Date: Tue, 25 Jun 1996 11:28:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Greg J. Seigworth" <gseigwor-AT-marauder.millersv.edu>
Subject: D&G and soccer




On Tue, 25 Jun 1996 FC262SAM01-AT-ntu.ac.uk wrote:

> OK it's not D&G but:
> What has Pearce got to do with vile patriotics? The guy was dead wound up cos
> he missed a penalty in the world cup shoot out that put England out and here
> he was in the same situ again with all the past on his shoulders. Cracking
> shot. Also all this sport without nationality business. Boring and totally
> unfeasible. Humans just don't work that way (hears distant rumblings about
> schizoanalysis approaching from all sides). It reminds me of all that non-
> competitive sports musings in the eighties. Kind of oxymoronic.
> Here's to adrenalin rushes and dancing in fountains.
> Simon

Actually, there is a nifty little book on British soccer and the
experience (and seduction) of crowd violence by Bill Buford called _Among
the Thugs_ that I've used, on occasion, to 'unpack' certain bits of D&G
for my undergrads.  In fact, travelling in 'packs' (when is a pack a mob?)
and deterritorializings (and terrorizings) and intensities (etc etc) is
what it is all about.  Buford writes, at one point, "I will not describe
the violence because what I want to depict is this precise moment in its
complete sensual intensity--before chronology allows the moment to evolve 
into its consequences.  What has occurred?  What has happened when a 
crowd goes over the edge--or the cliff ..." (204).  Writing the event, 
where is the battle?, and all that.

And devastatingly insightful about national identity too.  Why should
letting go of national identity suddenly bring about non-competitive
sports?  I've done my share of dancing in fountains and experiencing
adrenalin rushes and few of them were related in any way to my 'national
identity.' In fact, in the midst of such pleasures, it is among the things
lost: not just the 'nation' part of the equation but the 'identity' as
well.  If it disappears in the middle, maybe you don't need to have it at 
the beginning or hang onto at the end either.

How many weeks 'til the Olympics?

Greg


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