National identities, European identity and cosmopolitanism: The case of female golf fans at the 2019 Solheim Cup

Abstract

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to consider the relationship between sport and identity formation by examining testimonies of 24 British women who attended the Solheim Cup golf tournament in 2019 to support a transnational team made up of professional European women players. Relatively little is known about the effects of transnational sports teams on identity formation, not least because such teams are themselves rare. The Solheim Cup, contested by teams of female professional golfers representing the United States and Europe, is one such example. The data set consists of interviews with women who attended the competition that took place in a period of political uncertainty between the UK electorate voting to leave the European Union and Brexit actually taking place. The paper analyses the women's views in relation to national identity, European identity and cosmopolitanism. Although it emerges that most of the women felt more European in the context of a competition involving a team representing Europe and were opposed to the United Kingdom leaving the European Union, they could also be described as cosmopolitan as a result of their educational level, social class and experience of living in or regularly visiting foreign countries.