The African Cup of Nations (Afcon), hosted by Egypt this year, is in its decisive stages. For football fans, this is an opportunity to watch the game together, to sing the anthem of their country together, to conspire against your opponent and insult the referee who is always too hard on our team and too tolerant of the opposition. The atmosphere requires the antagonism of “us” versus “them.” It’s all part of the game and the show. Nothing bad in itself because it starts from a very good feeling.

For Moroccan fans everyday life seems more or less to stop on match day. The Afcon reveals, beyond the symbolic stakes, the fundamental characteristics of our society: the merit of certain players to be on the field, the construction and representation of collective identities, socialization, solidarity between Moroccans and the projection of the socio-economic structuring of a large part of society onto the players.

This competition indeed represents a major event from a political, economic and cultural point of view. According to French sociologist Marcel Mauss, this “total social fact” mobilizes and exposes all the resources of those that participate in it. Participation costs a lot of money. Enough to fuel discussions and fire up detractors on the technical choices of the coach. This is not what concerns me here. Instead, I am concerned here with the expression of the passion, especially by our compatriots and our Maghreb neighbors. This nationalism that emerges from exchanges amongst each other around a football match.