Paper short abstract:

How urban spaces became places of belonging, memory, and identification with the centennial football clubs of Oporto and how their supporters emulate this city and its areas in their football stadiums.

Paper long abstract:

Oporto is a city that has two centennial football clubs and a third that will complete one hundred years of existence in December 2011. Throughout its long history Boavista Futebol Clube, Futebol Clube do Porto and Sport Comércio e Salgueiros maintained a deep relationship with the city and its spaces. These were places, not just for sports, but especially of belonging and to which the club's supporters are emotionally attached and through whom emerge discourses that construct social memory and identity of clubs. Some of these places were both shared and conflict spaces between the clubs. They were therefore, the reason for discourses in praise of one club and in depreciation of the opponents, thus underlining the difference between them.

The communication that will be presented will highlight such place as symbols of belonging and identity of these three clubs. The football stadium will also be presented as a place where the city as a whole is emulated and celebrated, but also mapped according to their various residential areas represented in their hierarchy. The communication shall state the various signs of identification with the clubs that can be found in many residential areas of Oporto.