‘Diasporic Otherness’: racism, sectarianism and ‘national exteriority’ in modern Scotland

Abstract

This article examines the twin problems of racism and sectarianism in Scotland, exploring everyday experiences of them, the geographical bases of their production and their relationship to the wider Scottish society. I use qualitative interview and ethnographic research from Scotland, carried out in 2001, to examine these issues, arguing that they can be usefully considered together, within a framework focusing on diasporic belonging, hybridity and difference. These areas help uncover the positionalities of the groups involved, relative to each other and to Scotland, as well as the processes through which different minority groups are Othered and exteriorized whilst simultaneously (if differentially) embedded within Scottish/British society. Referring these issues to the ongoing political processes in post-devolution Scotland, ambivalences of belonging and desire can be identified which serve to complicate diasporic identities, which make both problems particularly intractable, and which pose questions for the construction of an inclusive ‘civic’ identity in Scotland.

Keywords:

• racism
• sectarianism
• identity
• diaspora
• hybridity
• Scotland

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of this paper was given as a seminar at the Department of Geography, University of Cambridge: I wish to express my thanks to those who provided useful feedback on that occasion. I would also like to thank Gerry Kearns and Rafe Blandford for their helpful comments on this paper, Dale Duddridge for a discussion on the idea of ‘national exteriority’, and two anonymous referees for their advice. Most thanks go to the interviewees whose words form such an important part of this article. I hope I have been able to represent their views as faithfully as they were originally expressed.

Notes

1. Where excerpts from interviews are used, they are followed by a brief description of the interviewee, using my respondents' own words regarding self-definition.

2. East: Bravehearts and Bhangras (originally broadcast on BBC2, 23 August 1999).

3. This division is not set in stone, though. Some supporters profess no faith, or consider religion and football to have minimal connection. As far as players are concerned, Mo Johnstone created shockwaves in the 1980s when he became the first Catholic player to sign for Rangers. Many supporters (on both sides) were not impressed.

4. Indeed, a report into the ‘Tartan Army’, the fans who follow the Scottish national football team, found that disproportionately few members support Rangers or Celtic as league clubs (BBC News 2000). Given the dominance of these two teams in domestic football, it suggests that many follow football purely for the religious connection, having national loyalties elsewhere.

5. Rangers (like many football clubs) has also suffered from racism among its supporters. For example, the racist chants and the throwing of bananas at (Rangers' own) black player Mark Walters in the 1990s, and the fact that outside Ibrox on match day is one of the few places in Scotland where the BNP openly sell their newspapers (Wood 2000).