![Sample our Sports and Leisure journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5949/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Sports-Leisure.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
In 2016 women-only swimming sessions targeting Muslims made the headlines in the Danish media, precipitating great discussion about whether such sessions contributed to or impeded social integration. This article focuses on the debate in the city council of Aarhus concerning women-only swimming activities that had existed for 10 years and had been well attended. Yet, after a year of discussion, the city council voted for a municipality-wide ban on women-only swimming during public opening hours. The popularity and longevity of the sessions pose the question: Why and how has women-only swimming become a ‘problem’, in other words a leisure time physical activity that challenges current discourses on immigration and integration? The debate on women-only swimming is an interesting case to study as it testifies not only to an increasing focus on the civic integration of ethnic minorities, including their leisure practices, but also to strong resistance by the general public and the women affected. Drawing on a postcolonial feminist perspective, our analysis shows how perceptions of Danishness, gender equality and non-religious leisure become central arguments in the debate, pointing to various ways in which understandings of gender, sexuality, ethnicity, religion and nation intersect in the current restrictive politics of belonging.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. The Liberal Party, ‘Venstre’ in Danish, is the largest centre-right party in Denmark.
2. With around 270,000 inhabitants, Aarhus is the second-largest city in Denmark. Aarhus Municipality has around 330,000 inhabitants.
4. According to the municipal department ‘Sport and Leisure’, 60–100 paying guests attended women-only swimming sessions at Gellerup pool every week. In the particularly popular winter months some women were denied entry due to a maximum capacity of 100 guests.
5. In 2005, a Danish newspaper published a series of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (the most controversial caricature portraying the prophet as a terrorist with a bomb in his turban), which caused great outrage around the world. In Denmark, the controversy sparked a fierce debate about the limits of freedom of expression.
6. Accordingly, the police may confiscate asylum seekers’ assets worth more than 10,000DKK (ca. 1300€) to cover their stay. After criticism from international organisations, items of sentimental value such as wedding rings were exempted.
7. This anti-ghetto plan comprises a range of controversial measures such as a doubling of the sentences for crimes committed in so-called ghetto areas or obligatory daycare for children 1 year or older living in these areas (otherwise parents lose child benefits).
8. In Danish politics, the Liberal Party, the Danish People’s Party, the Conservative Party, the Liberal Alliance and the Christian Democrats are classified as right-wing parties, whereas the Social Democrats, the Danish Social Liberal Party, the Socialist People’s Party, the Alternative and the Red-Green Alliance are referred to as left-wing parties. However, in the debate about gender-segregated swimming sessions in Aarhus only the Danish Social Liberal Party and the Red-Green Alliance supported women-only swimming.
9. Scholars like Walseth and Strandbu (Citation2014) have pointed out that Islam is not merely about religious obligations but also comprises embodied and reflexive practices. However, when referring to ‘Islam’ in this article, we refer to the dominant political discourse on Islam in Denmark that puts a strong focus on religious obligations.
10. Mahmood (Citation2005, Citation2009) and Fernando (Citation2010) understand ‘secularism’ as not simply the separation between church and state but as a form of governance of religious life. Hence, a secular society does not plainly banish religion from its law and politics, but rather establishes a set of regulatory practices (e.g. Turkey’s and France’s ban of the veil).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Verena Lenneis
Verena Lenneis is a sport sociologist and works as an assistant professor at the Department of Health Science and Technology at Aalborg University, Denmark. She is a qualitative researcher focusing in particular on the intersections between gender, ethnicity and social class.
Sine Agergaard
Sine Agergaard is a social anthropologist and works as a professor at the Department of Health Science and Technology at Aalborg University, Denmark, where she leads the research group ‘Sports and Social Issues’. She is also a co-founder and currently the head of the ‘International Network for Research in Sports and Migration Issues’ (spomi-net).