Gone and almost forgotten the dynamics of professional white football in SA 1959-1990

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This study has been positioned as a contribution to the emerging literature relating to issues of transformation in South African sport by exploring historical change in the demographics of professional football in South Africa at an institutional level. Through the use of archival documentation, contemporary media material and oral sources, it considers the political, economic and social factors that influenced white professional football during the period 1959–90, with a focus on the disappearance of the whites-only National Football League (NFL) and the subsequent struggles by its constituent clubs within integrated professional football prior to unity.The original contribution of this study to the scholarship pertaining to South African football spans multiple dimensions. In addition to arguing that new elements need to be considered in the debate regarding the NFL's demise in the late 1970s, it also contains the first in-depth analysis of the relationship between the National Party's multinational sports policy and South African football historically. Consequently it contributes to the broader literature exploring the nexus between sport, politics and race in South African sport generally. It further analyses the trajectory of former NFL clubs – and their disappearance over time – in the period subsequent to the white league's disbandment. This constitutes a new axis of analysis within the historiography of South African football.By the time football unity arrived in 1991 only two former (white) NFL clubs remained within the top tier of South African professional football – this after the NFL had experienced notable popularity during the 1960s and early 1970s. The analysis of this drastic historical shift relating to institutional white football represents an important marker regarding the complex and multifaceted range of historical variables that impacted the game locally during the period 1959–90. As a result this study offers historical perspective to current debates on sporting transformation. It is argued that despite the fact that football itself has largely been positioned outside these debates, the study thereof still serves as a crucial lens through which to consider the demographic fluidity that has been present within South African sport historically.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University