‘I was content just staying within my own circle’: interrogating the relationship between sport and acculturation among Chinese international students at a Canadian university

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study is to understand the sport and physical activity experiences of Chinese international students within a large Canadian public university in Toronto, Canada. This aim was addressed by conducting semi-structured interviews with nine Chinese international students enrolled at this university and analyzing the data through acculturation theory. The study found that sport was primarily utilized for helping participants maintain connections to their culture; an outcome of the acculturation process classified as separation (Berry, 2005), by helping them build a sense of community with fellow Chinese international students. We argue that creating such spaces for sport participation was instrumental to helping the participants navigate the dominant campus culture. Although there was also some evidence that sport created opportunities for the participants to interact with Canadian students, they experienced institutional and cultural challenges that prevented them utilizing sport to connect with, and feel a part of the broader university community. Based on these findings, we argue that sport can potentially be a useful tool for international students to maintain connections to their cultural community, though this is dependent on the demographics of such a community within each individual university campus. And while sport is often promoted as an effective tool for integration amongst international students, engaging in sport or physical activity with domestic students does not, on its own, result in the achievement of such goals and is insufficient without accounting for broader cultural challenges and barriers.

KEYWORDS:

• Acculturation
• sport
• international students
• internationalization
• belonging
• post-secondary education

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).