Social structure and the imagined mobility of youth football athletes in Dakar

Abstract

Across Dakar are many small football training centres where youth prospects start what could grow into professional careers. At these centres, imaginations of career and social mobility develop. In this paper, I explore the mobility imaginations of the youth athletes. I argue that the imaginations are shaped by existing social and class structures, and that the imaginations among the athletes from poor and working-class backgrounds are predominantly unidimensional. Such imaginations that construct mobility exclusively along a career in football produce barriers to the social mobility that the athletes strive for, thereby, reinforcing the structures of social immobility.

Keywords:

• African football migration
• imagined mobility
• social mobility
• social immobility
• unidimensional imagination of mobility

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the athletes and the training centres for sharing their experiences. Special thanks to Dr. Saliou Dione of Cheikh Anta Diop University of Dakar for his immeasurable role in my research stay in Dakar and Mr. Mamadou Diop for his assistance in the field. I thank Prof. Dr. Ansgar Thiel for his critical reviews and also extend my gratitude to the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by a scholarship grant from the BMBF/DAAD-funded Thematic Network Project ‘Futures under Construction in the Global South.’