Sport and Nationalism in Celebrations of Mega Events. Dancing victory with Zorba the Greek

Abstract

The present paper explores the negotiation of national identity in contemporary mega sporting events. The study focuses on certain performances of Greekness through Zorba’s dance in national sporting victories, especially in basketball. The attention shifts onto wider nationalisation processes by highlighting the socio-political relations of sport. The fieldwork took place in the broader area of Athens (Attica) and Patras (Peloponnese), between September 2020 and September 2022. It was based on Visual Anthropology methods, working with interlocutors who are engaged with sports in various ways. Through endearing habits, athletes and fans can constitute different embodied performances inside and outside the stadiums, where sport as a performative place of collectivity and solidarity invites a continuous embodied creative action highlighting how complex, versatile, and political it can be.