"Final Reflections"

-What was your perception of US sport before you took this class?

Before this class I had a very minimal understanding of sports in the United States. Growing up in the South, college football was always a really big deal, but I paid little or no attention to it. In many ways I feel that I even left the South because of the way they put so much value on things I did not necessarily understand or agree with. Sports was one of those activities that I did not understand. When I thought about sports, my mind immediately went to the sports my friends played in high school and college football. Since I grew up on a small island, our school did not have very many sports to offer which is why there was so much attention on college football. As i’ve said in one of my blogs, many of friends decided where to go to college not because of the education, but because of the sports. 

Thus, my perception of sports was something that our society values to such a high esteem that it dictates their decisions and identities. The part that I did enjoy was the way it brings people together. It has a community-like pull to it which I found to be a very positive quality. However, with that assimilation also came aggression. There was always a few people who were on the opposing team which made people get into arguments. 

In high school I lived with my mother, who was not a huge fan of sports. She never forced me or my brother to participate which caused me to feel very indifferent about sports in society. I did not enjoy watching it and sometimes felt as though I was missing out on some part of high school by not adding it into my life. 

-Has your understanding/perception of US sports culture changed through taking this class? if so, how and why?

My understanding/perception of sports culture has changed a great deal since I have taken this class. As I stated above, I knew sports was seen as a big deal but never understood why people cared about it so much. In my first paper I looked at a University of Alabama vs. Auburn game. I chose this one because I had a friend who went to each of these schools and was able to conduct interviews about this game and why they saw it as so important. After this paper I began to understand not only why sports was important to their identities, but how the media influences how these identities are formed. Before the game even started, the commentary began by saying “This is the state of Alabama”. Immediately there was a sense of state pride and even connected its history to sports. I knew from my friends that this game was important, but never knew it could create a states identity. Through this project I began to see that sports was more than just a form of entertainment. I now see sports as extremely significant because of how the media ascribes particular definitions to identities: race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. 

-What discussion topics/new facts stood out to you the most? why?

The part of the class that I liked the most was not necessarily a topic/new fact, but how we were encouraged to look at the “dark side” of sports. Since I am an English major, I am constantly finding counterarguments and encouraged to look at things critically. By taking this class, I was able to analyze a particular part of our society that I had not yet investigated. Understanding how important sports is to our world allowed me to develop a new appreciation for its presence. It is actually a very great way to look at society because of how globalized it has become. It explains a lot about how we view identities and can be a great outlet for making statements and unveiling issues that need to addressed. For example, In the book Sports in Society, the first two sentences Coakley states in the chapter Sports and the Economy are, “Sports have been used as public entertainment through history. However, they’ve never been so thoroughly commercialized as they are today” (Coakley, 2009, 354). Although sports have always been a form of public entertainment, Coakley notes that there has been a shift in how much it has evolved: becoming highly commercialized. Due to the increase in commercialized sports the portrayal of athletic identities has also increased. Through this, sports can help aid our understanding of different identities. 

-Will you start to ask more critical questions about the US sports world once you move on from this class?

Yes, I will definitely begin to ask more critical questions about US sports. My friends have always made fun of me for my lack of knowledge about sports, but now I feel as though I have a better understanding than they do. This class did not necessarily increase my desire to watch sports but it did aid in forming a new appreciation for it. After this class it seems almost impossible to not look at sports from a critical standpoint. Even more so, I hope that my critical understanding of it can help others understand sports differently when a conversation presents itself. I now feel as though I have a particular value within the sporting world.

-Do you think you will be able to use any of the skills learned in this class in your future career? if so, how?

When signing up for this class I was mostly just looking to fill one of my requirements. Now, I am deeply thankful that I took this class because of the job I have every summer. During my summers I work for an outdoor adventure company where I lead a group of high school students on back packing trips. Since most of the companies students are from the South and since most of them are in the early stages of thinking about their college career, I now feel like I can help them in ways I could not before. Luckily I always have a male co-leader who is able to talk about this topic whenever it was brought up. Now that I have a better understanding of sports, I can now understand its weight on some teenagers. I remember a student last summer talking about the pressures he felt from his father and brother to go to a college where he could play football. At the time I did not know how to relate since this was a pressure I never experienced growing up. Now I think I can help these students in ways that my co-leader could not. I may not be able to argue which sports team is better, but I can help in bring in these critical questions in order to get my students to think differently about sports. 

-Would you recommend this class to a friend? if so, why/why not?

I would definitely recommend this class to a friend. It is different than all of the classes I have taken at CU and incorporates a lot of different ways of studying besides just taking a midterm and an exam. This class is very good at keeping topics interesting while also bringing in different  ways in which view sports: through debates, open discussion, blogs, papers, exams. The versatility of tasks makes the class feel different and exciting every time. I can honestly say that I was never bored because it addressed important issues that I did not know could be viewed through the lens of the sporting world. 

"Interrogating inequalities in Sports Media: Examining gender/race representation in USA Today"

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2014/01/richard-sherman-erin-andrews-interview/

“Don’t you open your mouth about the best or I’m gonna shut it for you real quick.”

This is an expert from an interview with Richard Sherman, a Seattle Seahawks NFL player after the most recent super bowl game. The interaction between him and the female newscaster provides us an interesting look into patriarchy male dominance relations. The above quote suggests, that Sherman is not only aggressive in tone but also overconfident and dominant in his demeanor. From the public views perspective, we see a small blonde newscaster, Erin Andrews, and a large black football player overcasting her. Sherman not only overpowers Andrews but also becomes quite aggressive in tone and body language, we see her physically take a step back during the interview and it is clear that Richards is the dominant protagonist in the interview. It seems as if he disregards her as a woman and a human. Unfortunately, he insinuates the negative stigmas we see in male sports in today’s society. He is overpowering and dominant over the woman he is standing next to, and in the interview he is acting in a very egotistical manner with all disregard for his surroundings. In regards to sports in society; we see overpowering males and as a result women are often left on the back burner as newscasters and fans. Males are set at the forefront of the media, and in many cases it allows the dominant behavior that seems to transpire by many male athletes. The example I used is just one instance, where the male dominate character takes priority over the female. Unfortunately, the villain like persona that Sherman characterized in this interaction becomes somewhat normalized in the sports culture. 

"Why the 'Mans Mans' Game is an Insult to Men"

As we have seen in many issues within sports, misogyny brings core issues of violence and homophobia at the forefront. Masculinity is able to sustain itself because it is the dominant form in our society in terms of power relations. Since experiences in sports are typically divided up into the binary between “boys” and “girls”, this rivalry is what allows for sports to be unsafe for LGBT athletes. When people are divided up into all-male groups, this causes a sense of rivalry to act masculine because of their group interactions.  The same goes for the feminine side. On the cover of the film Training Rules it lists three rules No drinking, No drugs, No Lesbians. This immediately aligns sexuality as being a binary between normal and abnormal. If being a lesbian is grouped into the same wrongness as drugs and drinking, then that has a huge effect on those whose sexual orientation is not heterosexual. Instead of address sexual orientation issues, sports has created an environment where discussing “other” identities is not welcomed. 

Sexual orientation is often difficult to understand because of two issues. In the book The Psychology of Sexual Orientation, Behavior, and Identity, Diamant and McAnulty state that the two issues are “one that pertains to the meaning of sexual orientation, and the other is the quality of information available for understanding sexual orientation within the framework of social institutions” (410). These two issues are important to understand because it separates meaning and understanding.  With this model in mind, sports is thus the “social institution” in which the “quality of information available for understanding sexual orientation” is yet another institution where this is an apparent issue. 

Sports is and is not a safe environment for LGBT athletes. The reason why it is not is because of the violence that sports culture maintains. Misogyny within sports creates a focus on the ways males perform in relations to their masculinity. If someone’s sexual orientation is understood as not being masculine, then the issue is placed on the meaning of sexual orientation in the sporting institution. Ironically, this could be also be why sports is a safe place for LGBT athletes. Of course it is not safe because of what I just said, but, because of the focus on masculinity, sports could be the outlet for speaking up for LGBT rights. It’s highly commercialized and those who do begin to unveil their sexual orientation could help in making this issue more commercialized/normalized. This is also how I would strategize a more inclusive American sport culture. The more athletes begin to speak up for their identities, the more masculinity will begin to lose its weight on how we define a successful athlete. It’s not a big step, but it is a start. Even this class for example has brought more attention to the relationship between sports and sexual orientation.  This discussion is clearly become more popular and it can only continue to be so. 

Similar to what we discussed with the word “nigga” become a term of endearment, words such as “fag” “cunt” etc., are also becoming words that could become not associated with something negative. Since “nigga” is relating to race, “fag” “cunt” are words relating to sexual orientation. I am in a class right now where someone read an article that said women in other cultures see the word “cunt” as a positive term. Our vernacular is process that is constantly changing over time. This can be seen through music. The song “Strange Fruit” by Nina Simone, is used in Kanye West’s song “Blood on the Leaves” on his most recent album. While Simone’s song is more about the history of lynching, West uses this sampling within his own song to bring in issues about race relations today. Over time words, styles, music, etc., are all artistic expression that are adapting themselves to issues of the present. 

Darwin's Athletes

Although the sociology of sports looks at sports, as a social activity, influences our ideas about social life, the psychology of sport is also a realm in which to view sports. Sociology and psychology can be easily understood as the difference between the public and private sphere. Since sports takes places within a public setting, it is the private setting of sports that becomes more difficult because it is hidden. When I say private setting, I am referring to that which is  internal. This internal realm exists within the individual. The internal realm works as a way of defining Sports in African American culture. It is significant because society uses sports to define African Americans as “superior when it comes to physical abilities in certain sports” (Coakley 286). Due to this, African American’s see/feel as though sports is their gateway into society or at least as an activity that allows them to climb the social ladder. 

The commercialization of sports has allowed this to become a socially accepted norm. Due to the rags to riches mentality that America uses to illustrate it’s national identity as a land of opportunity. In Hoop dreams, this is seen because it shares topics and tropes that makes blackness out to be this superior trait that is crucial to winning in the game. This is a form of scientific racism. This idea was used a long time ago to prove that the white race was superior and to justify issues around slavery. Here, sports is being used as another form of scientific racism in the sense that the black race is superior within the sporting culture. The players in Hoop Dreams are African American subjects that are successful because of the pursuit for basketball stardom. The images in the film are ones of the inner-city. This is similar to the athlete in The Blind Side, a movie in which there are frequent images of inner-city life. Due to these Hollywood portrayals, society sees African American’s in sports as a group whose success is because they came from nothing. 

I believe that sports is not necessarily damaging Black Americans but it is the media and Hollywood who is to blame for these reinforced ideologies.  However, with that said, I do believe Hoop Dreams does a good job with using this type of portrayal as a way to reference the situation at hand. The characters hardship are a course of events that leads them to this suburban school. In this way, the movie and The Blind Side could also be making a comment on White American culture. Our failure to see this issues and the how the notion of being “color blind” is false. 

Sports, (Wo)Men, and the Gender Order

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9ei0047s1I

In this commercial, Under Armour uses football players to endorse their clothing line. This commercial is set in June and is using the upcoming football season as a way to show their product. It begins with an African American player getting ready for the season, waking up early to do push ups in home. The words  “ready for august” flash across three different pictures. These scenes move quickly with the fast pace rap music streaming in the background. It is directly targeting football which means they are also targeting the male gender. Most of the players shown are African American which links to the statistics on how 70-80 percent of football players are African Americans (Coakley 309). While this is true, it again reinforces race and ethnicity issues in sports. These players also have an expression on their faces that is directly linked to the male  stereotype: aggressive, indifferent, tough, etc. Their serious look sends a message that these individuals are serious. To even further this aggressive stereotype, there is one point when two players are arguing about “who is going to step up”. Every scene is covered with gender messages especially those towards African American males.

It frames sports as a way from rags to riches in society because it follows one player who is in a poor living environment and then suddenly having success on the field. Since the video ends with the words #Iwill, it is sending a message to young people that if you committed and work hard, this can be their future too. There is even one moment where the camera pauses on a young African American child looking out the window towards the players practicing. This has a lot of negative consequences because it is making a message more so for this targeted group than the product itself. In fact, the only time you actually see the products name is at the end of the commercial. This is negative because of this rags to riches idea. Sports is often seen as a way for society to integrate and improve issues around race and race relations.  However, it is actually suggesting that “young blacks, especially men, grow up believing that the black body is superior when it comes to physical abilities” and this commercial seeks to “inspire some young people to believe it is their biological and cultural destiny to play certain sports” (Coakley 286). 

"Once the cheering stops: The life of a retired pro-athlete".

In my opinion, this has been the most interesting blog articles to read. I have never truly thought about the difficulties retired athletes go. At least, I didn't think it was this extreme. The ESPN article started out very mundane and I thought to myself, "hey, watching tv shows on netflix in a Manhattan apartment sounds pretty good to me". However, this was not the case. Being so fixated on sports and sports only for so long makes this sudden and dramatic change very difficult. This quote "You can retire from football but you can't retire from living" has a huge impact on the article. Retirement at such a young age puts these athletes in a huge identity crisis. Football is their living and once football is taken out of the equation, living is not so easy.

These players are told what to do all the time. Having a schedule is important to the human routine to create stability but when there is nothing on the agenda, it is not surprising that these athletes go into an identity crisis. In the NY times article, Mr. Lee says about this issues  "I was witnessing my own social funeral". Going from being a star, having lots of support and fans, then having no one know who you are or even care is heartbreaking. Their worth, not only in a financial sense but in personal sense, is lost. I could not believe that 78% of athletes go bankrupt, among multiple health issues and emotional trauma.
Although these numbers astounded me greatly, I can understand why they are. They grew up focusing on just football. Not knowing how to handle their money is a typical thing for athletes. They spend constantly during the season and don't realize how much their money will be gone once its all over. There is a lot  that goes into retirement and trying to discover your self aside from being an athlete is like starting over completely from scratch. Trying to learn basic skills that most people at their age have already developed.

This is an aspect of sports that is not drawn on upon in the media. There needs to be some sort of program for athletes post-retirement in order to prepare them for the real world. Sports is highly valued in the United States. Being apart of this "value" is a huge ego boost. Once their ego is gone however, its no surprise that depression kicks in. I have never considered the true perils of life after sports because I think people think that it is the sports career in general that would be more difficult and dangerous. Greater awareness and support should be implemented and contracts should be reassessed.

"A kiss is not just a kiss: Sports, Politics, and the Sochi Olympics"

The issue illustrated in all of these articles are ones associated with sports and politics. Similar to the separation of Church and State, sports and politics are no different. Although we say that these two things are not in accord with one another, they most certainly are. The political issues surrounding these articles are ones related to sexual orientation. In the "Open Letter to David Cameron and the IOC" article by Stephen Fry, it becomes clear that this sports-politics relationship has happened many times in the past. Fry brings up the incident in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, when Jews were "banned from academic tenure or public office" causing the police to avoid any acts of violence towards this minority group. The Olympic movement also "paid no attention" to this discrimination and is again doing the same thing now with LGBT Russians.

The Olympics being used to frame this political debate can be seen in the Washington Post article, when Inouye states that the U.S. delegation "represents the diversity that is the United States". The "Accomplishments" he talks about later are directly correlated to "civic activism, and sports". This statement, parallels with the issues of gay rights in 2014 Olympics in Russia because it is being used to explain why President Obama is not attending the Olympics. While this may not be the entire the reason, it does appear from the article to be something that is a factor in the Presidents decision.

Standing up for these issues is a big deal. In terms of what should be done, I think this recognition and discussion about the issue should continue to remain open to the public eye. However, this could bring the "established" binary between politics and sports closure together. Awareness should be at the forefront because laws always have loop holes and/or are avoided.