never forced to question religious or political affiliation, only to accept every victory and defeat as a facet of a great cultural struggle. Identity is formed on the level of the communal, not on the ontological.
