‘From there to here’: narratives of transition, migration and national identity in Irish media representations of rugby union in the professional era

Abstract

Irish media representation of rugby union in the post-1995 professional era has become a vehicle for the rehearsal of fantasies and anxieties concerning national identity in the context of the Republic of Ireland as a neoliberal state. Irish rugby’s reorganization and competitive successes have generated comforting images and discourses of centralized management, national cohesion and continuity while successive Irish governments’ neoliberal policies have focused on deregulation, facilitating foreign direct investment and reduced social services spending. Representations of advancements in management intersected with pervasive managerialist discourses in Irish media and politics during and following the 2008 collapse of the Celtic Tiger boom, but with a heavy stress on serving the ‘national interest’. Relatedly, the targeted import of foreign players and coaches is often depicted as reflective of Irish rugby management’s successful negotiation of the neoliberal environment of contemporary European and world rugby. However, concerns regarding the potential hindrance of ‘native’ player/coach development and the threat of economically driven out-migration evince anxieties concerning Irish rugby’s fragile economy and cultural identity that interconnect with broader concerns regarding Ireland’s enduring economic vulnerability following the 2008 financial crisis.

Keywords:

• Ireland
• rugby union
• media representation
• national identity
• migration

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Marcus Free is a lecturer in Media and Communication Studies at Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick. He has published widely on constructions of gender, race and national identity in sport, sport fandom and sport media, and on Irish migration, gender and national identity in contemporary film and television drama.

Notes

1 For readers unfamiliar with Irish rugby, some contextual explanation is necessary. Henceforth, rugby refers to rugby union rather than rugby league. Ireland was partitioned following the war of independence into Northern Ireland, which remained in the United Kingdom, and the independent Irish Free State, later named the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) is an all-island organization whose single national team represents both north and south. The four provinces of Leinster, Munster, Ulster and Connacht currently compete in the Pro 12 league with teams from Wales, Scotland and Italy. Qualifiers from this league compete in the Heineken Cup successor, the European Champions Cup, which is currently dominated by representatives from England and France. Ulster comprises the six counties of Northern Ireland and three counties of the Republic. The provinces compete as clubs but are regionally representative entities that draw players from local feeder clubs and provincial academies. The provinces have only eclipsed the national club competition in popular appeal since the early 2000s.

2 All media, political and social commentaries referenced here were produced and principally circulated within the Republic of Ireland.

3 This tension echoes the variants of nativism and pragmatism expressed by supporters over many years. See, for example, http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=68689582.

4 O’Brien’s Communicorp is the largest shareholder in Ireland’s biggest newspaper group, Independent News and Media, and owns two national radio stations, Today FM and Newstalk – see Irish Independent (2015b).

5 The exhortation to wear the metaphorical ‘green jersey’ in the ‘national interest’ is often used in the Irish business and political spheres (Free, 2013, 222).