Constraints to Pickup Basketball Participation among Chinese American Women

ABSTRACT

This study examined Chinese American women's leisure experience within the context of male- and African/White American-dominated pickup basketball. Participants, who were serious basketball players, encountered numerous constraints unique to their identities as Asian females, and these were inexorably linked to how pickup basketball is organized in the United States. While some informants stopped playing basketball because of constraints, others developed ingenious negotiation strategies to combat constraints and to maintain participation.

KEYWORDS:

• Chinese American women
• leisure constraints
• negotiation
• pickup basketball