The right to the city: outdoor informal sport and urban belonging in multicultural spaces

Abstract

The right to the city: outdoor informal sport and urban belonging in multicultural spacesThe right to the city: outdoor informal sport and urban belonging in multicultural spaces Studies on 'everyday multiculturalism' and 'lived multiculture' have advanced knowledge on the kinds of inclusive everyday spaces and practices that characterise our culturally complex, mobile and superdiverse cities. This paper expands this agenda by exploring informal sporting and leisure interactions amongst migrant and ethnically diverse urban populations. Embedded in a larger comparative city project that examines how urban environments and wider social structures mediate inclusions and exclusions of urban dwellers, this paper presents a case study of temporary migrant workers in Singapore and their participation in outdoor informal sport. It deploys Lefebvre's notion of 'Right to the City' to understand city dwellers' access to urban resources and their collective ability to democratically inhabit the city. Despite structural constraints imposed on marginalised migrants, the nature of informal sport, the spontaneous coming together to play, creative use of public space and a range of convivial practices, generate a sense of urban belonging.

Exploring the gap between refugee-background communities’ needs and existing community-based physical activity programs in Australia

“…Participants in this study provided rich insight into the deep structural and systemic inequities that continue to marginalize and exclude refugee-background communities from participation in community-based physical activity programs. It is important to consider the significance of these barriers in the context of contemporary findings that participation in such programs plays a key role in democratizing cities and facilitating broader civic participation and can thus be understood as a fundamental right to and in place ( Aquino et al ., 2022 ).…”

Migration and social transformation through the lens of locality: a multi-sited study of experiences of neighbourhood transformation

“…While recognising the possibility of generative interactions, the potential for relations of ambivalence and exclusion have also been noted (Valentine 2008, Skrbis andWoodward 2007). In this body of work, the socio-material dimensions of placesas part of an assemblage of human and non-human elements that make up the city-feature strongly in the analysis of intercultural encounters in ordinary contact zones or other transversal places (for example, public libraries, sports fields or backyards) (Amin 2012, Neal et al 2019, Wise 2009, Fincher and Iveson 2008, Aquino et al 2020.…”

Meeting Places and Integration: Participatory Mapping of Cross-Cultural Interactions in Norwegian Cities

“…In a study from the same area, Figari, Haaland and Krange (2009) found that walking in the neighbourhood was an important mode of exercise for immigrant women, both as a social activity and alone. Aquino et al (2020) found that playing sports in public areas helps migrants generate a sense of belonging in Singapore, though the social exclusion migrants experience in the city extends to some extent to the sports in these public areas.…”