Rethinking Postcolonial Worlds through Physical Activities

Abstract

This special issue follows on from an international workshop entitled ‘Postcolonial Bodies’ which was held – in partnership with The International Journal of History of Sport – at the Institute of Sport Studies at the University of Lausanne on 5–6 June 2014. Thanks to the contributions from numerous specialists in the historical and social developments of physical activities in a colonial and postcolonial context, the main objective was to explore the epistemic issues raised by our approach. Why such a theme? Today, input from postcolonial and globalization studies greatly extends the scope for including the subject of ‘sport’ in polysemous analysis of transnational cultures and diasporas. The porous nature of both spatial and political borders is just as present in the development of sporting migration from not only south to north – but also north to south – as they are in the postcolonial transformation of former colonies (Niko Besnier). Moreover, the exploration of such practices before, during, and after decolonization shows that the political split which occurred on independence should also be put into perspective and rethought by looking at the role played by cultural practices – and physical activities – ‘through the colonial mirror’ (Nicolas Bancel), which shows the strong continuities which existed from colonial times to the postcolonial period. The ambivalence of this process which mixes political freedom with forms of intermixing, even acculturation, of the former colonial power’s culture can be identified from the moment modern sports were introduced into the former colonies until the postcolonial development of sport and sporting migration. On the one hand, the analysis of the role played by sport in postcolonial practices and representations of multiculturalism, frontiers, and gender shows the ambivalent nature of their local and international footings. Whilst the standards transmitted by modern sports favoured an individuation of the body, it also opened the door to numerous assertions whether of identity or politics. From South Africa (John Nauright and Benedict Carton) to postcolonial Ireland (Mike Cronin), from an East-West antagonism to a North-South competition (Anais Bohuon), well-known sportsmen and women incarnate the essential dimensions of the sporting postcolonial scene: ethnic and national identities, definition and control of gender, cultural change and hybridation of practices. On that point, one approach of this collection is to be able to gain a better understanding of the practices studied, in vastly different contexts, revealing at the same time a process of reaffirmation of genealogical rules in modern sports – meritocratic values, discipline of the body, competitive habitus – which all contributed to reinforcing