Sport in Australian National Identity by Tony Ward

Author:Tony Ward [Ward, Tony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sports & Recreation, General, Cultural & Social Aspects
ISBN: 9781317987659
Google: 6pHaAAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-09-13T04:50:30+00:00

Sports and the national vision

Towards the end of 1876, the Sydney Morning Herald saw Ned Trickett's sculling victory in broad terms:

Those who wish New South Wales to be well known throughout the United Kingdom … will rejoice because this contest will be a better advertisement for the colony than the entire edition of any possible Government handbook.67

Similarly broad claims have been made about racing and cricket, most notably in establishing a sense of Australian identity. One MP went so far as to comment in 1886 that the Melbourne Cup was ‘achieving Federation in one respect’.68 And when Australia won the 1897–98 Ashes series, The Bulletin argued that the victory did ‘more to enhance the cause of Australian nationality than could be achieved by miles of erudite essays and impassioned appeal’.69

Certainly a powerful image was being created. Cricket victories over England encouraged both massive crowds to games and a wider take up of the sport by participants. The backers of scullers stressed their ‘Australian’ heroes in marketing forthcoming contests. But earlier papers have demonstrated that people have a range of reasons for coming along to sports events – and that nationalism itself is multi-hued. The accounts of these early sports have noted the differing agendas involved in developing and organizing the sports – and some of the constraints on people wishing to adopt particular agendas.

The next paper provides more detail on the different visions of sport in Australia around 1900, when the new country was already gaining accolades (and also criticisms) for being this ‘sporting people’.

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