Still trying to figure out why American’s don’t like American soccer
*Disclaimer: I disapprove of using the term American to describe only the United States but if I phrased it any other way the title would have been a paragraph on its own.
It was early in the season and we were drawing practice to a close early. The RAC neglected to set the timer for the lights over the turf and it was getting too dark to follow the ball so the captain called the team to sit down together for a little team bonding- starting with some icebreaker questions, such as: “what is your favorite flavor ice cream?” and “what is your favorite TV show?” I decided to ask my teammates which soccer team they supported. To my surprise, many responded that they did not have a team that they favored and most did not watch it at all. I had assumed that since all of the girls on the team played the sport, they would be interested in following it outside of practice as well.
[You would think I would eventually learn to stop assuming anything when it came to soccer in the United States, but it seems that may be a lost cause.]
Interestingly enough, I have found that the majority of my North American friends who watch soccer do not actually play soccer. Additionally, few, if any, of these friends support the US national team or other MLS teams. The only friends of mine who both play and watch the sport were either born and raised in other countries, or were born first generation in the United States and still raised traditionally to their parents’ countries culture.
I felt like I could relate this experience to our reading for this week, Fado Resounding, by Lila Ellen Gray. In Fado Resounding, Gray talks about her experiences from her time in Lisbon, Portugal. She tells of how everyone in the fado circle is both a listener and a participant. Everyone in the audience is a trained listener, and that is where each fadista starts. From there, they join in on the refrains and eventually sing on their own in front of the group in a tasca or casa de fado. However, (nearly) everyone in the fado circle is Portuguese, following a theme of ‘authenticity-place-nation-genre-soul’. Gray is from the United States, and sought out people in Lisbon to help her pursue her research and her love of fado. She was told:
“You are not Portuguese. Fado is our music just like the flamenco is from Spain and the samba is from Brazil- just like you need to be American to sing country or blues. To sing fado you must be from here” (48)
How does this relate to soccer in the United States at all? The fado circles consist of listeners and singers. You cannot be a singer without being a listener. North American soccer, however, does not follow a similar requirement. You do not have to watch or observe the sport in order to play the sport. You can simply go to practice and learn how to play and leave your infatuation with the game on the pitch. From my travels and time spent abroad, I have found that this is not the case in European countries. Is this an American-soccer thing? Is this why soccer fans in America do not feverishly follow our national team- because many do not feel the need to fully invest in the sport? Where is the disconnect? Why can’t we have as much pride in our national soccer team as the Portuguese have in their fadistas?
