ABSTRACT
The most interesting and disturbing of research cracks open the gaps, lights the shadows and hears the words left out of history. Put another way, revisionist scholars follow the lead of Manchester City fans, hearing those who are not really here. Football is the world game, but such a cliché undermines the local accents and inflections that build a community and forge (mis)communication. Sport as a creative industry is culturally pervasive, bleeding not only into popular culture and social allegiances, but into the realm of tourism, museums and shopping. While much discussion of sport and media-based globalization stresses the possibilities of convergent ‘new media’ such as interactive television and the Web, this chapter evokes a much smaller project: to investigate the ‘old media’ of football photographs. Instead of replaying the team shots of young men holding trophies aloft, we twist our focus from the players to their fans.
