Tribal Sports and why sports teams are like a tribe
Sports have a lot in common with tribalism. The fact that a sports team becomes almost like a tribe, where people from one side dress up in their colours and go out to do battle with others dressed in different colours. Not actual battle as much as tussling on a playing field, but the concept is similar. Along with the case that can be made relating sports and tribalism, there are many tribal sports still being played around the world as they have been played for centuries.
Many studies have been conducted comparing sports to tribal cultures of the past and a lot of them have made some strong arguments. A lot of them say that one of the reasons we love sports so much is because of a forgotten sense of tribalism in us that makes us support our favourite team or country at sports. As we now live in multicultural societies full of people from all different backgrounds and cultures, it has become hard to identify a sense of tribe or belonging to a certain group now except when it comes to sports. Our inbuilt desire to raid the neighbouring village and plunder all we can has thankfully been replaced today with a sense of beating another team at a certain sport. It is all a lot more civil and less violent than it used to be when people would invade and murder their neighbouring villagers. Even though sports fans today can become violent and this can lead to hooliganism, this can be explained by the same tribal mentality that is just a little bit stronger in some people than in others.
Sports may have taken over from our primitive tribal mentality but there are still tribal sports played all over the world today. From India to Africa, wherever we find tribes still functioning in villages dotted around the countryside, we will inevitably find some sort of sport played there. There are many strange and wonderful sports that are played in villages all over the world.
The first of these to be discussed is the odd sport of Rarajipari, which is undertaken by tribes in Mexico. This sport is basically a 150-mile foot race across the Mexican wilderness. If that was not all, the runners have to kick a small wooden ball the entire way. Another strange example of a tribal sport is Suri Stick Fighting. This sport comes from Ethiopia in Africa and consists of a duel between two men who basically beat each other with 8 foot long sticks. The point of the sport is for one of the contestants to draw first blood from either their opponents head or feet. This dangerous sport has even seen people die from blows to the stomach. The last tribal sport to be discussed is water Buffalo racing. This sport can be found in many places around the world but the most interesting version comes to us from the Indonesian island of Sumbawa. This race consists of two water Buffaloes tied to a frame which has a small place for a driver to stand on and they all go charging across muddy, wet marshes to the finish line.
Sports can also be used as an effective method of bringing tribes together. Sporting events can help warring tribes take part in a much less violent contest that will help them break down barriers and promote understanding between people in villages all over the world. The charity World Vision has launched a campaign in Kenya to introduce sports in villages to help different tribes come together and engage in some friendly and competitive sports contests instead of fighting with each other. Once people can play sports together, they can then live together and work together and this helps the social structures of villages as well as their economical health. People in tribes can easily understand the concepts of most sports and so they become an effective way to get different tribes who do not understand each other to engage in activities together.
Sport has been described as a form of tribalism and we have seen many different unique tribal sports being played all over the world to even using sports as a peace building activity among tribes. It is interesting to find out the power that sports have and the strong hold it has over us as human beings and how important it is to our lives.
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