ICS Working Papers Nº1/2014

ICS

W O R K I N G P A P E R S

2014

Portugal. Since the year of 2005, the latter counted on the daughters of Portuguese

migrants who were socialised in the USA, Canada, Brazil, France, Switzerland and

Germany, some of them making the squad for a number of years. While continuing to

play in the domestic championships of their country of births, they expand their

football experience by integrating into the national squad of the country which their

parents had left, and at international competitions where they compete with other

national teams. They are supposed to improve the performance of the team and

expected to adapt to a probable different football system and cultural codes (including

language, interaction) on the pitch but hardly beyond.

Albeit, being part of a football team which represents a given nation, in reality they

are not embedded in this society-at-large. The space of socio-cultural experience of

the country which they represent is fairly limited to the social field of football - which

seems to be the reality of many fully professional women expatriate players as well,

who do not so much enter countries but clubs, clustering with team mates and other

migrant players and often living more virtual contacts beyond the borders than daily

life interactions in their immediate environment beyond the club (Botelho and

Agergaard 2011; Tiesler 2012b). And still, the mobility experience of diaspora players is

different, for it does not involve migration, housing and daily life but, instead, travel,

hotels and the interruption of daily routine. They travel to their parents’ country of

origin at average between three and six times per year for a few weeks or meet their

squad for preparation camps and matches at the location of international

competitions. For some of them, joining the national team had been the first occasion

to visit this country which, until then, was mainly introduced to them by the narratives

and memories of their parents who had left decades ago. Still, others knew their

ancestral homeland from more or less frequent holiday visits. Not all are fluent

speakers of their parents’ native language which is (supposed to be) the lingua franca

in the national team environment. A Mexican player write all kinds of Spanish football

expressions on her hands and arms before matches, while Portuguese players

motivate their parents to switch the house language to Portuguese during the days

before joining their team.

Diaspora players develop a greater interest for their parents’ home country, e.g. by

accessing media more frequently, and they generally start keeping close contact with

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