And this is what we sing – what do we sing? Exploring the football fan songs of the Northern Irish ‘Green and White Army’

Abstract

This paper draws upon digital recordings of Northern Ireland football fans singing in the stadium during all 10 qualifying matches for the 2016 UEFA European Football Championship. Supplemented by participant observation and interview data with 21 supporters themselves, the paper challenges assertions within the literature which focus upon the predominance of sectarian singing amongst a section of Northern Ireland football supporters. Although vocal manifestations of football fandom may initially appear to be randomly driven by irrational emotions, on the contrary, there is an underlying structure and sequence to fandom in the stadium in which certain factors promote collective singing at particular times. The paper identifies four key themes in particular: the timing in a match; whether or not a goal has been scored; if there is a lull or a break in play; and the use of musical instruments to encourage the wider collective to sing. We argue that it is important to understand the process by which collective singing occurs in the football stadium rather than fixating upon the alleged racist or sectarian psychopathology of the individuals involved. Such knowledge may assist in supporting those fan organisations that seek to challenge discriminatory behaviour in the stadium, particularly in the current context of the European (UEFA) and World football governing bodies (FIFA) punishing fans collectively, regardless of whether or not the majority in the stadium are opposed to what is being sung in their name.

Combatting sectarianism from the ground up: The Northern Irish Green and White Army and the football carnival

“…Norm entrepreneurship can be understood as a socialisation process occurring when 'principled ideas held by individuals become norms in the sense of collective understanding about appropriate behaviour which then lead to change in identities, interests and behaviour' (Risse and Sikkink, 1999: 11). The transformation of the norms of Northern Ireland fan culture away from sectarianism has been documented within the pages of this journal (Bell et al, 2020;Bell and Bell, 2021). However, despite seeming to adopt elements of wider carnival practices to challenge sectarian and discriminatory fan behaviour, the GAWA football carnival outside of the stadium remains underexplored.…”

“…There is also a broader conceptual point whereby such educational approaches assume a logical and linear relationship between attitudes and behaviour (with the former viewed as always driving the latter), which is not necessarily the case (Ryle, 1949;Wittgenstein, 1953). This assumption is particularly problematic for conscious yet non-discursive forms of behaviour driven by a more subtle form of 'practical consciousness' (Giddens, 1984) which may underpin repetitive fan practices such as singing and shouting (see Bell and Bell, 2021). Attitudes are comprised of three related constituent elements, often referred to as Affective, Behavioural, Cognitive (ABC) (Cuadrado et al, 2022).…”