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Football in America

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Football in America

by Jeannie Ray

SPM/210 - SOCIO-CULTURAL ELMNTS OF SPORT: PLAYING WELL W/OTHERS

DR DION DALY

August 6, 2011

Football In America

American football has a long legacy in American History. It can be traced back centuries to

early European cutures, influenced through the years by multiple people, changed the rules

and has become a National phenomenon for Americans. American football is over 100 years

old and still going strong. It has inspired songs, movies and motivated individuals to great

heights in their careers and lives.

American football originated with its earlier form of play that derived from a variation of

the sport Rugby in 1892. There are mentions of Native Americans playing …show more content…

The functionalist

theory is based on shared values in a social order. “Deviance in sports, according to a

functionalist approach, deviance occurs when an athlete rejects the goal of improving skills or

the expectation that the means to achieve goals is to work harder than others.” (McGraw−Hill,

2007) According to conflict theory, economic interests and economic power by those who

own the production in society control the social order. Those who are not wealthy lack the

ability to conntrol the enforcement of rules and are identified as deviant compared to people

with more wealth. It is also assumed that legal processes are formulated based around

people with financial gain and not those on a lower income based. This gives them less

power to resist the rules because their actions do not conform to the standards of the rule

makers. “A problem with conflict theory is that deviance in sports is always assumed to be the

result of biased norms and law enforcement processes controlled by wealthy owners and

sponsors who convince everyone that their rules are the only rules.” (McGraw−Hill, 2007)

Many sociologists use a constructionist approach which is based on interactionist and critical

theories. It focuses on two seperate issues: the meaning people give to traits, actions and

ideas and the ways that people use these to

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