ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the intersections between race, class and masculinity among young Filipino men playing in mainstream basketball. The kinds of everyday racism endured by Filipino ballers on the basketball court reproduce the racisms they are subject to in other contexts, where they are stereotyped either for being too effeminate or for being too violent. These racialisations intersect with the policing of hegemonic versions of white middle-class masculinity in Australia. The chapter suggests that street ball is a mode of embodied resistance - a habitus that offers possibilities for redemption of respect and dignity. While street ball can interrupt the stability of whiteness, it does not simply overthrow unequal power relations. The courts at Clinton are an unlikely 'sacred' space of resistance for the Filipino community in Sydney, where Filipino ballers have attempted to create an autonomous space to escape what hooks describes as the 'terrorising white gaze'.
