Sport and Nationalism

Please write a historiographical essay of 1600 words, analyzing the literature that I will include, the essay
will be assessed based on the strength and quality of your argument as supported by credible, logical
evidence. Making an argument means that you make an intervention – in other words, that you enter the
conversation with an opinion of your own – among the scholars we have read for the course. Utilizing the
“they say, I say” template, provide an interpretation of the scholarship on the history of African sport and
nationalism to this point in the course and then enter the conversation with this scholarship to stake out
your own position. To the degree that you must summarize, summarize with a point. If you use a source
from outside our course literature, then cite it. But this is not an essay based on literature external to this
course. Instead, your essay must focus on the course literature. Some questions that you may want to
consider include some of those discussed in class. For example:.
• What is a nation? What is nationalism? Are African nations and African nationalisms somehow
different from these standard definitions? Why?
•Why have nationalists used sport and leisure to imagine/create/define African nations in certain ways?
Why were concepts of time and space important to these imaginings/creations/definitions?
•Were African sports colonial inventions? Why or why not?
These are just examples to spur your thinking. But you must formulate a driving question that you plan to
answer with your essay and then answer that question with a thesis statement that succinctly posits your
primary argument. And your thesis should enter into conversation with other literature read for this
course. i.e. It should make an argument.
wk 2: Toby Green, “Africa, in its fullness: Liberating the precolonial history of Africa,” Aeon Essays,
January 2020 (10 p.) https://aeon.co/essays/liberating-the-precolonial-history-of-africa
Dennis Laumann, Colonial Africa, 1884-1994 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), Intro, Chap. 1
and 3.
Martin – Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville
For the Phyllis Martin book Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville, please see the e-book on the
AUC Library website.
wk 3: Akyeampong and Ambler – Leisure in African History–An Introduction, Emmanuel Akyeampong
and Charles Ambler, “Leisure in African History: An Introduction,” International Journal of African
Historical Studies 35:1 (2002), 1‐16.
Susann Baller and Scarlett Cornelissen, “Introduction: Sport, Leisure and Consumption inAfrica,” The
International Journal of the History of Sport 30:16 (2013), 1867-1876.
J. A. Mangan, “Soccer as Moral Training: Missionary Intentions and Imperial Legacies,” Soccer and
Society 2:2 (2001), 41‐5
Phil Vasili, “Colonialism and Football: The First Nigerian Tour to Britain,” Race andClass 36:4 (1995),
55‐70.
wk 4: Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism,
Rev. ed. (London; New York: Verso, 2006), 1-46.
Ziad Fahmy, “Media-Capitalism: Colloquial Mass Culture and Nationalism in Egypt, 1908-18,”
International Journal of Middle East Studies 42, no. 1 (February 2010): 83–103.
Laurent Dubois, “The Football Griot,” Africa Is A Country blog, June 27, 2018, accessed at
https://africasacountry.com/2018/06/the-football-griot.
WK5: For the Phyllis Martin book Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville.
WK 7: Phyllis Martin, Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville, 99-126 (Chap. 4: “Football Is King”).
Laura Fair, “Kickin’ It: Leisure, Politics and Football in Colonial Zanzibar, 1900s‐ 1950s,” Africa 67: 2
(1997), 224‐251.
WK 8: Peter Alegi, African Soccerscapes, Chap. 1: “‘The White Man’s Burden’: Football and Empire,
1860s-1919” and Chap. 2: “The Africanization of Football, 1920s/1940s,” 1-13, 14-35, Chap. 3 and Chap.
4