New Books in Anthropology Home Team Away: Watching European Football in Urban China with Yuan Gong (U Michigan Press, 2026)
Nov 3, 2026
Yuan Gong, a media studies scholar at Massey University, explores how China’s urban middle class follows European football from afar. They discuss team loyalty, beautiful football, digital fan communities, and two-screen viewing. The conversation also examines fan clubs, global identity, debates over racism and nationalism, and football’s role as social critique in contemporary China.
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Football Fandom Challenges China’s Nationalist Image
- Chinese European-football fandom reveals middle-class interests that resist the usual image of nationalist, populist, anti-Western cultural consumption.
- Yuan Gong’s decade-long research follows fans whose emotional investment in distant clubs complicates assumptions about contemporary Chinese identity.
How European Football Entered Urban China
- European football reached China through the convergence of cultural opening and the leagues’ neoliberal globalization during the 1990s.
- State television sought to satisfy rising entertainment demand while European clubs pursued China as a lucrative consumer market.
Why Chinese Fans Prefer Teamwork To Superstars
- Fans often choose clubs for teamwork and beautiful football rather than celebrity players or trophies.
- Barcelona supporters emphasize tiki-taka’s constant passing, while Arsenal and Chelsea fans define beauty through attacking or resilient styles.
