ABSTRACT
It needs to be remembered, however, that there was a phase of ‘development’ when in fact the DDA had successfully bridged gaps between class and sectarian differences which had started to manifest themselves in this area. The open fields of the ‘interim’ sports complex provided the liminal space which eased the differences between communities, presenting an opportunity to strangers to establish acquaintances outside their familiar social realms. The free access and unstructured nature of the leisure activities placed no premium on class or confessional differences. For the moment, people were accepted as individuals and not as extensions of their separate social worlds. On the contrary, the process of fraternisation provided the opportunity for doubting the validity of the many inherited, clichéd sentiments about unfamiliar people. Not merely was this sports complex secular and democratic, but it could also have proved to be an agent for neutralising a potential communal polarisation between neighbourhoods.
