Although people may be able to find time to do sports, only a very small number are found on the tennis court. This is surprising for the reason that tennis is a popular sport in many countries. Despite its popularity, there are many perceivable barriers in terms of age, race and gender.

Because of the high speed and power of the game, tennis has a great demand on physical strength. Most people who engage in tennis are in their adolescence or early adulthood. While a number of seniors find it hard to keep up the pace and eventually change to other less rigorous activities such as: jogging, swimming, golfing and bowling. 10-times grand slam champion and former world No.1, Ivan Lendl, at the age of 38, admitted to the Tennis Magazine "I have increased my interest in Golf over the past few years as I feel that my physical strength is diminishing in a rapid fashion." The average age of a female p

layer who is ranked in the top 100 is 21.91 while the average age of a male player who is ranked in the top 100 is 25.32. The trend of the average age of the tennis players is still decreasing. It is not surprising that all of my fellow tennis partners are in their early 20's. Most of them are college students who manage to spend some time on the tennis court.

One of my best tennis partners, Joshua, has chosen to engage in tennis because he thinks tennis is a cool game. He definitely thinks tennis is a trendy activity and he particularly likes the good looking outfit, tennis rackets. More importantly, Joshua thinks playing tennis can help him to date with girls because of tennis' high status in Asian culture. In China, tennis is regarded as a high-class sport. Unlike table tennis and basketball, which are classified as common sports, playing tennis is like a sign of good taste, which improves a person's social status or social class. It is interesting to note that Joshua has not played any tennis lately because he has changed to soccer for some more attractive jerseys and the rising popularity of soccer among girls. Sport, to some degree, and to some people, is a trendy hobby in society.

tennis player. There are two obvious natural causes of such racial differences: climate or geographical condition and physical statue. Everyone realizes that ice hockey is largely a European and North American sport because of the cold weather and ice field accessibility. Although tennis does not need such special requirement of an ice field and skates, still, the majority people who play tennis are white. Although wealthy residences have access to tennis facilities in larger African cities such as Johannesburg, Cairo and Casablanca, many countries still do not have a standard tennis court open for public. The lack of adequate tennis court, rackets and funding in sports programs that discourage many African residences in playing tennis.

People who are engage in tennis are likely to be middle class in the society. It is because the cost associated with tennis. First, the cost for tennis rackets. Second the rent for tennis court. Unlike football or basketball, in which the cost of the ball is shared by a large group of people, everyone has to have a tennis racket. Also, because of the limited tennis courts in rural areas, it discourages many rural residents from participating in tennis.

The good news about cultural relativism in respect to tennis is that all the values attached to tennis among different cultures are unique and important in nature. Despite the variations in social norms about tennis in different countries, there is not a culture that claims that its reason is better or more important than those of others are. Apparently, the theory of ethnocentrism does not easily apply to the cultural variations about tennis. Ethnocentrism is a thinking that one's culture is better than others and the difficulty to accept the significance of other cultures. Ethnocentrism is always compared with cultural relativism because both theories emphasize cultural differences and ability to see or accept the importance of such differences. Because of Canada's multicultural society, cultural relativism is a much more widely accepted belief than ethnocentrism.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Michael Chang, Mainland China, Irina Spirlea, Martina Navratilova, , Date Asian, Tennis Magazine, Monica Seles, Traditionally Asians, North American, tennis court, engage tennis, play tennis, playing tennis, tennis players, cultural relativism, grand slam, women tennis, michael chang, people play tennis, people play, ranked top 100, tennis challenging women, race factor determining, player ranked top,
Approximate Word count = 2222
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)