Whitewashed and Blacked Out: Counter-Narratives as an Analytical Framework for Studies of Ice Hockey in Canada

Abstract

Despite a longstanding relationship with hockey, Black Canadians are typically erased from dominant histories of Canada and sport. Erasure is detrimental to Black prosperity because it encourages social death, a process that socially marginalizes and dehumanizes Black Canadians. In response to Black erasure, we detail counter-narratives that challenge the historically whitewashed account of hockey’s origin in Canada. We celebrate the impact and contributions of Black Canadians, who transformed hockey while using it as a sport-for-development vehicle in the 19th and 20th century. Given the centrality of hockey to Canadian nationalism, we suggest that Black erasure within sport and society is an attempt at Black social death within Canada. By highlighting the sport development and sport-for-development work of Black Canadians, our objective is to confront Black erasure and exclusion. That way, Black presence becomes less surprising in the grand narrative of Canada, and Black social death becomes less certain.