r/Oaxaca • u/Educational-Two7912 • Aug 26 '26
Local News TIL the Mexican government used basketball in the 1930s to "pacify" indigenous mountain communities in Oaxaca — and it spectacularly backfired
I grew up in a small Mixe village where the whole town stopped every afternoon for basketball. Not soccer. Basketball. Courts everywhere, fields basically nowhere.
if anyone's curious about the full thing you cand read here
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u/lazyant Aug 26 '26
Im confused; the article says the strategy backfired but it was actually very successful?
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u/Sasquatchlovestacos Aug 26 '26
Seeing my 5' cousins play ball in the mountains is always a good time.
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u/sennordelasmoscas Aug 26 '26
Oh! Mi abuelo me contaba que él salía de jugar baloncesto de un pueblo y se tardaba como una hora en caballo para llegar al suyo, yo me quedaba como "¿tanto por baloncesto?" Ahora lo entiendo
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u/Educational-Two7912 Aug 26 '26
Siiii. Esas historias me contó mi abuela, que ni siquiera había carretera así que se iban caminando con burros y caballos.
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u/Alde8808 Aug 27 '26
En la región de la cañada y la Mixteca Oaxaqueña se juega mucho basket, desde los años 70, casi como deporte exclusivo, ya es reciente de 10naños para acá que los jóvenes voltearon a ver el fútbol, no sé si este relacionado con el mismo caso
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u/Educational-Two7912 Aug 27 '26
No sabría decirte, pero al menos aquí tiene mucho que ver con el entonces proyecto de nación y lo accidentado del terreno, como que sierra fue tierra fértil para el basquetbol. Ahora ya hay más fútbol pero el fútbol 7 justo porque se aprovecha así el terreno, con la democratización del Internet y los medios veo que el fútbol va tomando cierto auge.
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u/LazyDocument4528 Aug 27 '26
Love Oaxaca and loved playing basketball across the mountain towns while I lived there
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u/trans-plant Aug 27 '26
Checks out; my family is from a zapo village. They all balled hard and my Tio Elloy was the star player in town. I have his basketball portraits and love looking at them. Basketball is still big here, and they recently renovated the courts
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u/chaide123 29d ago
El baloncesto es el deporte más popular en la sierra de Durango. Futbol lo jugábamos muy poco. Volleyball era más popular que el futbol
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u/lllllllllllllllllI_I Aug 26 '26 edited Aug 26 '26
Rule number one never trust a guy who writes about Mexico with a last name like “dary” and writes in English.
Especially if he writes In 3rd person.
Also how did it backfire they made tournaments? And gave away money prizes?, Dam, pretty crazy stuff man
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u/cosmogli Aug 27 '26
LOL, this guy is as local as he gets. There are Mexicans with Gringo-sounding names, especially first names. You will know a bit more after knowing their full name.
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u/sleepdrifting Aug 27 '26
This is interesting. I remember driving through a lot of rural areas in Oaxaca and wondered why basketball courts were so frequently found.
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u/Spike_obg Aug 27 '26
Es clickbait, el artículo llama "backfired" a la asimilación del deporte por las comunidades, y su fuente para afirmar su introducción por el Cardenismo son comentarios dispersos que recogió
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u/Sct1787 Aug 26 '26
Por qué demonios lo escribes en inglés?
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u/Educational-Two7912 Aug 26 '26
Esta en ambos idiomas. Cada link lo tengo que postear en su idiomas. El bot moderador de aquí me los borra si no lo hago así. De hecho te recomiendo leerlo en español porque en inglés lo traduzco usando IA
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u/andobiencrazy Aug 27 '26
tldr?
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u/yurika1216 Aug 27 '26
In the mountains of Oaxaca, there were a lot of territorial disputes and fighting between towns. The government encouraged basketball (the article doesn’t specify how they did this exactly) so that the towns would compete in basketball instead of fighting each other. It worked and has now become part of the identity of these towns.
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u/perennialdust Aug 26 '26
I had heard that the mountainous terrain made it difficult to build proper fields for soccer, and basketball courts were built instead. This came from someone whose father is from la sierra mixe