Life in the (Mediated) Faust Lane

Narratives surrounding the career of former Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson offer a unique site for examining the political and discursive formation of national identity. Focusing on media discourses, this study examines the nature and extent to which a crisis of Canadian identity was constructed, negotiated and, at times, challenged in 1988. More specifically, the analysis (a) locates the discussion of national identity within what Hall identifies as the two dominant ways of conceptualizing identity within contemporary theorizing; (b) provides a context within which to situate the so-called crisis, including the prevailing political, economic and cultural state of the nation; and (c) traces the emerging discourses surrounding the affair to illustrate the various types of `national affective' responses, including oppositional reactions.