A People Apart: Soccer, Identity and Irish Nationalists in Northern Ireland

This article represents one part of a wider research project studying the role sport performs in the construction of identity for Irish nationalists living in Northern Ireland (northern nationalists). A common thread running through this work is the idea that soccer has become entwined in the projection and propagation of Irish identity for nationalists in a way that other sports have failed to achieve as convincingly. The function soccer performs in this regard has been the subject of academic discourse for some time but it was only comparatively recently that a more heterogeneous approach to identity construction in this subject area has been uncovered. Prior to this the principle agency central to this analysis, nationalism, with some notable exceptions, was often crudely defined and poorly thought out. Instead, as this research makes clear, a much more sophisticated approach to the study of nationalism in Northern Ireland is required to examine the full extent and range of identities held by northern nationalists. This study provides a new dimension to this debate by applying a more focused approach to the study of soccer in Northern Ireland. It reveals how nationalists use the game as a medium through which to disclose wider political ambitions, including moves towards Irish unification. However it also recognizes that there exists a sizeable minority of this community for whom so-called 'territorial integrity' is not of immediate concern. As such the extent to which soccer can act as a proxy variable on the part of northern nationalists, principally in demonstrating opposition to the existing social order but also, on occasion, by revealing increasing acceptance of the legitimacy of Northern Ireland, represents a recurring theme throughout this work.