Changing the Field: Challenging hegemonic narratives of cricket to drive change in Sri Lanka and global Sport for Development and Peace

在我的博士学位，我研究了板球在斯里兰卡的和解努力中所扮演的角色。虽然我的结论是板球对个人有一些积极的影响，可以改善该国的人际关系，但我的发现也提出了一个问题：像板球这样的运动不太可能以目前的形式促进结构性变化。通过对斯里兰卡板球运动员进行深入的人类学田野调查，我发现体育促进了某些叙事，这些叙事延续了对社会的狭隘看法，其中变革的想法大多是个人的。虽然板球运动员学习如何改变自己的生活，但这项运动很少让他们质疑或挑战自己的社会约束。许多体育促进发展与和平（SDP）的工作者倾向于把改变留给个人，只是为人们提供通过体育改变的机会，而不是解决使社会问题长期存在的系统性问题。因此，我得出结论，需要进一步评估体育与变革之间的关系，挑战这些占主导地位的体育叙事，以改变体育。这里提议的研究金是实现这一目标的第一步，即改变对体育的叙述，改变社会对体育的思考。它建立在我的具体研究结果在斯里兰卡的背景下，努力使他们在当地规模更有影响力，更相关的更广泛的audience.So到目前为止，我的研究已经在主要学术水平的影响，刺激会议论文和出版物，包括一本书的一章民族主义在斯里兰卡板球，并在探索体现运动的创新技术期刊文章。我管理着一个斯里兰卡研究小组，以及我于2020年创立的国际体育人类学网络（INSA）。ESRC奖学金将使我能够发展这一出版记录，并进一步发展这些网络，使我成为体育人类学领域的专家，他对社会变革有重要的见解。最重要的是，奖学金将使我能够在斯里兰卡传播我的研究结果，继续与当地SDP的参与者建立网络，并提供在地方一级影响的具体证据。这个奖学金的第一个主要目的是传播我对斯里兰卡板球与和解的研究结果，发展和提高他们在不同规模的影响。第二个是创建一个围绕体育和变化的人类学子领域，这将产生强大的理论来更好地推动体育活动，并支持我在学术界建立职业生涯的目标。这些目标将通过四个相互关联的目标实现：1.从我的博士材料中产生有影响力的出版物，包括建立有助于体育和社会变革人类学子领域的理论的期刊文章。通过一系列讲习班交流和传播调查结果，特别是在斯里兰卡，这些讲习班将影响地方和国家一级的社会发展方案执行人员。在英国和国际上建立研究网络和伙伴关系，通过海外机构访问渥太华，与体育促进和解的著名专家合作，并通过扩大体育人类学国际网络，建立自己的网络。制定一个赠款提案，这将通过扩大我的研究结果，包括更广泛的背景和跨各种学科，将这项工作扩展到未来的体育和变化。这些目标将通过确保我的研究结果达到更大的受众，从而最大限度地提高我的博士学位的影响，导致工具和概念上的好处。最终，这个奖学金将提供空间，使我的博士研究结果更具可操作性，并给他们更大的影响。达勒姆的ESRC博士后奖学金将帮助我改变这个领域，挑战板球的霸权叙事，并推动斯里兰卡和全球体育促进发展与和平的变革。

During my PhD, I examined the assumed role that cricket has in reconciliation efforts in Sri Lanka. Though I concluded that cricket had some positive influence on individuals and could improve interpersonal relations in the country, my findings also posed a problem: that sports like cricket are unlikely to promote structural change in their current form. Through in-depth anthropological fieldwork with cricketers in Sri Lanka, I found that sports promote certain narratives that perpetuate a narrow view of society, in which ideas of change are mostly individual. While cricketers learn how to make change in their own lives, the sport rarely leads them to question or challenge their social constraints. Many Sport for Development and Peace (SDP) practitioners tend to leave change up to individuals, simply providing opportunities for people to change through sport, rather than addressing the systemic problems that perpetuate social issues. Consequently, I concluded that work was needed to assess the relationship between sport and change further, to challenge these dominant sporting narratives in order to transform sport. The fellowship proposed here is a first step towards this goal of shifting the narrative on sport, and transforming thinking about sport in society. It builds on my specific findings in the Sri Lankan context, working to make them more impactful at the local scale, and more relevant to a wider audience.So far, my research has had impacts at a mostly academic level, stimulating conference papers and publications, including a book chapter on nationalism in Sri Lankan cricket, and a journal article on innovative techniques for exploring embodied movement. I run a Sri Lanka research group, and the International Network of Sport Anthropology (INSA), which I founded in 2020. An ESRC fellowship will enable me to develop this publication record and grow these networks further, positioning me as an expert within the growing anthropology of sport, who has important things to say about social change. Most importantly, a fellowship would enable me to disseminate my findings in Sri Lanka, to continue building networks with local SDP actors, and provide concrete evidence of impact at local level.The first major aim of this fellowship is to disseminate my findings about cricket and reconciliation in Sri Lanka, developing and improving their impacts at various scales. The second is to create a sub-field of anthropology surrounding sport and change, which would generate robust theory to better drive sport initiatives, and support my aims of establishing a career in academia. These aims will be achieved through four interlinked objectives:1. Generating impactful publications from my PhD material, including journal articles which build theory that contributes to a sub-field of anthropology in sport and social change.2. Communication and dissemination of findings, particularly in Sri Lanka, through a series of workshops that will impact SDP practitioners at local and national level.3. Establishing Research Networks & Partnerships in the UK and internationally, through an overseas institutional visit to Ottawa to work with a renowned expert in Sport for Reconciliation, and by expanding the International Network of Sport Anthropology to create my own network.4. Formulating a grant proposal, which will extend this work on sport and change into the future by broadening my findings to include wider contexts and across various academic disciplines.These objectives will maximise the impact of my PhD by ensuring that my findings reach a larger audience, leading to both instrumental and conceptual benefits. Ultimately, this fellowship will provide space to make the findings of my PhD more actionable and give them far greater impact. An ESRC postdoctoral fellowship at Durham will help me to change the field, challenge hegemonic narratives on cricket, and drive change in Sri Lanka and global Sport for Development and Peace.