Summary

Before the arrival of Europeans, Mesoamerican indigenous populations participated in various ball games that served some form of cultural and religious ritual. In an effort to suppress indigenous traditions, Spaniards introduced colonial sporting practices using animals. In the 19th century, British merchants brought cricket, soccer, and tennis to South America and the Caribbean, and occupying US soldiers disseminated baseball and other modern sports throughout Latin America. During the early 20th century, Latino/a immigrants and their children embraced European and American sporting practices, but they also used sports to express cultural and ethnic pride while rejecting Euro-American patronizing messages. As the financial crisis and anti-immigrant anxieties worsened during the Great Depression, sports took on a more political meaning to combat negative stereotypes. With professional sports coming to a halt, Latino/a organizations stepped up efforts to organize amateur athletic competitions. Their fight for equality in sports became more visible after World War II when they sacrificed their lives abroad only to return home to limited opportunities in jobs, education, and politics. During the 1960s civil rights movement, Latino/as used sports as a platform to speak about the social injustices their communities faced. The dramatic growth of the US Latino population since 1980 has alerted sports industry leaders that Latino/a fans and athletes are the future of US sports. Into the 21st century, Latino/as will continue to use sports to assert their identity while stressing their community’s integral place within American society.