The idea of community and belonging has always seemed like a straight cut notion to me; however, I have never questioned or thought critically about my community or even examined the different types of communities to which I belong. When I used to think of "community", I immediately thought of the town (place) where I resided all of my life. There is the community town hall, the community centre (which houses a variety of activities), community parks, community churches and community sports fields. I think of these spaces as very geographical and as places where anyone in the community can go to participate; however, now that I really think about these spaces, there are issues of "belonging" surrounding each of them. For example, although churches promote welcoming new members, one needs to identify with the institutional practices/beliefs in order to belong. For the sports fields, one must be able to play sports (i.e. talent-based, financially-able etc.) in order to participate in these communities. Therefore, there seem to be a lot of sub-communities within what I thought was the overarching community - but now I know I should be rethinking my unexamined notion of "community" and explore the different ways in which some community members may be excluded from these sub-communities.
Going further with the sports example, I think the realm of sports is one of the most poignant ways of creating, and making visible the values of community and belonging. In his article on belonging, author David Morley speaks about three spaces: physical space, spaces of belonging and communities. I think the subject of sports can work in all three spaces. As Darin Barney briefly noted in his article, the hockey rink can be a physical space where people come together to create a place of belonging. 
Together, these spaces can house the hockey community, which can include players, coaches, family and other members of the community who watch/help out with gameplay. I played baseball for 8 years and although it was not my favourite pastime, I enjoyed playing on a team with other girls my age and feeling like I belonged somewhere/to something. For example, if we won a game, we all shared the pride; if we lost a game, we all bore the sadness together. We learned to work together because baseball is a game that cannot be played individually; consequently, learning to work together helped us foster a camaraderie, which flowed into other communities (i.e. high school). All in all, I think sports is a great way to draw a variety of people together and experience a sense of pride and belonging to make visible the characteristics of community.
In reading this blog post, I realized that many communities are not inclusive. As Erin mentioned, there are many preconditions that come with being able to be a part of a community. It is hard to believe that something so important to my life may not be able to be experienced by another simply because of preconditions that person does not have. If I wanted to be a part of a Spanish community, I couldn't unless I learned Spanish. Likewise if someone wanted to be a part of our community as grad students they would need to be a grad student. It is interesting how even in trying to define our collectivity we continue to see patterns of segregation.
ReplyDeleteTo some extent, the exclusion of community demonstrates that mobility, or the ability to negotiate between different communities, is a cultural capital, a form of power. But I do believe that those talent-based and financially-abled athlets cannot join the community of youth football players; those male football-players cannot join female football-players' community...So this kind of exclusion is just because the nature of community. Community is not deemed to be inclusive, as far as I am concerned.
ReplyDeleteErin, I do think that the experience of community needs to be externalized in some ways. Big events like sports competitions or festivals are good ways to emphasize the visual existence of a community. And that's why people find facebook a fantastic place to build a community，because there are many marks that can display belongingness to others. Without geographical boundaries, a community is hard to maintain without some visible marks.
ReplyDeleteI have to say that being someone who did not grow up with sports I did feel somewhat excluded when my friends would go away to ringette or soccer tournaments on weekends. I also believe wholeheartedly that youth sports reinforce Foucault's notion of a disciplinary society whereby the body must be disciplined and conditioned in order to perform at an optimal level.
ReplyDeleteI had to, therefore, find another "community" to discipline my body with and that was through the outlet of competitive dancing (6 days a week) this too created a sense of belonging where I felt not only included but part of something somewhat exclusive.