John Samuel Elmer McManus

JOHN McMANUS, British Institute at Ankara, Ankara, Turkey, received a grant in April 2019 to aid research on ‘The Emirate of Men: Masculinities and the Forging of Qatar’s World Cup.’ This project explored the relationship of race, class, and gender among the diverse population of Qatar as the nation prepares to host the 2022 FIFA Men’s Soccer World Cup. Currently 88% of Qatar’s population are migrants and three out of four people in the country of 2.6 million are male. The project used the rubric of ‘sport’ to gather together the experiences of different types of migrant workers and Qatari citizens. The entwinement of sport in political economies, global capitalism, and migration patterns has led to a perpetuation of iniquity and precarity for many. Yet ‘sport’ also has intensified the focus of human rights charities on injustice, and sporting games are one of the few realms where migrants can take a step back and build solidarity. Such multifaceted rendering suggests that anthropology should take more seriously sport’s theoretical potential.