Americans famously do not care as much about soccer as the rest of the world. We follow it a little bit—everyone knows a guy who loves the Premier League—but generally Americans are less familiar with soccer teams and rules than other sports. The typical lack of comprehension of soccer is the premise that Ted Lasso needed to exist as a show. And while our women are good at playing soccer—the women’s national team has a distinguished legacy and some of the players are household names—our men’s national team has never excelled in international competition and often fails to advance in tournament play.
On top of all that, most other countries don’t call it “soccer.” The sport we call soccer is better known as “football,” “futbol,” etc., etc. And this is the basis of a number of jokes and quips and digs. Internationally, many other countries more-or-less roll their eyes about “soccer.” And people will very pointedly remind Americans that we need to distinguish between “football” and “American football.” To be fair, sometimes it is the reverse—we act as though we have the real football and there is no point in learning about the other one.
With the different terminology has come a certain amount of shame. There is an underlying assumption that Americans are basically silly or strange for calling the sport “soccer.” The general public, here and in many countries overseas, seems to think that this is a funny “Americanism.” Perhaps we were confused. Perhaps we are still confused. Many Americans who love soccer will talk about “real football”—ashamed to use the term that was used to introduce them to the sport when they were children.
In reality, we weren’t the first to call it soccer and there’s nothing at all wrong with that term. If you are a historian and read through old sources, you can actually observe something pretty interesting. Plenty of English people called “football” “soccer” in the past. You will find it in letters and diaries and published works. Soccer is not particular to this side of the pond or the fringes of empire. The term is of English origin. The term “soccer” originated in England and first stepped onto the pitch in the 1880s.
The term “soccer” was a nickname for “association football,” which was how the sport was distinguished from the many other things that could then be referred to by the term “football.” What else could be football? Gaelic football, rugby football, Australian rules football… A number of things. Rugby and football/soccer, in particular, were initially not very distinct in the nineteenth century, but were becoming clearly distinguished. That distinction was part of the point of the “laws of the game,” which formalized by the nineteenth-century, English, Football Association. Association football is what you would know as soccer: 11 players, the acceptable field dimensions, the prohibition of the use of hands on the pitch by anyone not the goalie, etc.
If we go back far enough, lots of English-speakers were using the term “soccer” along with “football.” The United States initially used both terms. In the 1910s, we had a United States Football Association, which only became the United States Soccer Football Association in 1945. As American football picked up, “soccer” really became the best term and we kept it, only really using football for the event with a pigskin in the gridiron. In the meantime, “soccer” fell out of favor in the UK. Soccer has stuck around more in other countries that have more other things which are called “football.” The next time someone tries to tease you for using the term “soccer,” you should not endure the teasing too easily. If anything, Americans are being more precise in using the term “soccer” than people who use the term “football.” “Soccer” is also a reminder of the history of the sport and the importance of the standardization that came in the nineteenth-century. Those who only use “football” can even be accused of erasure—past or present—of other sports and sporting heritage. Getting into an argument about the politics of the language we use to refer to sports and how we distinguish the formal from the informal and community-based and how we decide which terms to privilege is probably not at all worth the energy. But the argument is there if you need it and it does mean you needn’t let anyone give you a hard time for saying “soccer.”