Social inclusion through football fandom: opportunities for learning-disabled people

Abstract

In Britain, within the contemporary drive of using sport to tackle the isolation of socially excluded groups, association football (football) fandom has been implicated in many policy documents as a possible site for learning-disabled people to become more socially included. However, whilst there is some evidence of the benefits of playing football for learning-disabled people, there is little evidence to support these claims. Drawing on empirical data, this paper aims to provide a critical analysis of the opportunities to tackle social exclusion that football fandom provides to learning-disabled people. Evidence suggests that whilst football fandom offers social benefits to learning-disabled people – including a sense of belonging and a shared social identity – that go some way towards tackling their social exclusion, football fandom is unlikely to result in the ‘social inclusion’ characterized by the government.

Notes

^1.Devlieger, ‘From Handicap to Disability’.

^2.MENCAP, ‘What is a Learning Disability?’

^3.Hall, ‘Spaces of Social Inclusion’.

^4.MacIntyre, Learning Disability and Social Inclusion.

^5. Ibid.

^6.Baron, ‘Social Capital in British Politics’.

^7.Social Exclusion Unit, Preventing Social Exclusion, 109.

^8.Department of Health (DH), Valuing People.

^9.DH, Valuing People Now, 11.

^10.Labonte, ‘Social Inclusion/Exclusion’.

^11.Secker et al., Mental Health, Social Inclusion.

^12.Putnam, Bowling Alone.

^13.Collins et al., Sport and Social Inclusion.

^14.Waring and Mason, ‘Opening Doors’; Vermeulen and Verweel, ‘Participation in Sport’.

^15.The FA, Football for Disabled People.

^16.The FA, Disability Football Strategy.

^17. , Football for All.

^18. Ibid.

^19.Tacon, ‘Football and Social Inclusion’.

^20.Collins and Buller, ‘Social Exclusion’.

^21.Southby, ‘Football Fandom’.

^22.Solish, Minnes and Kupferschmidt, ‘Integration of Children’.

^23.The FA, Disability Football Strategy.

^24. , Football for All.

^25.Brown et al., Football and Its Community.

^26.Patterson and Pegg, ‘Serious Leisure’.

^27.Fawcett and Hearn, ‘Researching Others’.

^28.Bauer and Aarts, ‘Corpus Construction: A Principle for Qualitative Data Collection’.

^29. See Bryman 2008.

^30.Cleaver, Ouellette-Kuntz and Sakar, ‘Participating in Intellectual Disability’.

^31.Williams, ‘Researching Together’.

^32. Ibid.

^33.Baxter, ‘Learning to Interview’.

^34.Morris, ‘Including All Children’.

^35.Munford et al., ‘Looking Inside the Bag’.

^36.Cleaver, Ouellette-Kuntz and Sakar, ‘Participating in Intellectual Disability’.

^37.Walmsley, ‘Normalisation, Emancipatory Research’.

^38.Stalker, ‘Some Ethical and Methodological Issues’.

^39.Booth and Booth, ‘In the Frame’.

^40.Stalker, ‘Some Ethical and Methodological Issues’.

^41.Charmaz, ‘Grounded Theory’.

^42. ; Strauss and Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research.

^43.Strauss and Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research, 267.

^44.Fawbert, ‘Gentrification of Football Fandom’.

^45.Weed, ‘Pub as a Virtual Football Fandom Venue’.

^46.Brown et al., Football and Its Communities.

^47.Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans, and Flaneurs’; Williams, Is It All Over?

^48.Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans and Flaneurs’, 231.

^49. Ibid.

^50. Ibid., 231.

^51.Williams, Is It All Over? 35.

^52.Robson, No One Likes Us.

^53.Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans and Flaneurs’.

^54.Burton and Kagan, ‘Decoding Valuing People’, 305.

^55.Buttimer and Tierney, ‘Patterns or Leisure Participation’.

^56.Fawbert, ‘Gentrification of Football Fandom’.

^57.Frey, Buchanan and Sandt, ‘I'd Rather Watch TV’.

^58.Sen, ‘Disability & Justice’.

^59.Weed, ‘Pub as a Virtual Football Fandom Venue’.

^60.Penny and Redhead, ‘We're Not Really Here’, 757.

^61.Giulianotti, ‘Football and the Politics’; Giulianotti, ‘Scotland's Tartan Army’; Armstrong and Young, ‘Fanatical Football Chants’.

^62.Armstrong and Young, ‘Fanatical Football Chants’; Kytö, ‘We Are the Rebellious Voice’.

^63.Armstrong and Giulianotti, ‘From Another Angle’.

^64.Mathers, ‘Hidden Voices’.

^65.Pinfold, ‘Building Up Safe Havens’; O'Brien, Paying Customers Are Not Enough; Bray and Gates, Community Participation for Adults; Emerson and McVilly, ‘Friendship Activities of Adults’.

^66.Giulianotti, ‘The Sociability of Sport’.

^67.Simmel, ‘The Sociology of Sociability’, 255.

^68. Ibid., 259.

^69.Bray and Gates, Community Participation for Adults.

^70.Giulianotti, ‘The Sociability of Sport’.

^71.Hall, ‘Social Geographies of Learning Disability’; ‘Spaces of Social Inclusion’.

^72.Maffesoli, The Time of the Tribes, 76.

^73.Crabbe, ‘Post Modern Community’, 436.

^74.Sen, ‘Disability & Justice’.

^75.Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans and Flaneurs’; Weed, ‘Exploring the Sport Spectator’.

^76.Burton and Kagan, ‘Decoding Valuing People’.

^77.Devine and Parr, ‘Come On In but Not Too Far’, 402.

^78.Stone, The Role of Football.

^79.Giulianotti, ‘Football and the Politics’; Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans and Flaneurs’; Robson, No One Likes Us; Armstrong and Harris, ‘Football Hooligans’.

^80.Robson, No One Likes Us.

^81. Ibid., 9.

^82.Stone, The Role of Football.

^83.Hall, ‘Spaces of Social Inclusion’.

^84.Stone, ‘The Role of Football’.

^85.Hall and Hewson, ‘The Community Links’.

^86.Crabbe, ‘Post Modern Community’.

^87. Ibid., 436.

^88.Robson, No One Likes Us, 9.

^89.Crabbe, ‘Post Modern Community’, 436.

^90.Stebbins, Amateurs, Professionals, and Serious Leisure; ‘Serious Leisure’; ‘Serious Leisure for People’.

^91.Patterson and Pegg, ‘Serious Leisure’, 390.

^92.Giulianotti, ‘Supporters, Followers, Fans and Flaneurs’; Crabbe, ‘Post Modern Community’; Millward, Getting ‘into’ Europe.

^93.Stebbins, Amateurs, Professionals, and Serious Leisure, 3.

^94.McGill, Developing Leisure Identities.

^95.Patterson and Pegg, ‘Serious Leisure’.

^96.Buttimer and Tierney, ‘Patterns of Leisure Participation’.

^97.Rojek, ‘Leisure and Emotional Intelligence’.

^98.Burchardt, ‘Capabilities and Disability’.

^99.Sandvoss, Fans: The Mirror of Consumption; Clark, I'm Scunthorpe ‘til I die’; Crabbe, Fishing for Community.

^100.Lesseliers, Van Hove and Vanderveld, ‘Regranting Identity’.

^101.Giulianotti, ‘Popular Culture, Social Identities’.

^102.Sibley, Geographies of Exclusion, 61.

^103.Goble, The Third Force, 30.

^104.Parr, Mental Health and Social Space; Hall, ‘Spaces of Social Inclusion’.

^105.Robson, No One Likes Us, 9.

^106.Goble, The Third Force, 30.