Molly Pitcher is a famous American folklore |
The United States of America has its own unique social and cultural characteristics such as dialect, music, arts, social habits, cuisine, and folklore.
The United States of America is an ethnically and racially diverse country as a result of large-scale migration from many ethnically and racially different countries throughout its history as well as differing birth and death rates among natives, settlers, and immigrants.
Its chief early European influences came from English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish settlers of colonial America during British rule. British culture, due to colonial ties with Britain that spread the English language, legal system and other cultural inheritances, had a formative influence.
Other important influences came from other parts of Europe, especially Germany, France, and Italy.
Thomas Jefferson's cultural critique |
Original elements also play a strong role, such as Jeffersonian democracy. Thomas Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia was perhaps the first influential domestic cultural critique by an American and a reactionary piece to the prevailing European consensus that America's domestic originality was degenerate. Prevalent ideas and ideals that evolved domestically, such as national holidays, uniquely American sports, military tradition, and innovations in the arts and entertainment give a strong sense of national pride among the population as a whole.
American culture includes both conservative and liberal elements, scientific and religious competitiveness, political structures, risk taking and free expression, materialist and moral elements. Despite certain consistent ideological principles (e.g. individualism, egalitarianism, and faith in freedom and democracy), American culture has a variety of expressions due to its geographical scale and demographic diversity. The flexibility of U.S. culture and its highly symbolic nature lead some researchers to categorize American culture as a mythic identity; others see it as American exceptionalism.
US as melting pot was a popular Idea in 1900s |
It also includes elements that evolved from Indigenous Americans, and other ethnic cultures—most prominently the culture of African Americans, cultures from Latin America, and Asian American cultures. Many American cultural elements, especially from popular culture, have spread across the globe through modern mass media.
The United States has traditionally been thought of as a melting pot, however beginning in the 1960s and continuing on in the present day, the country trends towards cultural diversity, pluralism and the image of a salad bowl instead.
Due to the extent of American culture, there are many integrated but unique social subcultures within the United States. The cultural affiliations an individual in the United States may have commonly depend on social class, political orientation and a multitude of demographic characteristics such as religious background, occupation and ethnic group membership.
Regions of United States of America |
Regional Variations
Semi-distinct cultural regions of the United States include New England, the Mid-Atlantic states, the Southern United States, the Midwestern United States and the Western United States—an area that can be further subdivided, on the basis of the local culture into the Pacific States and the Mountain States.
The western coast of the continental United States consisting of California, Oregon, and the state of Washington is also sometimes referred to as the Left Coast, indicating its left-leaning political orientation and tendency towards social liberalism.
Go to Church- a billboard in Bible Belt, USA |
Southern United States are informally called "the Bible Belt" due to socially conservative evangelical Protestantism, which is a significant part of the region's culture and Christian church attendance across the denominations is generally higher there than the nation's average. This region is usually contrasted with the mainline Protestantism and Catholicism of the northeastern United States, the religiously diverse Midwest and Great Lakes, the Mormon Corridor in Utah and southern Idaho, and the relatively secular western United States. The percentage of non-religious people is the highest in the northeastern state of Vermont at 34%, compared to the Bible Belt state of Alabama, where it is 6%.
Strong cultural differences have a long history in the U.S. with the southern slave society in the antebellum period serving as a prime example. Not only social, but also economic tensions between the Northern and Southern states were so severe that they eventually caused the South to declare itself an independent nation, the Confederate States of America; thus initiating the American Civil War.
David Hackett Fischer |
Fischer's Theory
David Hackett Fischer theorizes that the United States is made up today of four distinct regional cultures. The book's focus is on the folkways of four groups of settlers from the British Isles that emigrated from distinct regions of Britain and Ireland to the British American colonies during the 17th and 18th centuries. Fischer's thesis is that the culture and folkways of each of these groups persisted, albeit with some modification over time, providing the basis for the four modern regional cultures of the United States.
According to Fischer, the foundation of American culture was formed from four mass migrations from four different regions of the British Isles by four distinct socio-religious groups. New England's earliest settlement period occurred between 1629 and 1640 when Puritans, mostly from East Anglia in England, settled there, forming the New England regional culture. The next mass migration was of southern English cavaliers and their Irish and Scottish domestic servants to the Chesapeake Bay region between 1640 and 1675. This facilitated the development of the Southern American culture.
Map of the Delaware Valley Region, USA |
Then (between 1675 and 1725), thousands of Irish, English and German Quakers, led by William Penn, settled in the Delaware Valley. This settlement resulted in the formation of what is today considered the "General American" culture, although, according to Fischer, it is really just a regional American culture, even if it does today encompass most of the U.S. from the mid-Atlantic states to the Pacific Coast. Finally, Scotch-Irish, English and Scottish settlers from the borderlands of Britain and Ireland migrated to Appalachia between 1717 and 1775. They formed the regional culture of the Upland South, which has since spread west to such areas as West Texas and parts of the U.S. Southwest.
Fischer suggests that the U.S. today is not a country with one General American culture and three or more regional sub-cultures. He asserts that the country is composed of just regional cultures, and that understanding that helps one to understand many things about modern American life. Fischer also makes the point that the development of these regional cultures derived not only from where exactly the settlers first came, but when they came.
Fischer asserts that during different periods of time, a population of people will have very distinct beliefs, fears, hopes and prejudices, and that various groups of settlers brought these feelings to the New World where they more or less froze in time in America, even if they eventually changed in their place of origin.
Woodard offers a unique theory of US culture |
Woodard's Theory
Continuing the work of Fischer, Colin Woodard, in his book American Nations, claims an existence of eleven rival regional cultures in North America, based on the cultural characteristics of the original settlers of these regions. These regions are: Yankeedom, New Netherland, The Midlands, Tidewater, Greater Appalachia, The Deep South, New France, El Norte, The Left Coast, The Far West and First Nation (a region in parts of northern Canada and Alaska, and Greenland).
According to Woodard, these regions cross and disregard formal state or even country borders. For example, he compares the Mexican border with the Berlin wall, saying that "El Norte in some ways resembles Germany during the Cold War: two peoples with a common culture separated by a large wall."
English is the most spoken language in US |
Language
Although the United States has no official language at the federal level, 28 states have passed legislation making English the official language and it is considered to be the de facto national language. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, more than 97% of Americans can speak English well, and for 81% it is the only language spoken at home. More than 300 languages besides English have native speakers in the United States—some of which are spoken by the indigenous peoples (about 150 living languages) and others imported by immigrants.
Spanish has official status in the commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the state of New Mexico; Spanish is the primary spoken language in Puerto Rico and various smaller linguistic enclaves. According to the 2000 census, there are nearly 30 million native speakers of Spanish in the United States. Bilingual speakers may use both English and Spanish reasonably well but code-switch according to their dialog partner or context. Some refer to this phenomenon as Spanglish.
Spanish spoken at home in the United States |
Indigenous languages of the United States include the Native American languages, which are spoken on the country’s numerous Indian reservations and Native American cultural events such as pow wows; Hawaiian, which has official status in the state of Hawaii; Chamorro, which has official status in the commonwealths of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands; Carolinian, which has official status in the commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands; and Samoan, which has official status in the commonwealth of American Samoa. American Sign Language, used mainly by the deaf, is also native to the country.
The national dialect is known as American English, which itself consists of numerous regional dialects but has some shared unifying features that distinguish it from other national varieties of English. There are four large dialect regions in the United States—the North, the Midland, the South, and the West—and several smaller dialect regions such as those of New York City and Boston. A standard dialect called "General American" (analogous in some respects to the received pronunciation elsewhere in the English-speaking world), lacking the distinctive noticeable features of any particular region, is believed by some to exist as well; it is sometimes regionally associated with the vaguely-defined "Midwest".
The Famous Zenger Trial in an American Court |
Literature
The right to freedom of expression in the American constitution can be traced to German immigrant John Peter Zenger and his legal fight to make truthful publications in the Colonies a protected legal right, ultimately paving the way for the protected rights of American authors.
In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, American art and literature took most of its cues from Europe. During its early history, America was a series of British colonies on the eastern coast of the present-day United States. Therefore, its literary tradition begins as linked to the broader tradition of English literature. However, unique American characteristics and the breadth of its production usually now cause it to be considered a separate path and tradition.
James Fenimore Cooper, an American writer |
America's first internationally popular writers were James Fenimore Cooper and Washington Irving in the early nineteenth century. They painted an American literary landscape full of humor and adventure. These were followed by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Henry David Thoreau who established a distinctive American literary voice in the middle of the nineteenth century.
Mark Twain, Henry James, and poet Walt Whitman were major figures in the century's second half; Emily Dickinson, virtually unknown during her lifetime, would be recognized as America's other essential poet. Eleven U.S. citizens have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, including John Steinbeck, William Faulkner, Eugene O'Neill, Pearl S. Buck, T. S. Eliot and Sinclair Lewis. Ernest Hemingway, the 1954 Nobel laureate, is often named as one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century.
John Singer Sargent |
A work seen as capturing fundamental aspects of the national experience and character—such as Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851), Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (1925)—may be dubbed the "Great American Novel". Popular literary genres such as the Western and hardboiled crime fiction were developed in the United States.
Fine Arts
In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, American artists primarily painted landscapes and portraits in a realistic style. A parallel development taking shape in rural America was the American craft movement, which began as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution. Developments in modern art in Europe came to America from exhibitions in New York City such as the Armory Show in 1913. After World War II, New York emerged as a center of the art world. Painting in the United States today covers a vast range of styles. American painting includes works by Jackson Pollock, John Singer Sargent, and Norman Rockwell, among many others.
Add Architecture in the US is diverse |
Architecture
Architecture in the United States is regionally diverse and has been shaped by many external forces, not only English. U.S. architecture can therefore be said to be eclectic, something unsurprising in such a multicultural society. In the absence of a single large-scale architectural influence from indigenous peoples such as those in Mexico or Peru, generations of designers have incorporated influences from around the world. Currently, the overriding theme of American Architecture is modernity, as manifest in the skyscrapers of the 20th century.
Early Neoclassicism accompanied the Founding Father's idealization of European Enlightenment, making it the predominant architectural style for public buildings and large manors. However, in recent years, suburbanization and mass migration to the Sun Belt has allowed architecture to reflect a Mediterranean style as well.
Eugene O'neill, the father of American Drama |
Theater
Theater of the United States is based in the Western tradition and did not take on a unique dramatic identity until the emergence of Eugene O'Neill in the early twentieth century, now considered by many to be the father of American drama. O'Neill is a four-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for drama and the only American playwright to win the Nobel Prize for literature. After O'Neill, American drama came of age and flourished with the likes of Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, Lillian Hellman, William Inge, and Clifford Odets during the first half of the twentieth century. After this fertile period, American theater broke new ground, artistically, with the absurdist forms of Edward Albee in the 1960s.
Social commentary has also been a preoccupation of American theater, often addressing issues not discussed in the mainstream. Writers such as Lorraine Hansbury, August Wilson, David Mamet and Tony Kushner have all won Pulitzer Prizes for their polemical plays on American society. The United States is also the home and largest exporter of modern musical theater, producing such musical talents as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, George and Ira Gershwin, Kander and Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim. Broadway is one of the largest theater communities in the world and is the epicenter of American commercial theater.
The US has many genres of dance |
Dance
The United States is represented by various genres of dance, from ballet to hip-hop.
Music
American music styles and influences (such as country, jazz, rock and roll, rock, hip-hop, rap) and music based on them can be heard all over the world. Music in the U.S. is diverse. It includes African-American influence in the 20th century. The first half of this century is famous for jazz, introduced by African-Americans in the south. In the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, rock was prevalent.
Lumiere Brother, pioneers of modern cenima |
Cinema
The cinema of the United States, often generally referred to as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early twentieth century. Its history can be separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period.
While the Lumiere Brothers are generally credited with the birth of modern cinema, it is American cinema that has emerged as the most dominant force in the industry.
American independent cinema was revitalized in the late 1980s and early 1990s when another new generation of moviemakers, including Spike Lee, Steven Soderbergh, Kevin Smith, and Quentin Tarantino made movies like, respectively: Do the Right Thing; Sex, Lies, and Videotape; Clerks; and Reservoir Dogs.
Fahrenheit 9/11, a controversial movie |
In terms of directing, screenwriting, editing, and other elements, these movies were innovative and often irreverent, playing with and contradicting the conventions of Hollywood movies. Furthermore, their considerable financial successes and crossover into popular culture reestablished the commercial viability of independent film. Since then, the independent film industry has become more clearly defined and more influential in American cinema. Many of the major studios have capitalized on this by developing subsidiaries to produce similar films; for example Fox Searchlight Pictures.
To a lesser degree in the early 21st century, film types that were previously considered to have only a minor presence in the mainstream movie market began to arise as more potent American box office draws.
These include foreign-language films such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero and documentary films such as Super Size Me, March of the Penguins, and Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11.
MLB is 1 of 4 professional sports leagues in US |
Sports in the United States:
Sports
are an important part of the culture of the United States. Three of the
nation's five most popular team sports were developed in North America:
American football, basketball and ice hockey, whereas soccer was
developed in England and baseball was developed in both Ireland and the
United States.
The
four major professional sports leagues in the United States are Major
League Baseball (MLB), the National Basketball Association (NBA), the
National Football League (NFL), and the National Hockey League (NHL);
all enjoy massive media exposure and are considered the preeminent
competitions in their respective sports in the world.
Three
of those leagues have teams that represent Canadian cities, and all
four are among the most lucrative sports leagues in the world.
Major League Soccer- the Logo |
The
top professional soccer league in the United States, Major League
Soccer, has not yet reached the popularity levels of the top four sports
leagues, although average attendance has been increasing and in fact
has surpassed those of the NBA and the NHL.
Professional
teams in all major sports operate as franchises within a league. All
major sports leagues use the same type of schedule with a playoff
tournament after the regular season ends. In addition to the major
league-level organizations, several sports also have professional minor
leagues, active in smaller cities across the country.
Sports
are particularly associated with education in the United States, with
most high schools and universities having organized sports. College
sports competitions play an important role in the American sporting
culture. In many cases college athletics are more popular than
professional sports, with the major sanctioning body being the NCAA.
USOC is the National Olympic Committee |
Olympics
The
United States has sent athletes to every celebration of the modern
Olympic Games, except the 1980 Summer Olympics, which it boycotted. The
United States Olympic Committee (USOC) is the National Olympic Committee
for the United States.
American
athletes have won a total of 2570 medals at the Summer Olympic Games
and another 253 at the Winter Olympic Games. More medals have been won
in athletics (track and field) (738, 29%) and swimming (489, 19%) than
any others. Thomas Burke was the first athlete to represent the United
States at the Olympics. He took first place in both the 100 meters and
the 400 meters of the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece. American
athlete Michael Phelps is the most decorated Olympic athlete of all
time, with 22 Olympic medals, 18 of them gold.
US is the only country to win atleast 1 GM in every Winter Olympics |
The
United States has won more gold and overall medals than any other
country in the Summer Games and overall. The US also has the second-most
overall medals at the Winter games, trailing only Norway. Earlier
United States mainly conceded to Soviet Union at summer Games and to
Soviet Union, Norway, East Germany at winter Games only and now strongly
fights with China only at summer Games. The United States is the only
country to have won at least one gold medal at every Winter Olympics,
and has won the total medal count at Lake Placid in the 1932 Winter
Olympics and at Vancouver in the 2010 Winter Olympics. During the
Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, the United States set a record for most
total medals of any country at a single Winter Olympics.
Motor sports are widely popular in the United States |
The
United States has hosted both Summer and Winter Games in 1932 and most
occasions of the Games among other countries - eight times, four times
each for the Summer and Winter Games:
- 1904 Summer Olympics in St. Louis, 1932 Summer Olympics and 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta
- 1932 Winter Olympics and 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley, 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Motor Sports
Motor sports are widely popular in the United States, but Americans generally ignore major international series, such as Formula One and MotoGP, in favor of home-grown racing series.
Indianapolis Motor Speedway |
Americans,
like the rest of the world, initially began using public streets as a
host of automobile races. As time progressed it was soon discovered that
these venues were often unsafe to the public as they offered relatively
little crowd control. Promoters and drivers in the United States
discovered that horse racing tracks could provide better conditions for
drivers and spectators than public streets. The result has been long
standing popularity for oval track racing while road racing has waned;
however, an extensive illegal street racing culture persists.
Indianapolis 500
Historically,
open wheel racing was the most popular nationwide, with the
Indianapolis 500 being the most widely followed race. However, an
acrimonious split in 1994 between the primary series, CART (later known
as Champ Car), and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (the site of the Indy
500) led to the formation of the Indy Racing League, which launched the
rival IndyCar Series in 1996.
The Baryan-Bob and Mike-brothers |
From
that point, the popularity of open wheel racing in the U.S. declined
dramatically. The feud was settled in 2008 with an agreement to merge
the two series under the IndyCar banner, but enormous damage had already
been done to the sport.
Tennis
Tennis
is a popular sport in the U.S. with the pinnacle of the sport in the
country being the US Open. Tennis is popular in all five categories
(Men's and Ladies' Singles; Men's, Ladies' and Mixed Doubles); however,
the most popular are the singles. The United States has had a lot of
success in tennis for many years, with players such as Billie Jean King,
Chris Evert, Jimmy Connors, John McEnroe, and Pete Sampras dominating
their sport in the past. More recently, the Williams sisters, Venus
Williams and Serena Williams, have been a strong force in the women's
game, and twin brothers Bob and Mike Bryan hold almost all significant
career records for men's doubles teams.
An NFL American Football Match |
Popular Team sports
The
most popular team sports in the United States are American football,
basketball, baseball/softball, soccer, and ice hockey. All five of these
team sports are popular with fans, have a fully professional league,
are played by millions of Americans, and enjoy varsity status at many
Division 1 colleges.
American Football
American
football, known within the U.S. simply as football, has the most
participants of any sport at both high school and college levels.
The NFL is the preeminent professional football league in the United
States. The NFL has 32 franchises divided into two conferences. After a
16-game regular season, each conference sends six teams to the NFL
Playoffs, which eventually culminate in the league's championship game,
the Super Bowl.
A college football match Colorado State v. Air Force |
Millions
watch college football throughout the fall months, and some
communities, particularly in rural areas, place great emphasis on their
local high school football teams. The popularity of college and high
school football in areas such as the Southern United States
(Southeastern Conference) and the Great Plains stems largely from the
fact that these areas historically generally did not possess markets
large enough for a professional team. Nonetheless, college football has a
rich history in the United States, predating the NFL by decades, and
fans and alumni are generally very passionate about their teams.
During
football season in the fall, fans have the opportunity to watch high
school games on Fridays and Saturdays, college football on Saturdays,
and NFL games on Sundays, the usual playing day of the professional
teams. However, some colleges play games on Tuesday and Wednesday
nights, while the NFL offers weekly games on Monday (since 1970) and
Thursday (since 2006). Between September and Thanksgiving weekend, there
is at least one nationally televised college or professional football
game every day. Super Bowl Sunday is the biggest annual sporting event
held in the United States. The Super Bowl itself is always among the
highest-rated programs off all-time in the Nielsen ratings.
Tom Brady, a notable NFL player |
Notable
NFL players include Larry Csonka, Roger Staubach, Dick Butkus, Joe
Greene, Bart Starr, Johnny Unitas, Walter Payton, Steve Young, Jerry
Rice, Brett Favre, Emmitt Smith, and Ray Lewis. Notable current NFL
players include Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, and Adrian Peterson.
Indoor
American football, a form of football played in indoor arenas, has
several professional and semi-professional leagues. The Arena Football
League, which plays by the formerly proprietary code of arena football,
was active from 1987 to 2008 and folded in 2009, but several teams from
the AFL and its former minor league, af2, relaunched the league in 2010.
Most other extant indoor leagues date to the mid-2000s (decade) and are
regional in nature.
The
Canadian Football League has a niche market in the United States; the
league has not had any teams in the United States since the mid-1990s
but has had at least some television coverage continuously since 2004.
Team Washington Redskins on the field |
Nationwide,
the NFL obtains the highest television ratings for regular and
post-season games among major sports. This situation began in the late
1960s and early 1970's with the establishment of the Super Bowl and
merger of the existing professional leagues, the old NFL and the
American Football League, into one NFL league. Since then, watching NFL
games on television on Sunday afternoons has become a common routine for
many Americans during the football season. Among the professional
American football teams in the NFL which have become practically
identified with their host cities are the Pittsburgh Steelers, the
Dallas Cowboys, the Green Bay Packers and the Washington Redskins. It
could also be said that college football (i.e. NCAA) enjoys unparalleled
popularity in the southeastern states, where there are fewer
professional teams in the major sports leagues. In many of these areas,
college football is the most avidly followed sport, with the Saturday
college games being the biggest event of the week.
Fenway Park, the oldest stadium in major league baseball |
Baseball
Baseball
and the variant, softball, are popular participatory sports in the U.S.
The highest level of baseball in the U.S. is Major League Baseball. The
World Series of Major League Baseball is the culmination of the sport's
postseason each October. It is played between the winner of each of the
two leagues, the American League and the National League, and the
winner is determined through a best-of-seven playoff.
Notable
American baseball players in history include Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Cy
Young, Ted Williams, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Stan
Musial, Willie Mays, Sandy Koufax, Yogi Berra, Hank Aaron, Nolan Ryan,
Cal Ripken, Roger Clemens, and Jackie Robinson, who was instrumental in
dissolving the color line and allowing African-Americans into the major
leagues. The more noted players of today include Derek Jeter and Albert
Pujols.
Basketball was invented by James Naismith |
Basketball
Of
those Americans citing their favorite sport, basketball is ranked
second (counting amateur levels) behind football. However, in regards to
professional sports the NBA is ranked third in popularity. More
Americans play basketball than any other team sport, according to the
National Sporting Goods Association, with over 26 million Americans
playing basketball. Basketball was invented in 1891 by physical
education teacher James Naismith in Springfield, Massachusetts.
The
National Basketball Association, more popularly known as the NBA, is
the world's premier men's professional basketball league and one of the
major professional sports leagues of North America. It contains 30 teams
(29 teams in the U.S. and 1 in Canada) that play an 82-game season from
October to June. After the regular season, eight teams from each
conference compete in the playoffs for the Larry O'Brien Championship
Trophy. The American Basketball Association, active from 1967 until
1976, when it merged with the NBA, was the last major competitor of the
NBA.
US men's national basketball team at the 2008 summer Olympics |
Since
the 1992 Summer Olympics, NBA players have represented the United
States in international competition and won several important
tournaments. The Dream Team was the unofficial nickname of the United
States men's basketball team that won the gold medal at the 1992
Olympics.
Basketball
at both the college and high school levels is popular throughout the
country. Every March, a 68-team, six-round, single-elimination
tournament (commonly called March Madness) determines the national
champions of NCAA Division I men's college basketball.
Most
U.S. states also crown state champions among their high schools. Many
high school basketball teams have intense local followings, especially
in the Midwest and Upper South. Indiana has 10 of the 12 largest high
school gyms in the United States, and is famous for its basketball
passion, known as Hoosier Hysteria.
Kareem Abdul Jabbar, a notable NBA player |
Notable
NBA players in history include Wilt Chamberlain (4 time MVP), Bill
Russell (5 time MVP), Bob Pettit (11 time all NBA team), Bob Cousy (12
time all NBA team), Walt Frazier, Jerry West, (12 time all NBA team),
Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (6 time MVP), Magic Johnson (3 time
MVP), Larry Bird (3 time MVP), Michael Jordan (6 time finals MVP), John
Stockton (#1 in career assists and steals), Karl Malone (14 time all NBA
team), Shaquille O'Neal (3 time finals MVP) and Jason Kidd (#2 in
career assists and steals). Notable players in the NBA today include
Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Tim Duncan, Kevin Durant, Paul George, Dwyane
Wade, James Harden, Dwight Howard, Demarcus Cousins, Blake Griffin and
Carmelo Anthony.
Ever
since the 1990's, an increasing number of players born outside the
United States have signed with NBA teams, sparking league interest in
different parts of the world. Among the notable foreign-born players in
the NBA today are two-time MVP Steve Nash (a South Africa-born
Canadian), 2007 Finals MVP Tony Parker (France), and 11 time all-star
Dirk Nowitzki (Germany), the first European to win the NBA Most Valuable
Player Award.
Michael Jordan with hi coach Phil Jackson |
Aside
from its huge popularity as a high school and college sport in Indiana
and Kentucky, basketball may also be the most popular professional sport
in cities during particular periods when the local NBA team may be
enjoying an era of remarkable success, such as in Chicago during the
dynasty days of the Chicago Bulls and Michael Jordan during the 1990s,
or in Los Angeles ever since the Los Angeles Lakers developed as a
perennial powerhouse and title contender since the 1980's, becoming the
most popular sports team in the city and the league's glamor team in
part due to the many Hollywood stars regularly attending their games.
Professional basketball is also primarily followed in cities where there
are no other sports teams in the four major professional leagues, such
as in the case of the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Sacramento Kings, the
San Antonio Spurs, or the Portland Trail Blazers. New York City has also
had a long historical connection with college and professional
basketball, and many basketball legends initially developed their
reputations playing in the many playgrounds throughout the city. Madison
Square Garden, the home arena of the New York Knicks, is often referred
to as the "Mecca of basketball."
Soccer is increasing in popularity in the US |
Soccer
Soccer
(called "football" in most of the world), although not as popular in
the U.S. as certain American sports such as baseball and American
football, has been increasing in popularity in recent years. Soccer is
played by over 13 million people in the U.S., making it the third most
played sport in the U.S. Most Division 1 colleges field both a men's and
women's varsity soccer team. Many American sports fans, as compared to
decades ago, now follow international competitions such as the World
Cup, and club competitions such as the UEFA Champions League and
England's Premier League, and there is growing interest in the top local
professional league, Major League Soccer.
The
United States men's and women's senior national teams, as well as a
number of national youth teams for both sexes, represent the United
States in international soccer competitions and are governed by the
United States Soccer Federation (U.S. Soccer). The U.S. men's team is
one of only seven teams in the world to have qualified for every World
Cup since 1990.
A Football Stadium in America |
Major
League Soccer is the premier soccer league in the United States. MLS
has 19 clubs (16 from the U.S., 3 from Canada). The 34-game schedule
runs from mid-March to late October, with the playoffs and championship
in November. Soccer-specific stadiums continue to be built for MLS teams
around the country. Other professional soccer leagues in the U.S.
include the Division II North American Soccer League, the Division III
USL Pro, and the Major Indoor Soccer League.
Women's
professional soccer has not seen sustained success. The first two
attempts at fully professional leagues—the Women's United Soccer
Association and Women's Professional Soccer—each folded after playing
three seasons. U.S. Soccer has since established a new professional
league, the National Women's Soccer League, which started in 2013.
However, at the lower levels of the salary scale, the NWSL is
effectively semi-professional. The new league has financial and
operational backing from U.S. Soccer, and additional financial support
from the Canadian Soccer Association and Mexican Football Federation.
Pele played in NASL |
Many
notable international soccer players have played in NASL — including
Pelé, the Brazlian football legend, Eusébio, George Best, Franz
Beckenbauer, and Johan Cruyff — or in MLS — including Roberto Donadoni,
Lothar Matthäus, David Beckham, Thierry Henry, and Robbie Keane. Notable
international women to have played professionally in the U.S. include
Marta, Birgit Prinz, and Christine Sinclair.
The
best American soccer players enter the U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame.
Particularly notable American players, past and present, include Bert
Patenaude, Kyle Rote, Jr., Shep Messing, Roy Lassiter, Alexi Lalas, Cobi
Jones, Tony Meola, Eric Wynalda, Brad Friedel, Brian McBride, Kasey
Keller, Jeff Cunningham, Claudio Reyna, Eddie Pope, Landon Donovan, and
Clint Dempsey. Notable female American players include Mia Hamm,
Kristine Lilly, Brandi Chastain, Julie Foudy, Michelle Akers, Christie
Rampone, Abby Wambach, Hope Solo, and Alex Morgan.
Beach Volleyball has become popular |
Volleyball
Volleyball
is also a notable sport in the United States, especially at the college
and university levels. Unlike most Olympic sports which are sponsored
widely at the collegiate level for both sexes, the support for college
volleyball is dramatically skewed in favor of the women's game.
In
the 2011–12 school year, over 300 schools in NCAA Division I alone (the
highest of three NCAA tiers) sponsored women's volleyball at the
varsity level, while fewer than 100 schools in all three NCAA divisions
combined sponsored varsity men's volleyball, with only 23 of them in
Division I. This is partially due to Title IX; female-oriented sports
such as volleyball help balance a college's athletic opportunities for
women with those for men.
Beach volleyball has increasingly become popular in the United States, in part due to media exposure during the Olympic Games.
A Rugby Match in the United States |
Rugby Union
Rugby
union, popular in other English-speaking nations, is not as well known
in the United States. Rugby is played recreationally and in colleges,
though it is not governed by the NCAA There are more than 457,983
registered and unregistered players, with more than a quarter being
women. The semi-professional Rugby Super League is the premier domestic
competition. The U.S. national team competes at the Rugby World Cup. In
the sevens variation of the sport, the men's national team is one of 15
"core teams" that participate in every event of the annual IRB Sevens
World Series, and the women's national team is one of nine core teams in
the IRB Women's Sevens World Series.
Rugby
participation in the US has grown significantly in recent years,
growing by 350% between 2004 and 2011. A 2010 survey by the National
Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association ranked rugby as the fastest
growing sport in the US.
USA vs Tonga in 2007 Rugby World Cup |
Rugby's
profile in the U.S. has received a tremendous boost from the IOC's
announcement in 2009 that rugby would return to the Olympics in 2016.
Since the Olympic announcement, rugby events such as the Collegiate
Rugby Championship, the USA Sevens, and the Rugby World Cup have been
broadcast on network TV. The USA Sevens, held every year in February,
regularly draws more than 60,000 fans to Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas.
Two recent American presidents have been rugby players. Bill Clinton
developed an interest in rugby in England, playing at Oxford University.
George W. Bush was a keen player, during high school and University,
and was on Yale's 1st XV, and in 1968, he was part of their dramatic win
over Harvard.
A Water Polo Match |
Water Polo
Water
polo is a team water sport. The playing team consists of six field
players and one goalkeeper. The winner of the game is the team that
scores the most goals by getting the ball past the opposing team's
goalkeeper into the net. Gameplay involves swimming, players passing the
ball while being defended by opponents, and scoring by throwing into a
net defended by a goalie. Water polo, therefore, has strong similarities
to the land-based game of team handball. The frequency of 'man-up' (or
'power play') situations also draws comparisons with Ice hockey.
Cricket
Cricket,
another common sport in Commonwealth countries, is not a popular sport
in the U.S. Many amateur cricket leagues have been formed by Indian,
Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Australian, South African, English and Caribbean
(more specifically Commonwealth Caribbean) immigrants, and as a result,
the sport has made limited inroads into the mainstream sports community
because of a large influx of migrants from cricketing countries who
make up almost 16 million of the American population.
Cricket was the most popular sport in 18th century |
Cricket
used to be the most popular sport in America during the 18th century,
19th and early 20th centuries, when it suffered a rapid decline. In fact
the first intercollegiate tournament in America was a cricket
tournament.
The first annual Canada vs. U.S. cricket match, played since the 1840s,
was attended by 10,000 spectators at Bloomingdale Park in New York. The
U.S. vs. Canada cricket match is the oldest international sporting event
in the modern world, predating even today's Olympic Games by nearly 50
years. The U.S. participated in the 2004 ICC Champions Trophy where they
were comprehensively beaten in matches against Australia and New
Zealand. United States of America Cricket Association governs the
professional Cricket in the country and are an associate member of
International Cricket Council.
Cricket is slowly growing in popularity in the US |
United
States Cricket team currently plays in World Cricket League Division IV
to work their way up to 2013 Cricket World Cup Qualifier in order to
enter 2015 Cricket World Cup. In 2011, they played Americas Region
Twenty20 Division One tournament and qualified for the 2012 ICC World
Twenty20 Qualifier. United States Cricket team also plays in the ICC
Americas Championship and were qualified for ICC Intercontinental Cup in
the past.
United States Youth Cricket Association formed in 2010 to develop the
interest in sport among the young kids. Women's cricket is one of the
plans of USACA but it is a long road to build the infra-structure.
Cricket is one of the most watched pay per view sports in the U.S., and
multiple channels are provided by DirecTv, Dish Network and Comcast TV
services. Starting 2012, ESPN will broadcast Cricket on ESPN3 and on its
regular channels.
The
only professional Cricket Stadium in the U.S. is Central Broward
Regional Park located in Lauderhill, Florida. The Leo Magnus Cricket
Complex in Los Angeles and Philadelphia Cricket Club in Philadelphia are
few other established Cricket Grounds in the country that could qualify
to play professional Cricket. Compton Cricket Club is a private club in
Los Angeles that uses Cricket to promote Peace and good will among the
troubled neighborhood of Compton.
Disc Ultimate match in America |
Ultimate and Disc Sports (Frisbee)
Alternative
sports, using the flying disc, began in the mid-sixties. As numbers of
young people became alienated from social norms, they resisted and
looked for alternative recreational activities, including that of
throwing a Frisbee. What started with a few players like Victor
Malafronte, Z Weyand and Ken Westerfield experimenting with new ways of
throwing and catching a Frisbee, later would become known as playing
freestyle. Organized disc sports, in the 1970s, began with promotional
efforts from Wham-O, a few tournaments and professionals using Frisbee
show tours to perform at universities, fairs and sporting events. Disc
sports such as freestyle, double disc court, guts, disc ultimate and
disc golf became this sports first events. Two events, the team sport of
disc ultimate and disc golf are very popular worldwide and are now
being played semi professionally. The World Flying Disc Federation,
Professional Disc Golf Association, and the Freestyle Players
Association, are the official rules and sanctioning organizations for
flying disc sports worldwide.
Australian Rules Football match in the US |
Disc
ultimate is a team sport played with a flying disc. The object of the
game is to score points by passing the disc to members of your own team,
on a rectangular field, 120 yards (110m) by 40 yards (37m), until you
have successfully completed a pass to a team member in the opposing
teams end zone. There are currently over four million people that play
some form of organized ultimate in the US. Ultimate is also being played
semi professionally with two newly formed leagues, the American
Ultimate Disc League (AUDL) and Major League Ultimate (MLU).
Other Sports
Australian
rules football in the United States is a fast growing team and
spectator sport that was first played in the country in 1996. The United
States Australian Football League is the governing body for the sport
in the U.S., with various clubs and leagues around the country. The
National Championships are held annually. The United States men's
national Australian rules football team and the women's national team
both regularly play international matches and play in the Australian
Football International Cup, a tournament for all competing countries
apart from Australia.
Team Handball is not a popular game in the US |
Curling
is popular in northern states, possibly because of climate, proximity
to Canada, or Scandinavian heritage. The national popularity of curling
is growing after significant media coverage of the sport in the 2006 and
2010 Winter Olympics.
Gaelic
football and hurling are governed by North American GAA and New York
GAA. They do not have a high profile, but are developing sports, with
New York fielding a representative team in the All-Ireland Senior
Football Championship.
Team
handball, a common sport in European countries, is not a popular sport
in the U.S. The sport is mostly played in the country on the amateur
level. Handball is not a NCAA sport, but is played in the Summer
Olympics. The sport's governing body is USA Team Handball.
Angleball match in the United States of America |
Inline
hockey was invented by Americans as a way to play the sport in all
climates. The PIHA is the league with the largest number of professional
teams in the nation. Street hockey is a non-standard version of inline
hockey played by amateurs in informal games.
Other Team Recreational Activities
Angleball
is a high fitness sport developed in the 1940s by College Hall of Fame
football coach Rip Engle as a way for players to maintain physical
fitness in the off-season. It has light contact and minimal rules.
Angleball is used for muscle conditioning in the NFL, and for fun by
colleges, schools, camps and all-age groups. Because of angleball's
light contact gameplay that emphasizes skill, accuracy and endurance, it
has been called the best game ever developed for groups up to 40
composed of mixed ages and genders. Angleball gameplay is simple. Two
large balls are placed atop standards (normally 10' tall posts with a
10' radius circle around the post) at opposite sides of a field. Teams
pass a smaller ball back and forth, attempting to knock the other team's
ball off its perch with the smaller ball. An offensive player who is
touched by a defensive player cannot shoot for a goal and has three
seconds to pass the ball.
Capture the flag is played recreationally by adults and children.
Kickball is traditionally played in elementary school level |
Dodgeball
is played traditionally by children in school, though adult leagues in
urban areas have formed within the past 10 years. A caricatured version
was portrayed in the 2004 film comedy Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story.
Kickball
is also played recreationally by adults and children, especially at the
elementary school level. Its rules are largely identical to baseball,
except that no bat is used and instead a large rubber ball is rolled
along the ground for the "batter" to kick.
Roller
derby is a fast-growing contact sport played on roller skates. Roller
Derby was portrayed in the 2009 film Whip It and in the 2012 documentary
"Derby, Baby! A story of love, addiction and rink rash" Since September
2009, there were 350 women's, men's, and junior leagues in the U.S.A.
There are multiple Associations that govern roller derby: JRDA = Junior
Roller Derby Association MADE = Modern Athletic Derby Endeavor MRDA =
Men's Roller Derby Association OSDA = Old School Derby Association RDCL =
Roller Derby Coalition of Leagues USARS = USA Roller Sports WFTDA =
Women's Flat Track Derby Association WFTDA-AL = WFTDA Apprentice.
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