Caribbean colonial schooling instilled English moral values through sport when classrooms failed

Evidence

But as soon as we stepped on to the cricket or football field, more particularly the cricket field, all was changed… . [W]e learned to obey the umpire’s decision without question, however irrational it was. We learned to play with the team, which meant subordinating your personal inclinations, and even interests, to the good of the whole. We kept a stiff upper lip in that we did not complain about ill-fortune. We did not denounce failure, but “Well tried” or “Hard luck” came easily to our lips. We were generous to opponents and congratulated them on victories, even when we knew they did not deserve it… . On the playing field we did what ought to be done. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 1242

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes C.L.R. James’s own Beyond a Boundary but also connects to how colonized elites absorbed English bourgeois codes — parallels the Frankfurt School’s account of administered acculturation and the disciplining of the subject through ritual.