Brawling in Berne: Mediated Transnational Moral Panics in the 1954 Football World Cup

von der Lippe, Gerd and MacLean, Malcolm ORCID: 0000-0001-5750-4670 (2008) Brawling in Berne: Mediated Transnational Moral Panics in the 1954 Football World Cup. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 43 (1). pp. 71-90. doi:10.1177/1012690208093472

Preview

Text (Author's version) Brawling in Berne.pdf - Accepted Version Download (205kB) | Preview

Abstract

This paper explores the use of national and racial stereotypes in the moral panic surrounding a case of athlete violence at the 1954 World Cup of Football, focussing on the differences in mediation of this event across three nations with different forms of involvement in or connection with the match. Texts are analysed from Norwegian and English national papers, and Swiss papers of German origin using Fairclough’s (1995a, 1995b, 2003) critical discourse analysis. Each of the three national settings presented four discursive perspectives: degradation of play, the referee, the locker room fight, and national racial stereotypes. The media have long operated as agents and stimulants of moral indignation (Hall et al, 1978; Cohen, 1972:80). The analysis explores the extent to and ways in which mediation of the violence may be understood through the logic of a moral panic, interpreted as a parallel to Fairclough’s societal discourse order. We argue that the discursive framing of the event in each national context reveals common significant characteristics in the understanding of significant variations in the national and racial stereotypes invoked that are specific to the implicit codes associated with national socio-cultural practices, and to reinforce asymmetrical power relations to manage a sense of cultural threat to Western and Northern European cultural codes.

Item Type:	Article
Article Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	moral panic, critical discourse analysis, athlete violence, national racial stereotypes, asymmetrical power relations, football.
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Divisions:	Schools and Research Institutes > School of Education and Science
Research Priority Areas:	Health, Life Sciences, Sport and Wellbeing
Depositing User:	Anne Pengelly
Date Deposited:	19 May 2015 13:21
Last Modified:	31 Aug 2023 09:11
URI:	https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/2294

University Staff: Request a correction | Repository Editors: Update this record