New Sociological Perspectives 2021, Vol. 1, No. 1, 42–56 https://nsp.lse.ac.uk “Playing on the Back Foot”: The Pakistani Male Diaspora and Cricket in Berlin Aseela Shamim Haque* Abstract Although cricket is not yet a widely popular sport in Germany, it has been growing in part be- cause of the enthusiasm for the sport carried forward by South Asian immigrants. Despite the sharp rise in the number of registered teams playing in the country, very little is known about the sporting practices that are in many ways continuations of traditions, social bonds, and as- pirations brought over from home countries. Although the configurations of cricket and South Asian diasporas have been widely researched in the UK and to a lesser extent in Norway, the German context has not received much attention. Through interviews and ethnographic field- work in Berlin, this article addresses that gap by underscoring how the Pakistani male diaspora emerges through cricket. It illustrates the experience of migrancy shared by Pakistani men in Berlin in the context of rising racism and Islamophobia. As such, it reveals how cricket shapes ideas of identity, community, and resistance against marginalisation. In doing so, it emphasis- es how cricket serves as an important avenue for Pakistani immigrants to negotiate their place in German society, form community bonds, express their cultural identities in resistance to racialising norms, and maintain continuities to home. Keywords cricket, Germany, Pakistani diaspora, migration, Islamophobia, racism * Aseela Shamim Haque is a doctoral fellow at the Department of Human Geography at Freie Universität Berlin. She received an MA in Global Studies from Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and this article is part of her Master’s thesis on cricket as postcolonial cultural practice in Berlin. Her current research focuses on the politics of infrastructure and urban public space. She considers the social and political materialities of flyo- vers in her hometown Karachi and how spaces underneath them can be significant and contested resources in the lives of people bypassed by the structures. In her work, she focuses on issues of development, ethnicity, gender, leisure, subaltern appropriation, and resistance in urban public space. “Playing on the Back Foot”: The Pakistani Male Diaspora and Cricket in Berlin – New Sociological Perspectives 43 One early morning, I arrived at the Maifeld in Olympiapark for a cricket tournament that was publicised on a Facebook group for Pakistanis living in Berlin. With no signs or posters outside the stadium indicating that a cricket tournament was underway, I thought I had made a mistake. As soon as I entered the massive open field, however, I knew I had come to the right place. My ears were inundated with familiar sounds. A rapturous, traditional, beating dhol (drum) melted into the distinct grooves of contemporary Punjabi music. I walked closer to the field and heard Urdu, Hindi, Dari, Tamil, Pashto, Punjabi, and German voices intermingling. To my surprise, I was the only woman there. As I walked around the field to find Asjad, one of the interlocutors in my research, I was met with curious gazes and sometimes long stares. I guessed that it was unusual for a Pakistani woman to join such an event as a spectator. The Maifeld, most often used for gymnastics and equestrian sports, is the home of cricket in Berlin because it is the only field with cricket pitches available. At the tournament, there were multiple matches spread over the entire ground. Two pitches formed the nuclei where teams were having intense contests. Around the pitches, there were clusters of men watching, cheering, talking, and lounging. Even more games were dispersed in emp- ty spaces in and around the field: casual ball throwing, warming up, batting in the nets, informal matches with water bottles as wickets, and imaginary boundaries that extended into the stands. Two young boys practised swinging bats twice their size. Asjad, who was playing in the tournament, explained to me that teams consisting of nearly 200 players had come from all over Germany and other parts of Europe to take part in it. On the long day, the teams played against each other, broke for lunch provided by the organisers of the tournament in the stands, and reconvened. In the end, a winner was announced: The team from Sweden took back the €1000 cash prize. I asked a young man what he was looking forward to. He replied, “Now what… It’s over. Back to work, the usual, mundane life.” “Until when?” I asked. He beamed, “Until the weekend. Then back to cricket.” Cricket is growing in Germany due to the growing presence of South Asian immigrants (AFP 2017; Hill 2016; Radley 2018; Schmidt and Masters 2017). Considering that sport and politics are inseparable (James 1983), the stories of cricket playing out in Berlin require deeper engagement. In this paper, I explore how cricket serves as an important avenue for Pakistani male immigrants to negotiate their place in German society. In close en- gagement with diaspora theory, I consider how cricket encapsulates homing desires (Brah 1996) not only in the playing of the sport but also through the various materials that are brought over from home. In addition to diaspora theory, I present the diaspora space of Berlin through the framework of coloniality of migration (Rodríguez 2018) in which migra- tion and asylum policies in Germany, produced by orientalist and racialised practices of European colonialism and imperialism, inform how Pakistani immigrants are seen in Ger- man society. Furthermore, I examine how Pakistani men respond to racism and anti-Mus- lim sentiments by striving for self-expression and self-identification on the cricket field. In essence, I elucidate the role of cricket in the lives of male players as a safe space that offers freedom of cultural expression, a respite from racism, strong community bonds, and continuities of home. In the following sections, I expand on the methodology of this research, offer reflections on thinking through diaspora and cricket in Germany, and contextualise immigration discourses in the country. Subsequently, I present the experiences of everyday racism and Islamophobia shared by interlocutors, their understandings of cricket as a cultural practice, and as a space of “freedom” and “release” from the racialising gaze. In the last two sections, I highlight how cricket players are struggling for space and visibility in the country and how passion for the sport and materials involved drive interlocutors to make “sacrifices” to construct social bonds and communities that are reminiscent of home. “Playing on the Back Foot”: The Pakistani Male Diaspora and Cricket in Berlin – New Sociological Perspectives 44 Figure 1: A scene from the stands at the Maifeld. Figure 2: Boundaries (big scoring shots) are serenaded by dhol. The gentleman pictured here brought the instrument from India and was requested to play at the event by the organisers. Figure 3: To the right, the small strip is one of the cricket pitches at the Maifeld. Methodology 1 “Viktoria 89” plays “hard Data collection for this paper included triangulated methods of detailed life story inter- ball” cricket in official ‘A views (Chilisa 2012) and ethnographic fieldwork in sports grounds in and around Berlin League’ matches, organ- ised by the German Crick- (primarily the Maifeld stadium, the Werder Havel Cricket Ground in Brandenburg, and a et Federation (DCB) at the sports club at Westend, Charlottenburg) from winter 2018 to summer 2019. I interviewed Maifeld at Olympic Stadi- fifteen men between the ages of 25 and 45 years. Many of the participants were contact- um or Werder Havel Crick- et Ground. “Berliner Ti- ed through a Facebook group for Pakistanis in Berlin, while others were encountered in gers”, on the other hand, official matches and practice sessions of two teams, henceforth referred to as “Viktoria play “tape ball” cricket and 1 enter privately organised 89” and “Berliner Tigers”. Although Pakistanis are not the only group playing cricket in tournaments. They have the city, both the teams I came to work with happened to have members from Pakistan. ambitions of entering the This may be because of the online platform for Pakistanis through which I found my in- ‘A League’ in the future. For now, they practice at troduction to cricket in the city. Being a member of various online groups for Pakistanis a football club in Charlot- in the city, as a Pakistani myself, meant that I did not spend extended periods ‘looking’ tenburg. for my research group. Sharing my memories, experiences, and knowledge of Pakistani “Playing on the Back Foot”: The Pakistani Male Diaspora and Cricket in Berlin – New Sociological Perspectives 45 cricket helped me relate to the participants and develop relationships that have extended beyond the research. Despite the shared experiences, however, I was an outsider in the cricket field that was a distinctly masculine space. All the interviews were conducted in Urdu, in a variety of places such as cafes, sports grounds, participant homes, and parks. I later translated the interviews into English. In- terlocutors in this research have diverse occupations such as software engineers, office administrators, shopkeepers, delivery personnel, activists, healthcare workers, business owners, and electricians. All of the men I spoke to were first-generation immigrants from Pakistan. Some had German citizenship, while others had varied visa statuses. The iden- tities of some interlocutors have been pseudonymised for various reasons, such as the safety of participants who shared stories of repeated attacks by racist groups, the privacy of concerned individuals, and the pending status of asylum applications of participants. The decision to not employ the usual blanket anonymisation method was taken because other participants of the research wished for their names to appear in the work.