Bilbao Catch-22: passions and double binds in soccer madness

Abstract

Through a specific example, this article argues that at the heart of soccer fandom, there are Catch-22 double binds that prevent fans from abandoning their team despite potential physical or psychological violence. The ethnographic locus of my discussion is the Basque Athletic Club of Bilbao in the Spanish Liga. The club's identity rests on two pillars: during its 100 plus years, (1) it has never descended to the second division and (2) it has played with local Basque players only. The localist, ethnicized philosophy of recruitment, I argue, is not only a source of enjoyment, but also of suffering and anxiety: in 2006/2007, the Club was one game away from descending to the second division. This article explores how Athletic fans engaged psychological violence imposed by the double binds of their club's identity. It concludes that its Catch-22s reveal a most important dimension of soccer fandom.

Notes

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^2.Delaney and Madigan, Sports: Why People Love Them!

^3.Vaczi, ‘Subversive Pleasures, Losing Games’.

^4.Glas, Bilbao's Modern Business Elite.

^5.Giulianotti, Football.

^6. Vaczi, ‘Subversive Pleasures, Losing Games’ and Castillo, ‘The Other Basque Subversives’.

^7.Castillo, Play Fresh, Play Local.

^8.Groves, ‘Resisting the Globalization’.

^9.MacClancy, ‘Nationalism at Play’, 192.

^10. Orr is a fictional character, a bomber pilot in Heller's novel.

^11.Heller, Catch-22, 56.

^12. A Mashpee Indian in Clifford, The Predicament of Culture, 281.

^13.MacClancy, ‘Biological Basques, Sociologically Speaking’, 92.

^14. In documentary Around the World with Orson Welles.

^15.Zulaika, Del cromañon al carnaval, 51.

^16. Ibid.

^17. Ibid., Aranzadi, 56.

^18.Humboldt, Researches into the Early Inhabitants.

^19.Gallop, The Book of the Basques.

^20.Ortiz and Mayr, El matriarcalismo vasco.

^21.Caro Baroja, The Basques.

^22. MacClancy, ‘Biologically Basques, Sociologically Speaking’, 117.

^23. Clifford, The Predicament of Culture, 301.

^24.Zulaika, Basque Violence, 7.

^25. Anonymous informant, Personal communication.

^26. Ibid.

^27. Zulaika, Basque Violence, 300.

^28. MacClancy, ‘Biological Basques, Sociologically Speaking’, 104–5.

^29.González Abrisketa, Basque Pelota, 102.

^30. Agiriano, ‘Bixente, el proscrito’. http://www.elcorreo.com/vizcaya/prensa/20070425/politica/bixente-proscrito_20070425.html.

^31. Ibid.

^32. Anonymous blogger, http://www.fotolog.com/samacrew/33808052.

^33. Personal communication.

^34. Interview with Imanol Murua, http://www.berria.info/blogak/imanol/index.php?blog = 10&title = zarra_espultsatua&more = 1&c = 1&tb = 1&pb = 1#comments.

^35.Deia, May 21, 2007.

^36.El Mundo, June 17, 2007.

^37.Deia, June 17, 2007.

^38.Gara, June 16, 2007.

^39. Personal communication.

^40. Ibid.

^41. Ibid.

^42. Ibid.

^43. Ibid.

^44. Ibid.

^45.Deia, June 17, 2007.

^46. Personal communication.

^47. Ibid.

^48. Ibid.

^49.http://www.canalathletic.com/noticias/2012-09-26/somos-distintos-20120926.html.

^50. Giulianotti, Football, 33.

^51.Halliwell, Images of Idiocy, 83.

^52.El Correo, July 2, 2007.

^53.El Correo, July 7, 2007.

^54.El Correo, July 8, 2007.

^55. Deia, July 7, 2007.

^56. Ugarte, El Correo, July 8, 2007.

^57.El Pais, July 8, 2007.

^58. Ugarte, El Correo, July 8, 2007.

^59. Sara Estevez, El Correo, July 3, 2007.

^60. Personal communication.

^61. Ibid.

^62.Žižek, How to Read Lacan, 38.

^63. Personal communication.

^64.Bateson, An Ecology of Mind, 178–9.

^65. Ibid.

^66. Video available on Youtube, titled ‘La iglesia rojiblanca’. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v = 8JV5hEMnuiw.

^67. Personal communication.

^68.Huizinga, Homo Ludens; Bateson, Truth and Method; and Bateson, An Ecology of Mind.

^69.El País, February 4, 2012.