Bodies, Football Jerseys, and Multiple Male Aesthetics through Football in Turkey

Abstract

Football (soccer) jerseys for professional male players are increasingly designed with a tighter, snugger fit. Such design infers a fit male body and a lifestyle, which accompanies, and cultivates such a body. Replica kits, which are manufactured for consumption by fans, often emulate this tight fit but are purchased and worn by bodies that differ substantially from the increasingly valorized fit athlete’s body. This paper discusses the multiple male aesthetics that are produced in the process and through the practice of differing bodies wearing the same garment. I specifically juxtapose the body and the sociality of the disciplined, professional, and fit male footballer to the body of male fans with bellies. I argue that the reverence of a specific fit male body which results in tightening jerseys and which tighter jerseys celebrate, produces the unintended consequence of highlighting less-than-fit bodies and body parts as well as the social practices that yield such bodies through fans’ dressing practices. With an ethnographic focus on Turkey, I demonstrate how the idealization of a specific male body is subverted, albeit unintentionally, by the very forces that create it in the first place.