Lately, I’ve been thinking about what it means to play the game. If you know me, I’m not really one for playing games (and the crowd moans and boos). I need rules, and oftentimes, no one explains them thoroughly. My short-term, goldfish memory (paired along with my everlasting, hieroglyphic long term memory) makes me a poor candidate for picking up organized fun on the spot.
Which is why, I’m writing to you here, challenging myself as a rare player of any game - but, perhaps, a begrudging player of life, like every friend and neighbor - to write about a game I really have no business writing about.
Badminton. If you’re like most Americans, you probably at least see it as a ghost of ping pong, or even better, a bastard son to pickleball. Or, maybe, just maybe, you really know this world. Maybe you’re already of international mind. You play this game, and I mean, really play it. And if you do, perhaps your heart is beating faster, heat is rising behind your ears, and sweat is beading around your temples. The voices are swarming around in your head. Isn’t that just a Walmart version of tennis? Badminton’s for grandmas. Oh, wait, yea, I-I think I know badminton…I play that in my backyard…
No, no… Make the voices stop. Return to reality. Wait for the echoing of those terrible voices to dissolve away like butter, then come back to earth.
Having dated a long-time player, teacher, and obsessor over badminton, it’s my duty to write this homage and exploration of badminton. Don’t get me wrong - I’m still a polite stranger to the sport (I don’t have an affinity for racket sports overall). It’s time I throw my two cents in here, like throwing coins and making a wish in a fountain.
But, my wish is not just to convince you to like one sport more, or to force yourself to feel inclined to play it and blindly respect it. My wish is for you to somewhat see things in a new light - to understand how most sports are story-driven, and that in order to see sports for how they are, we need a healthy dose of colorful and aerodynamic perspective.
Fly high like a birdie
Unless you’re based in Europe or the Far East, badminton falls on mostly deaf ears here in the US. Your everyday American Jack or Jill here is not flocking to badminton as an excuse to wear a cute athleisure outfit, nor are they making group plans with their friends to find one of the few select badminton centers in their neighborhood.
And even if you have played, I wonder if you’ve ever played seriously. We are not talking about blind whacks and making contact with the birdie as signals of a good game. Are you playing badminton, or are you playing chess? Have you painted out strategies in your mind like maps that lead men into war? Have you anticipated movements before your opponent makes them like a mirror could? Have you reacted to shots with the quickness of lightning in the sky?
I’ve heard it countless times. “People just don’t get it. It’s not popular here {in the US}. They always make fun of badminton.” In return, I’ve always exchanged a knowing and bittersweet look, like a sympathetic hand on the shoulder.
Shoulders. Literature and sports have, in fact, brushed each other’s shoulders throughout history. Some spotlights over sports have been warmer than others. And if we reflect on what makes a spotlight warmer on certain sports over others, I think we can crack the case.
Baseball, for instance, has a storied, dream-like history and has served as a bedrock for American ideals, like teamwork, optimism, and exceptionalism.
A League of Their Own
And although baseball was created on American soil, its harmonious balance between strength and agility struck a chord with countries like Japan. The demand for perfectionpitching until the point of exhaustion, is much like a sushi apprentice making tamago 200 times before master Jiro deems it acceptable. There is poetry in suffering.
“Unlike the mindless tackling and punching that were sanctioned in American contact sports, baseball struck a harmonious balance between physical strength and mental agility. The resulting demand for concentration and finesse harkened to the cultivated martial ideals of the samurai gentleman. Thus, at the end of the century, while Americans in Yokohama played baseball to be more American, Japanese students, especially in the higher schools, turned to baseball in an effort to reify traditional values and to establish a new basis for national pride.”
In the same lane, badminton’s combination of the thrill of action and the slow grace of a ballet must resonate with countries across the world for similar reasons. Elegance feigns ease, when really, there are gears churning underneath the surface - blood, sweat, and tears, all invisible from afar. Suffering can be gracefully athletic and hypnotic. It’s a dance we enjoy moving to.
But, my impression is that there’s a weaker literary aspect to badminton, which explains its lack of being lodged into the American cultural consciousness.
With American football, there’s literary elements that run through its veins. Football has evolved into framework for culture and acceptance. There’sthe tropes of having white boys in football play a heartthrob, a stud, a romantic interest, the lead, the jock.
But, it’s also been a capsule of America’s darkest shadows: the toxic racism; socioeconomic divide (a cultural divide, if you will); and capitalist exploitation, where working class kids are lured into a devastating activity that cosplays as a tool for social mobility.
Corey Sobel makes a case for football being overlooked as a literary sport alongside baseball, where he astutely mentions:
If the baseball novel shows America as we’d like to see ourselves, the football novel can show us as we are.
He proposes that baseball has reigned long enough. However, I’d argue that the same goes for football. Of course, we’d like to think there are many innate traits to football that we have to thank for its notoriety, but I think it’s even simpler than the phenomenon of our values being sewn into the fabric of touchdowns.
It’s the TV, man. It works better on your magic screen. People are talking about it all the time: they’re analyzing it, replaying it, training for it. There’s stories and advertisements and commercials with football players’ faces. There’s Fantasy Football so fans can put their dream team together and feel like they’re a part of the game. There’s the Super Bowl, for God’s sake - a complete theater performance that defiantly says, This game is war. It’s do or die. There’s a cinematic world to football that not only exists in Hollywood itself, but even more so in our regular, degular lives. And for other sports that don’t reign as intensely, perhaps it just doesn’t always make the cut for good ol’ entertainment.
If we look to an even closer relative to badminton, like tennis - we can see the money shining in everyone’s eyes at Wimbledon, and the investment in tennis stars that badminton stars just don’t seem to get. We have the Williams sisters, the Sharapova grunt, and Roger Federer sponsored shirts at Uniqlo. Most recently, we even have Challengers.
We also, obviously, have pickleball. Pickleball, pickleball, pickleball. I’ve been to the birthplace of pickleball, Bainbridge island. Bought a hat for my dad, who plays every day (sometimes twice a day), 7 days a week. Yes, I know, it’s not just a sport; it’s a lifestyle. It’s a mindset.
But, from my uninformed, yet hopefully somewhat insightful standpoint - I believe the strength at which roots of a sport grasp onto society is not just a matter of preference, and it’s not just about money (though it often boils down to it).
It’s a matter of storytelling (yes, yes - which is, often fueled by people, with money 🙄 ) and many other things that push people to articulate the meaning of something, and more importantly, push them to decide whether or not to include it in their lives.
Naturally, as an outsider, I’m here to find the character and the story of badminton. And I’m also here to declare that it’s time more players and people in general to actually reflect on its story, and meaning, if they actually want other people to embrace it fully aside from another random extracurricular activity.
Make a racket
So, with all of that pensiveness about the literary world of sports, we can do a bit of detective work now. If I scrape the digital landscape with my bare fingers, what will be underneath my fingernails? In other words, if badminton were a person, how would I come to describe him, based on what I find?
He’s finding himself
He’s the middle child of his racket sport brothers - always misunderstood, and somehow invisible.
Contrary to Reddit comments, he also makes a decent guitar.
He’s a fun time
He rubs shoulders with twilight, poached salmon, focaccia, dancing, rhythm, and breathless gazes. He can be the life of a party, a fun outdoor game that can last the whole night long, outshining the stars, where “the shuttlecocks {get} lost among the bats fleeting through the dark sky above.”
You can find him in aisles at Daiso as an outdoor game set for a couple dollars. The output: a sweaty, exhilarating afternoon, cheaper than a coffee in 2025.
He’s complex, riddled with emotion
He’s caught in a book. The tension of a racket string is literature. It’s like the intensity of a complex relationship still discovering itself. The athleticism and grace with which badminton is played is the perfect envelope for holding feelings in emotionally simmering storylines like Jane Eyre, and many others that are probably still unwritten.
He’s a 10,000-day dream
Many owe their lives to him. He’s a home base, a consistent heart beat, and a North star. And, dare I say it, many emotionally stunted individuals from the Asian communi are learning how to unravel their feelings and create a narrative.
He’s immortal
He lives forever and ever, like a rally at the Olympics.
He’s nostalgic
He often encapsulates the feeling of a time forgotten - a glorious nostalgia that we can’t ever make contact with, like a dance you can’t quite articulate.
He seems quietly dedicated, hardworking, but also misunderstood. I may go as far to even say that he’s more invisible than misunderstood, for people would have to have some sort of pre-conception of it beforehand in order to call it a misunderstanding. And most people, perhaps, might not even think of him at all.
The history you think you don’t need, but deserve
It’s hard to say the exact moment that gave birth to badminton. But, based on my astute research, I can take a proper stab at how it probably all came together.
How it all came together, probably
The sun’s pouring over China like tea. It’s a long time ago - probably around the 5th century B.C. Men are gathering together, doing what men do, which is training for the military, and relaxing from training. They usually play a game similar to football. But, today’s different. A Chinese general clears his throat and speaks to the men, waving them over.
“Okay, guys, guys! Can you gather ‘round? Take a seat. Sit, sit. Criss cross apple sauce.” The men seat themselves, criss cross apple sauce.
The Chinese general surveys the crowd for a moment, then clicks his tongue once he’s made sure everyone’s accounted for. “Ok, great. Today, we’re, uh… we’re gonna try something new,” he holds his palms in a jazz-hand formation, as if he’s ready to pitch a new business. His fingertips meet each other, forming a little tent in front of his chest. He gestures with them, his connected fingertips one unit, for emphasis.
“You know, I’ve been noticing this past week it’s been tough for you guys,” he begins empathetically. His tone rings somber, and he nods at the men in solidarity. “So… so, I-I want to make sure that we’re taking time for ourselves,” here, he brings his hands to his heart, “and, you know… maybe, we’ll feel re-energized if we just relax a little bit more.” At ‘relax,’ he slowly lets his hands lower ground-ward, as if he’s pulling a curtain down. The men blink at him expectantly. The Chinese general clears his throat.
“We’re going to play a game called Jianzi (毽子).” He pulls out a heavily weighted object, with what appears to be feathers attached to its body.
The men get into small groups and begin to pass the time, using their own bodies to keep a weighted, feathered, round-bodied object in the air. They kick with their feet, propelling the feathered objects into the sky, floating like birds. It’s almost as if their feet are lily pads, and the objects soaring back and forth are like bouncy frogs, elastic and limitless.
The Chinese general paces through the men, moving through the groups, with his hands clasped behind his back, like one would through a museum exhibition - pausing to observe, reflecting, nodding. The general smiles, clapping his hands with vigor, letting a toothy grin escape him. He stops to circle his index fingers in the air around in a lasso motion, gesturing at the splendor of the environment. “This is good, guys. Really good.”
After several minutes playing Jianzi (毽子), the general calls everyone’s attention and stands before them. “Alright, guys! Really nice work, today. We’ll play some more tomorrow.”
Later that afternoon, the general meets with other generals, and he shares his findings. “This is a big morale booster. I still need to gather feedback from the boys, but I’m thinking…” he wiggles his fingers, as if sizzling with excitement, “we get the other troops in on this. They don’t wanna miss out.” The generals grunt with optimism.
How it dominated the world, probably
And so, naturally, the game lasted through several dynasties and spread throughout the rest of the world. It spread throughout ancient civilizations in Asia, and then Europe.
The game spread like wildfire from various foreign travelers visiting China, catching sight of Jianzi (毽子), and taking the game back with them to their respective countries and flying (pun intended) with the idea. People of all ages and cultures began to wave rackets, battledores, and/or wooden paddles around, whacking feather-like objects back and forth in the air - dare we say, much like a shuttle, or an arrow in battle.
But, this game of ‘battledore and shuttlecock’ really started to find its legs on the estate of Badminton House in Gloucestershire during the 19th century, after making its way there from India (another case of British men observing a cute little sport abroad and taking it back home with them).
So, now, we’re in the United Kingdom, and it’s 1863. The game has taken place within several lawn parties. And the gentlemen have been having fun - really, they have. But, it’s also been bloody hot.
“It’s bloody hot,” a British player named George probably said, and he and the others moved indoors, namely to the North Hall at Badminton House. If you know anyone who plays badminton, there’s a general disdain for those who regard badminton itself as an outdoor sport at all (I would know, because my boyfriend - a long-time badminton player, coach, and enthusiast - lets out the most exasperated sigh whenever I mention this, even though its roots started there). But, we can’t sneer at its environment of origin. Alas, this transition of the game to an indoor environment is where, I’d arguably proclaim, the evolution of its rules and physicality began to truly grew new dimension.
Previously a cooperative sport, where two players would aim to create as long of a rally as possible, players began to introduce competition. They changed things up by hanging a string in the middle of the room to divide areas between opposing teams. An article from the Victorian Cornhill magazine, “Life in a Country House” (December 1863) touches on this historical point, and the glory of what would lead to a net:
“If the weather be such to induce you to remain within doors, your co-operation will be sought for a game at pool, badminton (which is battledore and shuttlecock played with sides, across a string suspended some five feet from the ground), and similar amusements.”
Additionally, the North Hall’s hourglass shape of the room - with doors opening inwards on either side, protruding into the playing area - most likely led to the formation of the hourglass/waste court.
And if we skip through history, legs abounding, we’ll know that poles with a net eventually landed on the scene, and that the court shape was adjusted by the Badminton Association into the rectangular court players move on today.
As they say, the rest is history.
An important point (pun intended)
Just so we’re clear, I’m really not here to convince you to think about badminton a certain way. I also really am not qualified to tell you why it’s worthy of your time, or why it’s underrated. And I’m especially not here to teach you the rules, or prove why it’s famously loved in other parts of the world. You can do that on your own. I can barely move my feet on a court.
But, I do feel I have sufficient experience to say that in order for more of us to think about badminton at all, in a more full sense, we need to talk about it as such. Sure, we can still do the airy, dream-like sequences of parties or sunny afternoons in the yard, crystallized with the ballet of a shuttlecock grand jeté-ing across the court. And sure, you can modestly downplay badminton as a forgotten stepson to other popular sports that make cheerleaders’ knees go weak.
But, how about, no more punishing people for not understanding badminton at first glance? No more death glares towards people who mistakenly suppose it an outdoor sport (for that’s what it was). And no more marinating in this woe-is-me narrative, that some people just don’t get it. If you receive these responses, then the onus is on you to explain it well, and invite people in, rather than scoot them out.
So, then, we need more of other things. More of learning how to articulate it well. More conversations about badminton, and what it really means. More explanations that don’t water down its grace and athleticism.
Sports can be, and are, metaphors for life. Take it from the couples therapist who told my boyfriend and I to navigate conflict with a Pitch and Catch communication framework (and inevitably, told us to never forget that we’re on the same team); or, my dad (who played baseball back in the day), who’s advised me that many balls are pitched to me throughout my life, but that it’s up to me to figure out which balls to hit, and which ones to let fly past me.
That calls for us to get the storytelling right. And maybe one day, we’ll see more people, especially men, in art and media connecting with meaning through a badminton court. It’s not enough to just want to win. So, let’s make our expressions count.
Fine, I’ll write some. They spoke quickly with fire, like a badminton match taking the court’s breath away. At first kiss, sparks flew between them, like shuttlecocks touching the clouds with crowns of feathers. His retort flew with the unexpected cunning of a badminton backhand, precise and relentless in its route and destination. They snapped at each other, emotions taut with the elasticity and percussive pop of rackets and birdies joining in mid-air. His pounding heartbeat quickened into a badminton-esque rally of rhythm that could disappear like smoke at any second. The birds sang as they migrated south, a sound as beautiful as badminton.
Now, your turn.