Pressures on regional games in a dominant metropolitan culture: the case of shinty.
Today, the dominant culture reaches further than ever before … into hitherto inaccessible areas of experience and practice and meaning. (Williams, 1977.) This paper examines the current problems which the Scottish sport of shinty faces in endeavouring to remain a living tradition (that is, a well-loved and vital part of local life) in Highland communities which are increasingly accessible to the reach of the dominant, metropolitan culture of the United Kingdom as a whole. The paper first essays a brief history of shinty in the Gaelic regions of Scotland, and then draws on the sociological literature on modernization to suggest the dynamics of cultural, as well as economic, domination. This provides a background for the subsequent examination of the position and prospects of shinty today, a game which is indigenous to the peripheral regions of Scotland (the Highlands and Western Isles) and which is now fighting for its survival there against the growth of other games originating in metropolitan Britain.