Being an Argentina Soccer Fan
Messi is said to be the greatest soccer player alive. He plays for the club team Barcelona, which is based in Spain. His nationality though is Argentina, which is why he plays for the Argentina international soccer team.
Why does this even matter? Well, if one wants to be a fan of the International team, it is basically a necessity to know Messi is the captain and debatably best player on the team.
Being a fan of Argentina is not as easy as watching one game and deciding “I like this team and want to be a fan.” Instead one has to know many facts and common things about them. One has to get into the Discourse of being a fan of Argentina.
Discourses can be best described by James Paul Gee, the writer of many pieces on language. Gee defines discourses as
“ways of being in the world; they are forms of life which integrate words, acts, values, beliefs, attitudes, and social identities” (7).
Another famous writer Darcy A Fiano wrote a piece about a kindergarten student and used Gee’s seven building tasks to explain a Discourse analysis.
Argentina is an international team which means they have players from many different club teams, but they all have to have the nationality of Argentina. The team plays in the World Cup which happens every four years, so being a fan of Argentina watching the game’s leading up to this is very important.
Using last years world cup highlights, a website that shows a team’s chants, and the rooster information page a Discourse analysis is easily achieved. This analysis is meant to bring people closer and closer to being able to be in the Argentine fandom community, and maybe even have someone follow the process and actually become a new fan.
Secondary Discourse:
Being a fan of the Argentinean soccer team is a secondary Discourse. Gee splits Discourses into two parts which are primary and secondary. A primary Discourse is the environment and language that one grows up with starting at a young age. Secondary Discourses are ones that people can enter later on in life, just like being a fan of Argentina.
People are not born and then taken right to a soccer game to cheer on Argentina right away. Becoming a fan requires one to outgrow their immaturity. It may help to live and grow up in Argentina, but anyone from anywhere can achieve fandom.
Being a fan is a non-dominant Discourse which means that it brings unity between all people associated, but nothing valuable is obtained from it. Gee says that
“non-dominant Discourses are secondary Discourses the mastery of which often brings solidarity with a particular social network, but not wider status and social goods in a society at large”(8).
Being a fan of Argentina may fit into any of these parts of Discourses, but there are certain things that actually make it able to be a Discourse. Fiano writes about Discourse analysis and includes Gee and his points on Discourses.
She brings in Gee’s seven building tasks since he says they are needed in order to perform a Discourse analysis. However, not every Discourse is going to fit every task so not all of them have to apply. Fiano explains Gee’s
“seven building tasks as the seven components of discourse situations are significance, practices (activities), identities, relationships, politics, connections, and sign systems and knowledge” (66).
The Discourse of being an Argentina fan does not fit all of the tasks, but most of them do. This Discourse has significance, practices, relationships, and sign systems and knowledge.
Significance:
There are a lot of different parts that are needed to be able to say one is a fan, and going by the seven tasks significance is one of them. Significance is seen in the fact that it is really important for a fan to know the names of each of the players. If the names are not known how is a fan going to know who to cheer for when they see a goal scored, but cannot make out the name on the back of the jersey.
There are always eleven players for each team on the field, unless there was a red card in which a player is suspended. Red cards do not occur that often since they require a really bad foul to happen, yet when a player does get a card the fans are usually upset at the referees.
Counting both the players off the field and on there are between twenty-one and thirty players on a team. Usually a team wants to have at least one extra player for each position incase one gets hurt. Argentina specifically has twenty-three players on the roster (Argentina Squad).
Each player on the squad has their name on the back of their jersey along with their number. Most numbers stay relatively low landing in the 1–11 range since it used to be common for the number to represent what position that player played. Low numbers were for goalies and defenders, middle numbers were for midfielders and high numbers were for forwards and wingers.
Practices:
The next task is practices, which would be watching most if not all of the games that Argentina plays. One of the most important games to watch, if Argentina makes it that far, is the World Cup.
In 2014, Argentina was in the world cup final against Germany which was held in South America. The game was an incredibly intense one with Argentina having most of the chances, and germany looking as if they might lose.
The game ended at a tied score of zero, zero, and had to go into thirty minute overtime. During the second half of the overtime at the time mark 22:22 out of the extra thirty minutes given, a substitute for Germany named Gotze put the ball in the back of the net for the lead (TKeyha).
With only about seven minutes left Argentina had to try their best to try can come back. Sadly Argentina did lose that year, but the true fans would stay loyal and start watching next year’s games as soon as possible. The mast of the fan community will have the belief that they will make it next time. Fans will have to cheer and bond better relationships for the next four years awaiting the time where they can have revenge.
Relationships:
Building a relationship with the team by watching and cheering for the, is the easiest relationship to acquire. This is because anyone can sit in the stands and pretend to watch argentina and know everything about them.
Real relationships are ones fans build with their favorite players, knowing everything about them. This is why Messi was mentioned earlier, since he is probably the most liked player on the team.
Most people like him because of the unbelievable skills that he has and the ways he shows it. There are multiple examples of when Messi has dribbled through three or more players and scored all on his own.
Lionel Messi is number ten and is one of the best forwards on the team. He has been named world soccer player three times and is looked at like a god of soccer. Fans even have a cheer made for Messi which is not that common because cheers are usually for the whole team.
“Vamos Vamos Argentina, Vamos Vamos a ganar, Que esta barra quilombera, No te deja no te deja de alentar,’ which translates to ‘Come on, come on Argentina, Come on, come on and win, This will be a madhouse, And we will never leave you’” (Vamos).
Words, acts, values, beliefs, attitudes, and social identities are all shown within being a fan. From the chants being part of the language, to watching the games to have some type of actions. Having attitudes towards whether Argentina is winning or losing the World Cup and showing the true fan identity by not losing hope and looking towards the next final. Some of the seven tasks were left out because being a fan of Argentina is not compatible with what they meant. Taking in all of this knowledge hopefully forces one to wonder about this Discourse so they will look further into it.
Works Cited
(June 6, 2014). Argentina squad for 2014 World Cup. The Gaurdian. http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/jun/06/argentina-squad-2014-world-cup
Fiano, Darcy A. “Reading Research Quarterly.” Litracy, Discourse, And Linguistics: Introduction 171 (1989): 5–7. Web. 18 Oct. 2015.
Gee, James Paul. “Literacy, Discourse, and Linguistics: Introduction.” Journal of Education 171.1 (1989): 5–17. print.
TKeyha, M. (2015, January 23). Highlights BBC. [FIFA World Cup 2014 FINAL — Germany vs. Argentina 1:0]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6S8Sah9onAg
Vamos Vamos Argentina. Fanchants.com. http://en.argentina.fanchants.com/football-songs/argentina-chants/come-on-come-on-4/
