From Pilot Recording to Small Comparative Corpus: Event-Aligned Analysis of Organised Terrace Chanting across Match Contexts

Football terrace chanting is often described through broad labels such as atmosphere, crowd noise, or supporter culture. These terms can obscure the organisation through which chanting is cued, sustained, interrupted, redirected, and reassembled during matches. This study asks how a curiosity-driven, event-aligned mode of listening can make such organisation analytically traceable across match contexts.

 

This study extends a pilot analysis of The Dalian North Union into a four-match comparative corpus. Dalian’s home match against Zhejiang on 10 April 2026 serves as the methodological baseline for approximate alignment, segmentation, and descriptive coding. Three further matches were purposively selected to vary setting, outcome, cueing resources, spatial conditions, and recording availability: a home victory against Chongqing, an away defeat against Beijing, and an away defeat against Qingdao Hainiu. The materials comprise researcher-produced video and audio recordings, still images extracted from the videos, and event logs documenting chant entries, cues, interruptions, transitions, re-entry and reassembly, and post-match continuation. Collective uptake was identified through the spread of vocal entry, clapping, jumping, and coordinated bodily responses from an initial local response towards broader participation.

 

This study examines how continuity, fragmentation, and reassembly vary with venue conditions, match pressure, cueing restrictions, and changing participation. The comparison suggests that supporter organisation cannot be explained by match outcome alone. Across the materials, chanting appears as a situated and adaptable practice shaped by capo-led cueing, drum-supported timing, bodily coordination, and the availability of auditory and visual cues. By moving from a pilot case to a four-match corpus, the study demonstrates how event-aligned comparison can make collective sound practices analytically traceable without claiming full-season representativeness. In relation to the symposium theme “Curiosity and Courage,” the study frames curiosity as attentive listening to collective sound and courage as the willingness to present and stand by an interpretation that challenges assumptions reducing terrace chanting to atmosphere or crowd noise.