In the Spirit of the Game? Cricket & Changing Notions of Being British in Northern Ireland

This article looks at cricket as a cultural practice that embodies Britishness in Northern Ireland. In general, cricket is mythologically tied to an unchanging, nostalgic vision of quintessential Britishness. As a practice, though, cricket represents varieties of Britishness as well as other identities. In Northern Ireland, being "British" is taken as possessing a specific political position and viewpoint within the context of the sectarian conflict that dominated the sociopolitical realm in the latter half of the twentieth century. The cessation of formal political violence in 1998 not only resulted in increased economic prosperity and investment but also increased immigration to the region. Consequently, alternative, more broadly defined notions of Britishness potentially threaten the entrenched, locally specific understandings. I argue that these new understandings played out against local sensibilities on the cricket pitch represent some of the changes occurring in post-conflict Northern Ireland.