Football (word)
Encyclopedia
The English language
word football may mean any one of several team sport
s (or the ball
used in that respective sport), depending on the national or regional origin and location of the person using the word.
Where English is a first language the unqualified use of the word football is used to refer to the most popular code of football
in that region. The sports most frequently referred to as simply football are association football, American football
, Australian rules football
, Canadian football
, Gaelic football
, rugby league football
and rugby union football
.
Of the 45 national FIFA
(Fédération Internationale de Football Association) affiliates in which English is an official or primary language, 43 use football in their organisations' official names (only Canada
and United States
use soccer). Soccer has been the prevailing term for association football in the US, Canada, Australia
, New Zealand
, and South Africa
, where other codes of football are dominant. The term used for association football is going through a period of transition in recent times. In 2005, Australia's association football governing body changed its name from soccer to football to align with the general international usage of the term. In 2006, New Zealand decided to follow suit citing "the international game is called football".
There are also many other languages where the common term for association football uses a phonetically similar word to the English term football. (See the Names for association football article.)
(OED) records that the first written use of the word football used to describe a game was in 1424 in an Act forbidding it. The first written use of the word football to describe the ball was 1486, and that the first use as a verb (hence footballing) was in 1599. Allthough the OED just indicates it is a compound of foot and ball, the 1486 definition indicates that a ball was of the essence of the game.
Although it is widely assumed that the word football, or "foot ball", originated in reference to the action of a foot kicking a ball, this may be a false etymology
. An alternative explanation has it that the word originally referred to a variety of games in medieval Europe, which were played on foot. These sports were usually played by peasant
s, as opposed to the horse-riding
sports more often enjoyed by aristocrat
s. This explanation is supported by the fact that the word football has always implied a wide variety of games played on foot, not just those that revolved around kicking a ball. In some cases, the word has been applied to games which involved carrying a ball and specifically banned kicking. For example, the English
writer William Hone
, writing in 1825 or 1826, quotes the social commentator Sir Frederick Morton Eden
, regarding a game — which Hone refers to as "Foot-Ball" — played in the parish of Scone, Perthshire
:
However, there is no conclusive evidence for either hypothesis regarding the origins of the word.
The word "soccer" originated as an Oxford "-er" slang abbreviation of "association", and was popularized in the late nineteenth century by a prominent English footballer, Charles Wreford-Brown. This origin is evident in the sometimes-heard variation, "soccer football".
the term "football" is ambiguous and can mean up to four different codes of football in Australian English
, depending on the context, geographical location and cultural factors; this includes Australian rules football
, rugby league
, association football and rugby union. The most common usage of the word among the people is between the former two. In the states of Victoria
, Western Australia
, South Australia
and Tasmania
football commonly means the Australian rules football variant with their league the Australian Football League
, the slang term footy is also used in an unofficial context, while in these states the two rugby football
codes are called rugby. There is a different situation in New South Wales
, Queensland
and ACT
, where rugby league
is most popular and known as just league, football or the slang footy instead and Australian rules football is known as
AFL, Australian football or Aussie rules, while rugby union is known as rugby, "union" and also simply football or footy.
, "football" can refer to association football, but more often refers to Canadian football
or American football
, often differentiated as either "CFL" (from the governing Canadian Football League
) or "NFL" (from the US National Football League
). Because of the similarity between the games, many people in both countries do not consider the two styles of gridiron football separate sports per se, but rather different codes of the same sport. If a Canadian were to say, "My brother plays football in the States", it would be clear from context that American football is meant. Association football, which is rapidly gaining in popularity, is called soccer by most, however, as Canada is a very multicultural country, those with strong ties to their foreign heritage, as well as those who have a serious level of involvement in the sport will often refer to association football simply as "football". In fact, the MLS franchises in Toronto and Vancouver are respectively known as Toronto FC and Vancouver Whitecaps FC, with "FC" standing for "Football Club" in both cases. The topic of which football code is the "true" football can be the source for serious disagreement between fans of association football and either or both of the gridiron codes, as each wish to lay claim to the title. As the popularity of association football in Canada increases with greater access to international matches on television as well as the rising profile of Canadian teams in domestic leagues, it can be said that this is only the beginning of this debate. Canadian French
usage parallels English usage, with le football usually referring to Canadian or American football, and le soccer referring to association football. When there is ambiguity, le football canadien or le football américain is used.
Rugby union football in Canada is almost always referred to as simply "rugby" as there is next to no rugby league played in the country.
Caribbean
, with the exception of the Bahamas where the term "football" is used exclusively (as it is in Bermuda too), "football" and "soccer" are both used to refer to association football, but use of the word "football" is far more common. The nickname of the Trinidad & Tobago team, "The Soca
Warriors", refers to a style of music, not the word soccer.
, "football" can mean association football, Gaelic football
or rugby union
Any of these sports may be called football depending on the context; usage of the term football without context is generally avoided because of its ambiguity. Full names are used to overcome this ambiguity: instead of football, Gaelic football, rugby football or rugby union and association football or soccer are used. This is the approach taken by most of the Irish media
.
In New Zealand
, the word football most commonly means rugby union due to the huge success of the All Blacks
national side; this sport is better-known as just rugby. The word football is also used to a lesser extent to refer to rugby league or association football. The slang term footie generally only means either of the two codes of rugby football
, while rugby league is traditionally known as rugby league or just league. Association football is usually known as soccer by the general population; however usage of the term is going through a period of transition in recent times as the federation changed its name to New Zealand Football from New Zealand Soccer and the nickname of its women's team to Football Ferns from SWANZ.
, the word football generally refers to association football. However, association football is commonly known as soccer despite this. The domestic first division is the Premier Soccer League
and both in conversation and the media (see e.g. The Sowetan
or Independent Online
), the term "soccer" is used. Despite this, the country's national association is called the South African Football Association
and "football" is mostly used in official contexts.
Rugby union
is another popular football code in South Africa, but it is commonly known as just rugby or sometimes rugby union to distinguish it from rugby league
, which has a smaller presence.
tends to refer to the most popular code of football in the country, which in the case of England
and Scotland
is association football. However the term "soccer" is understood by all as a name for association football in the same way that colloquial term rugger
is used for rugby union
. The word "soccer" was in fact the most common way of referring to association football in the UK until around the 1970s, when it began to be perceived incorrectly as an Americanism. On the other hand this could merely be a confusion brought about by erroneous claims in "Soccer: A way to annoy the GM" (op cit pp 456-90 and passim) by P J Boner a defrocked priest and screamer.
For fans who are more interested in other codes of football, within their sporting community, the use the word football may refer to their own code and they may call association football soccer for brevity and clarity. However even within such sporting communities an unqualified mention of football would usually be a reference to association football. In its heartlands, rugby league
is referred to as either "football" or just "league".
Irish nationalists in Northern Ireland
may use "football" for Gaelic football (see above). Outside the nationalist community in Northern Ireland, Gaelic football is usually known as Gaelic football.
American football is usually known by that name or "gridiron", a name made familiar to a wider British audience by Channel 4
, when it showed American football on Saturday evenings in 1982-92.
In the United States
, the word "football" refers to American Football
. Association football is called "soccer". Soccer is a less popular spectator sport, though it does have a considerable following, particularly among younger people and immigrants. Soccer is one of the most popular participatory sports in the United States among children (though its popularity is equaled or eclipsed by other sports in certain regions, especially baseball
and ice hockey
). Rugby union is generally known as rugby, with the "union" name rarely used. Gaelic football and rugby league have very small, albeit growing, numbers of adherents. Most people in the US are not usually aware of the distinction between rugby union and rugby league, and consequently both are referred to simply as "rugby". Because of the number of American players in the Canadian Football League
, a small number of Americans follow Canadian football
, which is occasionally broadcast on American cable channels. Because of the similarity between American and Canadian football, many people in both countries do not consider the two styles of football separate sports per se, but rather different codes of the same sport. If an American were to say, "My brother plays football in Canada", it would be clear from context that Canadian football
is meant.
s for association football. Examples include:
This has contributed to the adoption of the word football into the auxiliary language Interlingua
.
The loanwords bear little or no resemblance to the native words for "foot" and "ball". By contrast, some languages have calque
s of "football": their speakers use equivalent terms that combine their words for "foot" and "ball". An example is the Greek ποδόσφαιρο (podósfero).
By contrast, in German
, "Football" is a loanword for American football, while the German word Fußball, a calque of "football" (Fuß = "foot", Ball = "ball"), means association football. The same goes for Dutch
voetbal (voet = "foot", bal = "ball"), Swedish
fotboll (fot = "foot", boll = "ball"), and so on — the words for "foot" and "ball" are very similar in all the Germanic languages. Only two Germanic languages do not use "football" or a calque thereof as their primary word for association football:
The Celtic languages
also generally refer to association football with calques of "football" — an example is the Welsh
pêl-droed. However, Irish
, which like Afrikaans is native to a country where "soccer" is the most common English term for the sport, uses sacar.
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
word football may mean any one of several team sport
Team sport
A team sport includes any sport which involves players working together towards a shared objective. A team sport is an activity in which a group of individuals, on the same team, work together to accomplish an ultimate goal which is usually to win. This can be done in a number of ways such as...
s (or the ball
Football (ball)
A football is an inflated ball used to play one of the various sports known as football.The first balls were made of natural materials, such as an inflated pig bladder, sometimes inside a leather cover...
used in that respective sport), depending on the national or regional origin and location of the person using the word.
Where English is a first language the unqualified use of the word football is used to refer to the most popular code of football
Football
Football may refer to one of a number of team sports which all involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball with the foot to score a goal. The most popular of these sports worldwide is association football, more commonly known as just "football" or "soccer"...
in that region. The sports most frequently referred to as simply football are association football, American football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
, Australian rules football
Australian rules football
Australian rules football, officially known as Australian football, also called football, Aussie rules or footy is a sport played between two teams of 22 players on either...
, Canadian football
Canadian football
Canadian football is a form of gridiron football played exclusively in Canada in which two teams of 12 players each compete for territorial control of a field of play long and wide attempting to advance a pointed prolate spheroid ball into the opposing team's scoring area...
, Gaelic football
Gaelic football
Gaelic football , commonly referred to as "football" or "Gaelic", or "Gah" is a form of football played mainly in Ireland...
, rugby league football
Rugby league
Rugby league football, usually called rugby league, is a full contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. One of the two codes of rugby football, it originated in England in 1895 by a split from Rugby Football Union over paying players...
and rugby union football
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...
.
Of the 45 national FIFA
FIFA
The Fédération Internationale de Football Association , commonly known by the acronym FIFA , is the international governing body of :association football, futsal and beach football. Its headquarters are located in Zurich, Switzerland, and its president is Sepp Blatter, who is in his fourth...
(Fédération Internationale de Football Association) affiliates in which English is an official or primary language, 43 use football in their organisations' official names (only Canada
Canadian Soccer Association
The Canadian Soccer Association is the governing body of soccer in Canada. It is a national organization that oversees the Canadian men's and women's national teams for international play, as well as the respective junior sides...
and United States
United States Soccer Federation
The United States Soccer Federation is the official governing body of the sport of soccer in the United States. Its headquarters are located in Chicago, Illinois. It is a member of FIFA and is responsible for governing amateur and professional soccer, including the men's, women's, youth, futsal...
use soccer). Soccer has been the prevailing term for association football in the US, Canada, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
, and South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, where other codes of football are dominant. The term used for association football is going through a period of transition in recent times. In 2005, Australia's association football governing body changed its name from soccer to football to align with the general international usage of the term. In 2006, New Zealand decided to follow suit citing "the international game is called football".
There are also many other languages where the common term for association football uses a phonetically similar word to the English term football. (See the Names for association football article.)
Etymology
The Oxford English DictionaryOxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
(OED) records that the first written use of the word football used to describe a game was in 1424 in an Act forbidding it. The first written use of the word football to describe the ball was 1486, and that the first use as a verb (hence footballing) was in 1599. Allthough the OED just indicates it is a compound of foot and ball, the 1486 definition indicates that a ball was of the essence of the game.
Although it is widely assumed that the word football, or "foot ball", originated in reference to the action of a foot kicking a ball, this may be a false etymology
False etymology
Folk etymology is change in a word or phrase over time resulting from the replacement of an unfamiliar form by a more familiar one. Unanalyzable borrowings from foreign languages, like asparagus, or old compounds such as samblind which have lost their iconic motivation are...
. An alternative explanation has it that the word originally referred to a variety of games in medieval Europe, which were played on foot. These sports were usually played by peasant
Peasant
A peasant is an agricultural worker who generally tend to be poor and homeless-Etymology:The word is derived from 15th century French païsant meaning one from the pays, or countryside, ultimately from the Latin pagus, or outlying administrative district.- Position in society :Peasants typically...
s, as opposed to the horse-riding
Equestrianism
Equestrianism more often known as riding, horseback riding or horse riding refers to the skill of riding, driving, or vaulting with horses...
sports more often enjoyed by aristocrat
Aristocracy (class)
The aristocracy are people considered to be in the highest social class in a society which has or once had a political system of Aristocracy. Aristocrats possess hereditary titles granted by a monarch, which once granted them feudal or legal privileges, or deriving, as in Ancient Greece and India,...
s. This explanation is supported by the fact that the word football has always implied a wide variety of games played on foot, not just those that revolved around kicking a ball. In some cases, the word has been applied to games which involved carrying a ball and specifically banned kicking. For example, the English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
writer William Hone
William Hone
William Hone was an English writer, satirist and bookseller. His victorious court battle against government censorship in 1817 marked a turning point in the fight for British press freedom.-Biography:...
, writing in 1825 or 1826, quotes the social commentator Sir Frederick Morton Eden
Frederick Morton Eden
Sir Frederick Morton Eden, 2nd Baronet, of Maryland was an English writer on poverty and pioneering social investigator.-Early life:...
, regarding a game — which Hone refers to as "Foot-Ball" — played in the parish of Scone, Perthshire
Scone, Scotland
Scone is a village in Perth and Kinross, Scotland. The medieval village of Scone, which grew up around the monastery and royal residence, was abandoned in the early 19th century when the residents were removed and a new palace was built on the site by the Earl of Mansfield...
:
The game was this: he who at any time got the ball into his hands, run [sic] with it till overtaken by one of the opposite part; and then, if he could shake himself loose from those on the opposite side who seized him, he run on; if not, he threw the ball from him, unless it was wrested from him by the other party, but no person was allowed to kick it. [Emphasis added.]
However, there is no conclusive evidence for either hypothesis regarding the origins of the word.
The word "soccer" originated as an Oxford "-er" slang abbreviation of "association", and was popularized in the late nineteenth century by a prominent English footballer, Charles Wreford-Brown. This origin is evident in the sometimes-heard variation, "soccer football".
Australia
Within AustraliaAustralia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
the term "football" is ambiguous and can mean up to four different codes of football in Australian English
Australian English
Australian English is the name given to the group of dialects spoken in Australia that form a major variety of the English language....
, depending on the context, geographical location and cultural factors; this includes Australian rules football
Australian rules football
Australian rules football, officially known as Australian football, also called football, Aussie rules or footy is a sport played between two teams of 22 players on either...
, rugby league
Rugby league
Rugby league football, usually called rugby league, is a full contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. One of the two codes of rugby football, it originated in England in 1895 by a split from Rugby Football Union over paying players...
, association football and rugby union. The most common usage of the word among the people is between the former two. In the states of Victoria
Victoria (Australia)
Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....
, Western Australia
Western Australia
Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...
, South Australia
South Australia
South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...
and Tasmania
Tasmania
Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...
football commonly means the Australian rules football variant with their league the Australian Football League
Australian Football League
The Australian Football League is both the governing body and the major professional competition in the sport of Australian rules football...
, the slang term footy is also used in an unofficial context, while in these states the two rugby football
Rugby football
Rugby football is a style of football named after Rugby School in the United Kingdom. It is seen most prominently in two current sports, rugby league and rugby union.-History:...
codes are called rugby. There is a different situation in New South Wales
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
, Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
and ACT
Australian Capital Territory
The Australian Capital Territory, often abbreviated ACT, is the capital territory of the Commonwealth of Australia and is the smallest self-governing internal territory...
, where rugby league
Rugby league
Rugby league football, usually called rugby league, is a full contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. One of the two codes of rugby football, it originated in England in 1895 by a split from Rugby Football Union over paying players...
is most popular and known as just league, football or the slang footy instead and Australian rules football is known as
Names of Australian rules football
Australian rules football has had a number of different names throughout its history. The official name according to the sport's governing body, the Australian Football League, is Australian football...
AFL, Australian football or Aussie rules, while rugby union is known as rugby, "union" and also simply football or footy.
Canada
In CanadaCanada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, "football" can refer to association football, but more often refers to Canadian football
Canadian football
Canadian football is a form of gridiron football played exclusively in Canada in which two teams of 12 players each compete for territorial control of a field of play long and wide attempting to advance a pointed prolate spheroid ball into the opposing team's scoring area...
or American football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
, often differentiated as either "CFL" (from the governing Canadian Football League
Canadian Football League
The Canadian Football League or CFL is a professional sports league located in Canada. The CFL is the highest level of competition in Canadian football, a form of gridiron football closely related to American football....
) or "NFL" (from the US National Football League
National Football League
The National Football League is the highest level of professional American football in the United States, and is considered the top professional American football league in the world. It was formed by eleven teams in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, with the league changing...
). Because of the similarity between the games, many people in both countries do not consider the two styles of gridiron football separate sports per se, but rather different codes of the same sport. If a Canadian were to say, "My brother plays football in the States", it would be clear from context that American football is meant. Association football, which is rapidly gaining in popularity, is called soccer by most, however, as Canada is a very multicultural country, those with strong ties to their foreign heritage, as well as those who have a serious level of involvement in the sport will often refer to association football simply as "football". In fact, the MLS franchises in Toronto and Vancouver are respectively known as Toronto FC and Vancouver Whitecaps FC, with "FC" standing for "Football Club" in both cases. The topic of which football code is the "true" football can be the source for serious disagreement between fans of association football and either or both of the gridiron codes, as each wish to lay claim to the title. As the popularity of association football in Canada increases with greater access to international matches on television as well as the rising profile of Canadian teams in domestic leagues, it can be said that this is only the beginning of this debate. Canadian French
Canadian French
Canadian French is an umbrella term referring to the varieties of French spoken in Canada. French is the mother tongue of nearly seven million Canadians, a figure constituting roughly 22% of the national population. At the federal level it has co-official status alongside English...
usage parallels English usage, with le football usually referring to Canadian or American football, and le soccer referring to association football. When there is ambiguity, le football canadien or le football américain is used.
Rugby union football in Canada is almost always referred to as simply "rugby" as there is next to no rugby league played in the country.
Caribbean
In the English-speakingAnglophone Caribbean
The term Commonwealth Caribbean is used to refer to the independent English-speaking countries of the Caribbean region. Upon a country's full independence from the United Kingdom, Anglophone Caribbean or Commonwealth Caribbean traditionally becomes the preferred sub-regional term as a replacement...
Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...
, with the exception of the Bahamas where the term "football" is used exclusively (as it is in Bermuda too), "football" and "soccer" are both used to refer to association football, but use of the word "football" is far more common. The nickname of the Trinidad & Tobago team, "The Soca
Soca music
Soca is a style of music from Trinidad and Tobago. Soca is a musical development of traditional Trinidadian calypso, through loans from the 1960s onwards from predominantly black popular music....
Warriors", refers to a style of music, not the word soccer.
Ireland
In IrelandRepublic of Ireland
Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
, "football" can mean association football, Gaelic football
Gaelic football
Gaelic football , commonly referred to as "football" or "Gaelic", or "Gah" is a form of football played mainly in Ireland...
or rugby union
Rugby union in Ireland
Rugby union is a popular team sport played in Ireland. The sport is organised on an all-Ireland basis with one team, governing body and league for both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland...
Any of these sports may be called football depending on the context; usage of the term football without context is generally avoided because of its ambiguity. Full names are used to overcome this ambiguity: instead of football, Gaelic football, rugby football or rugby union and association football or soccer are used. This is the approach taken by most of the Irish media
Media in Ireland
The media in Ireland include all the media and communications outlets of any other developed nation.-Press freedom:Ireland has freedom of the press enshrined in its constitution. The NGO group Reporters sans frontières named Ireland in joint first position in their "Worldwide press freedom index"...
.
New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
, the word football most commonly means rugby union due to the huge success of the All Blacks
All Blacks
The New Zealand men's national rugby union team, known as the All Blacks, represent New Zealand in what is regarded as its national sport....
national side; this sport is better-known as just rugby. The word football is also used to a lesser extent to refer to rugby league or association football. The slang term footie generally only means either of the two codes of rugby football
Rugby football
Rugby football is a style of football named after Rugby School in the United Kingdom. It is seen most prominently in two current sports, rugby league and rugby union.-History:...
, while rugby league is traditionally known as rugby league or just league. Association football is usually known as soccer by the general population; however usage of the term is going through a period of transition in recent times as the federation changed its name to New Zealand Football from New Zealand Soccer and the nickname of its women's team to Football Ferns from SWANZ.
South Africa
In South AfricaSouth Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, the word football generally refers to association football. However, association football is commonly known as soccer despite this. The domestic first division is the Premier Soccer League
Premier Soccer League
Premier Soccer League is the trading name of the National Soccer League of South Africa. The top league is the ABSA Premiership, sponsored by ABSA...
and both in conversation and the media (see e.g. The Sowetan
The Sowetan
The Sowetan is an English language, South African newspaper that started in 1981 as a liberation struggle newspaper and was freely distributed to households in the black township of Soweto, Johannesburg, Gauteng Province....
or Independent Online
Independent Online (South Africa)
Independent Online, or IOL is a news and information website based in South Africa. It is owned by the Independent News & Media organisation, which is the largest publisher of print material in South Africa....
), the term "soccer" is used. Despite this, the country's national association is called the South African Football Association
South African Football Association
The South African Football Association or SAFA is the governing body of football in South Africa.-History:The South African Football Association was founded on 8 December, 1991, the culmination of a long unity process that was to rid the sport in South Africa of all its past racial division.Four...
and "football" is mostly used in official contexts.
Rugby union
Rugby union in South Africa
Rugby union is a popular team sport played in South Africa. Along with cricket and football it is one of the most popular ball sports in South Africa...
is another popular football code in South Africa, but it is commonly known as just rugby or sometimes rugby union to distinguish it from rugby league
Rugby league in South Africa
Rugby league is a team sport played in South Africa. There has been three dynasties of rugby league in South Africa that attempted to establish a thriving rugby league. Not all attempts were in the interest of South Africans; rather an interest in financial windfall...
, which has a smaller presence.
United Kingdom
The unqualified use of "football" in the United KingdomUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
tends to refer to the most popular code of football in the country, which in the case of England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
and Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
is association football. However the term "soccer" is understood by all as a name for association football in the same way that colloquial term rugger
Rugger
Rugger may mean:*A slang word for rugby football, or for one who plays rugby football*List of Star Wars creatures#Ruggers, a species of animal in the Star Wars fictional scenario*A person who makes rugs, or a tool used when making rugs...
is used for rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...
. The word "soccer" was in fact the most common way of referring to association football in the UK until around the 1970s, when it began to be perceived incorrectly as an Americanism. On the other hand this could merely be a confusion brought about by erroneous claims in "Soccer: A way to annoy the GM" (op cit pp 456-90 and passim) by P J Boner a defrocked priest and screamer.
For fans who are more interested in other codes of football, within their sporting community, the use the word football may refer to their own code and they may call association football soccer for brevity and clarity. However even within such sporting communities an unqualified mention of football would usually be a reference to association football. In its heartlands, rugby league
Rugby league
Rugby league football, usually called rugby league, is a full contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. One of the two codes of rugby football, it originated in England in 1895 by a split from Rugby Football Union over paying players...
is referred to as either "football" or just "league".
Irish nationalists in Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland is one of the four countries of the United Kingdom. Situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, it shares a border with the Republic of Ireland to the south and west...
may use "football" for Gaelic football (see above). Outside the nationalist community in Northern Ireland, Gaelic football is usually known as Gaelic football.
American football is usually known by that name or "gridiron", a name made familiar to a wider British audience by Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, when it showed American football on Saturday evenings in 1982-92.
United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, the word "football" refers to American Football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
. Association football is called "soccer". Soccer is a less popular spectator sport, though it does have a considerable following, particularly among younger people and immigrants. Soccer is one of the most popular participatory sports in the United States among children (though its popularity is equaled or eclipsed by other sports in certain regions, especially baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
and ice hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take...
). Rugby union is generally known as rugby, with the "union" name rarely used. Gaelic football and rugby league have very small, albeit growing, numbers of adherents. Most people in the US are not usually aware of the distinction between rugby union and rugby league, and consequently both are referred to simply as "rugby". Because of the number of American players in the Canadian Football League
Canadian Football League
The Canadian Football League or CFL is a professional sports league located in Canada. The CFL is the highest level of competition in Canadian football, a form of gridiron football closely related to American football....
, a small number of Americans follow Canadian football
Canadian football
Canadian football is a form of gridiron football played exclusively in Canada in which two teams of 12 players each compete for territorial control of a field of play long and wide attempting to advance a pointed prolate spheroid ball into the opposing team's scoring area...
, which is occasionally broadcast on American cable channels. Because of the similarity between American and Canadian football, many people in both countries do not consider the two styles of football separate sports per se, but rather different codes of the same sport. If an American were to say, "My brother plays football in Canada", it would be clear from context that Canadian football
Canadian football
Canadian football is a form of gridiron football played exclusively in Canada in which two teams of 12 players each compete for territorial control of a field of play long and wide attempting to advance a pointed prolate spheroid ball into the opposing team's scoring area...
is meant.
"Football" as a loanword
Many languages use the English word "football" and variations of it as loanwordLoanword
A loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
s for association football. Examples include:
- CatalanCatalan languageCatalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island...
: futbol - CzechCzech languageCzech is a West Slavic language with about 12 million native speakers; it is the majority language in the Czech Republic and spoken by Czechs worldwide. The language was known as Bohemian in English until the late 19th century...
: fotbal - FrenchFrench languageFrench is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
: football (le foot) - PortuguesePortuguese languagePortuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
: futebol - SpanishSpanish languageSpanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
: fútbol or futbol - TurkishTurkish languageTurkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...
: futbol - SerbianSerbian languageSerbian is a form of Serbo-Croatian, a South Slavic language, spoken by Serbs in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia and neighbouring countries....
: fudbal
This has contributed to the adoption of the word football into the auxiliary language Interlingua
Interlingua
Interlingua is an international auxiliary language , developed between 1937 and 1951 by the International Auxiliary Language Association...
.
The loanwords bear little or no resemblance to the native words for "foot" and "ball". By contrast, some languages have calque
Calque
In linguistics, a calque or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal, word-for-word or root-for-root translation.-Calque:...
s of "football": their speakers use equivalent terms that combine their words for "foot" and "ball". An example is the Greek ποδόσφαιρο (podósfero).
By contrast, in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, "Football" is a loanword for American football, while the German word Fußball, a calque of "football" (Fuß = "foot", Ball = "ball"), means association football. The same goes for Dutch
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...
voetbal (voet = "foot", bal = "ball"), Swedish
Swedish language
Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
fotboll (fot = "foot", boll = "ball"), and so on — the words for "foot" and "ball" are very similar in all the Germanic languages. Only two Germanic languages do not use "football" or a calque thereof as their primary word for association football:
- AfrikaansAfrikaansAfrikaans is a West Germanic language, spoken natively in South Africa and Namibia. It is a daughter language of Dutch, originating in its 17th century dialects, collectively referred to as Cape Dutch .Afrikaans is a daughter language of Dutch; see , , , , , .Afrikaans was historically called Cape...
— sokker. This echoes the predominant use of "soccer" in South African EnglishSouth African EnglishThe term South African English is applied to the first-language dialects of English spoken by South Africans, with the L1 English variety spoken by Zimbabweans, Zambians and Namibians, being recognised as offshoots.There is some social and regional variation within South African English...
. - IcelandicIcelandic languageIcelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...
— knattspyrna (knatt- = ball- and spyrna = kicking) is one of the two most common terms; this reflects a tendency to create indigenous words for foreign concepts. However, the calque fótbolti is equally common if not more common. Knattspyrna is a more formal term.
The Celtic languages
Celtic languages
The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic"; a branch of the greater Indo-European language family...
also generally refer to association football with calques of "football" — an example is the Welsh
Welsh language
Welsh is a member of the Brythonic branch of the Celtic languages spoken natively in Wales, by some along the Welsh border in England, and in Y Wladfa...
pêl-droed. However, Irish
Irish language
Irish , also known as Irish Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family, originating in Ireland and historically spoken by the Irish people. Irish is now spoken as a first language by a minority of Irish people, as well as being a second language of a larger proportion of...
, which like Afrikaans is native to a country where "soccer" is the most common English term for the sport, uses sacar.
See also
- Names of association football
- Names of Australian rules footballNames of Australian rules footballAustralian rules football has had a number of different names throughout its history. The official name according to the sport's governing body, the Australian Football League, is Australian football...
- Nuclear footballNuclear footballThe nuclear football is a briefcase, the contents of which are to be used by the President of the United States of America to authorize a nuclear attack while away from fixed command centers, such as the White House Situation Room...
- Political footballPolitical footballA political football is a political topic or issue that is continually debated but left unresolved. The term is used often during a political election campaign to highlight issues that have not been completely addressed, such as the natural environment and abortion.There are many reasons that an...
Further reading
- Steve Boughey Soccer: Alan Shearer in town this week, AucklandAucklandThe Auckland metropolitan area , in the North Island of New Zealand, is the largest and most populous urban area in the country with residents, percent of the country's population. Auckland also has the largest Polynesian population of any city in the world...
Herald on Sunday, October 3, 2006. This article shows how soccer is used for association football in New Zealand and Australia and how Alan ShearerAlan ShearerAlan Shearer OBE, DL is a retired English footballer. He played as a striker in the top level of English league football for Southampton, Blackburn Rovers, Newcastle United and for the England national team...
, a former captain of the English association football team, uses the term soccer to avoid confusion while visiting Australia and New Zealand.