Without even running the numbers, it doesn’t take a genius to tell you that it is abundantly clear that a significant portion of the basketball population is black.
As of 2020, just over 74% of NBA players identify as black.
As a black kid, the first thing you are asked by literally anyone is do you play basketball or run track. Every black kid gets this question at least once in their life.
First of all, not only do people assume you play basketball or run track, they assume you’re an athlete in the first place!
After basketball and track, I’d say the next assumed sport after that is football. The last thing they’d expect from you is to say hockey given that when it comes to hockey the ice is in fact white. So as a former black female hockey player myself, I am definitely an outlier here.
These assumptions stem from our society’s habit of attribution bias - when people infer that a person’s behaviour is due to situational factors.
These assumptions of athletic performance all tie back to the notion of “Black Athletic Superiority” which is a theory that states that black people possess certain traits that are acquired by genetics and the environment in which they live which allows them to excel over other races in athletic competition.
A decade ago, the Journal of Black Studies published a research article analyzing the perception of sport socialization from the intercollegiate athlete’s perspective. What they discovered is that “an elevated level of sports socialization in the family, neighbourhood, and media exists within the African American community [which] creates an overrepresentation of African American males in certain sport”.
In fact, when compared to whites, African American males are deliberately socialized to basketball by limiting their exposure to other hobbies with the intention of pushing sports as a possible career path. The research on this study concluded that 75% of respondents identified African American athletes as their role models.
The most significant element of black culture that is now part of the game of basketball is Hip Hop. Elements of Hip hop culture have heavily influenced the game from everything from fashion to storytelling.
Because of the dominant black population in the NBA, of all major sports fashion has the strongest influence on basketball. This once again all goes back to history. Over time, as black people, we have an increased value in experiencing ourselves through our physical appearance in hopes of rebelling against the trends and expectations to dress and appear as white people.
Summary: Basketball is black for the following reasons
- Because society reinforced the stereotype that blacks are natural athletes because of their enslaved ancestors which ultimately socialized black people to sports.
- Because of the overrepresentation of black males in certain sports namely basketball due to a mentality that becoming a pro athlete is a feasible way for black males to make a name for themselves.
- As well, the increased socialization of sport in black communities allowed black culture to heavily influence the game of basketball with fashion being the most influential element of black culture shaping the sport.
