Competitive sport and the construction of place identity in rural Australia

Abstract

Competitive sport is widely mythologized as a central component of Australian rural life, and an essential ingredient in the socio-cultural identity of places. This essay explores the role of competitive sport in the construction of such identities, focussing on the way in which local narratives, practices and symbols are used to build an apparently shared ‘sense of place’. Drawing on a case study of two rural areas in Western Australia, the essay demonstrates that sport does indeed contribute to the formation of place identity through diverse local and regional social interactions, practices and memories. Central to this are the symbolic boundaries and sense of difference that sport creates with neighbouring towns, and the social bonds created within place. However, the essay also highlights the contested and exclusionary dimensions of sport as a building block of local identity. Rather than contributing to a unified and egalitarian sense of local identity, sporting narratives and practices exclude a range of hidden or marginalized ‘others’.