Abstract des Autors

This article questions popular and academic historical readings of rugby union in the Otago province of New Zealand. It focuses on the Otago Rugby Football Union (ORFU) in relation to the early promulgation of amateur ideals, and the subsequent establishment of rugby league in the province upon the return of the 1907-08 ‘All Golds’. In popular history the ORFU has been viewed as a ‘rebel’ union, asserting its independence from both the New Zealand Rugby Football Union (NZRFU) and its colonial master the (English) Rugby Football Union (RFU). In academic histories it is portrayed as symptomatic of emerging nationalism. Analysis of its early minutes and documents and local media reveal that it was a staunch advocate of imperially rooted ideologies of amateurism and public school esprit d’ecorp. Though the bodies were initially in dispute, the NZRFU and ORFU worked in unison to limit the spread of rugby league. While popular narratives of the ‘rebel’ Otago province are romanticized, academic accounts have not fully captured the complexities of the imperialism-colonial nationalism linkage. Verf.-Referat