Sports Ethnography Analysis

In a majority of cases, this view is even endorsed by the tribes themselves (Morrison). They argue that the restriction and ultimate elimination of the Native American mascot would also abolish the nation’s historic view of this cultural entity as characters of strength, determination, boldness, resourcefulness and courage. They contend that these same positive attributes are not only required by athletes, but are held expectations of the sporting community. The pursuant argument entails that there is an inherent oddity in the suggestion that naming a team after an Indian tribe is a calculated insult.

It is no doubt that African-Americans make up a majority of the population when it comes to globally known sports such as basketball and football. We often ignore that there is still racism present in games, just because there are minorities within the atmosphere. Sports as mentioned by Harrison, “is upheld as a meritocratic social arena in which other disadvantages groups can excel.” However, I argue that other disadvantaged groups find it tough, sometimes impossible, to excel in individual sports when they are constantly looked down upon or not welcomed in a sport where there’s white domination.

In the article “Why sports history is American history” by Mark Naison, The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, adapted by Newsela staff, the main idea is discrimination in sports history, and the advancements of minorities in sports (topic sentence). In paragraph 3, it says “In the first half of the 1900s, Irish, Italian and Jewish Americans were often looked on with suspicion. ”(Quote 1) This means that in America, people were already not treated fairly (explain 1). In paragraph 9, Mark wrote “During the first half of the 20th century, they were barred from participating in most professional sports.”

Anglo-Saxon culture is in many ways obsessed with sport and, from the late eighteenth through to the nineteenth centuries, produced many of the formalized sports now adopted world-wide and played according to the standard rules (Holt, 1989). In the last century following a brief period of participation, black sportsmen were barred participating alongside whites e.g. Baseball in the early 1860s which led to black players resorting to create their own teams and leagues. Black sportsmen have since World War II made a remarkable impact in baseball, basketball, athletics, American football and boxing but not so much in golf and tennis (Coakley 1978, Edwards, 1973). A reason being that according to the 2012 U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey the poverty rate for African Americans is 28% compared to 15% for all races which shows some races are more inclined to be part of a certain social class. Certain sports tend to be linked with middle and upper classes lifestyle both in their recruitment and their supporters.

In recent history it has been evident that some of the most popularize sports in America have been dominated and overran by African American and other minority athletes. In turn when the coaching and management positions in sports are analyzed and broken down, the number of minority coaches and managers in sport are almost non-existent and have been since those sports organization became established.

One socioligical explanation as to why African Americans excel in athletics is because it is viewed as a way of upward social and financial mobility. Being one of the world’s largest institutions, sports generate billions of dollars in revenue each year. Specifically, the National Football League generates six billion dollars in revenue a year (Sports Industry Overview, 2009). The life of an NFL player is filled with fame, fortune and limitless opportunites, something that the majority of young children dream about. The reason we see more African Americans succeeding in sports is because they have limited resources and opportunities for upward social mobility elsewhere. With the poverty rate among African Americans so high (24.7 %) they often do not have the resources to excel in education so instead they look to sports as a way of socio-economic advancement (Bureau, Poverty, 2009). Sports sociologist Harry Edwards defines this concept of black youth using sports as a way of social mobility as “blind faith”. Edwards explains three reasons as to why black families push their

Sports as an industry is quickly evolving into a grand, formless entity with many avenues, opportunities for scholar-practitioners, and segments that have prolonged the business of sports like never before. But, not quite in the racial area of the sports world, whether it is in the media or through personal experiences, Racism has always been a part of history, but today, it seems as if theirs have been modestly an acceptance of racism. As the industry expands a growing blend between the worlds of sports and entertainment has also formed, linking the two together, and bringing entertainment to the forefront in sports in terms of sponsorships, marketing, athlete representation, team ownership and sports law have effected. Professional American athletes should be against prejudice and racism in sports because it created prejudice and unequal right for speech and protest while amplifying prejudice in professional sports leagues such as the NBA and NFL.

The topic of race in sport, particularly African Americans in sport, has long been a controversial yet, widely discussed matter. Human and social issues are never easy subjects to discuss or debate, and racial differences tend to provoke very strong reactions. To begin, we will explore those whom claim that black athletes excel in sports as a result of their biological make up. Of all players in the NBA, more than 75% of them are black; of all players in the WNBA, more than 70% of them are black; of all players in the NFL, more than 65% of them are black (Hoenig, 2014). Evidently, black athletes make up a vast majority of these sports in the United States. Athletes must be of elite caliber to have the ability to play at this level, so this

There has always been this possibility for “sport to provide a site to achieve the American Dream.” While this is possible yet rare, this common conception allows African Americans to believe from a young age that “sport is [their] way out of the ghetto.” Thereby, their attentions are once again focused on sports, yet media fails to mention that less than 1 of every 10,0000 succeeds at the professional level and that there is a better chance for them to be a doctor or a lawyer. When there are cases without much outside knowledge of the chances one has in the sports world versus the professional world, “black culture may add to the problem by promoting athletic success as important for its youth.” Clearly, this has a cyclical nature and is a rather repetitive problem as time is then spent on sports more than anything else.

Native Americans are labelled as the “righteous warriors” but also as savages. This duality, in some part leads to a lack of support from many Americans for their culture and way of life. As many Native American tribes receive their funding and schooling from the government, this presents a problem. In their article, "Race, Power, and Representation in Contemporary American Sport”, authors Charles Fruehling Springwood and C. Richard King discuss the tradition in sports of making the Native American the “halftime spectacle”. Contrastingly author Yuko Kawai, in his article “Stereotyping Asian Americans: The Dialectic of the Model

Just as baseball had both a cyclical and chronological history, the history of racial inequality in sports did as well. The chronological history of racial inequality in sports involved a slow progression from minorities being viewed as racially inferior to minorities being viewed as equals and in some cases even superior in some sports. The cyclical history of racial inequality involves processes of segregating and disbarring minorities to integrating teams and then back to inequality in opportunities for minorities in sports. This generational history shows the challenges that minorities faced repeatedly by challenging cultural norms throughout time. Jack Johnson, Joe Louis, and many other minority athletes acted as political activists as well as athletes from the Civil War to World War II. The athletic prowess of these political activists allowed them to defy longstanding attitudes of racial inferiority and manliness in the United States. They fought against the attitudes of physical, moral, emotional, and intellectual inferiority by using their success, fame, and power in the media.

Consequently, in regards to the Canadian context, the reader may be asking, how can sport help Aboriginal youth given the dismal past of Aboriginal sport policy? As such, at this juncture, the numerous challenges Aboriginal youth face must be discussed in order to properly contextualize how sport participation can be tremendously helpful for Aboriginal communities. Accordingly, despite only encompassing 3.8% of the total Canadian populace, health and social issues are disproportionately prominent within Aboriginal communities (Ning & Wilson, 2012). Consequently, these particular challenges will be examined through the following variables: physical health, mental health, and criminal justice.

I would like to discuss the issue of race and ethnicity in sports. We will also explore the bigger questions. How much does race and ethnicity matter in the sports world? Are certain races dominant in certain sports? Is there a difference in how we treat players based on race and ethnicity? Does it matter? I would like to answer some of these questions and gain a better understanding of how much of a part they play.

I recently saw the film, 42, and I found many connections with our Sociology of Sport class. First and foremost, the movie was about the baseball legend, Jackie Robinson. Jack broke the baseball color barrier and was the first African American player allowed in Major League Baseball. He played for the Brooklyn Dodgers beginning in 1947. Jack was a strong, talented player, but he also had a mind of his own. He played with an attitude that would be taunting to other players. When he made it to the Montreal Royals in 1946, he had to quickly get rid of this taunting, smart attitude. He was the only black player in a time of hatred and prejudice in the United States. Although he

Introduction: Sport has often been viewed as an agent linked to the constructive development of individuals and as a mechanism that can foster positive social change within communities. As such, this paper intends to examine the recent expansion of sport for development (SFD) programs within Canadian Aboriginal communities by exploring the historical and concurrent structure of Aboriginal sport initiatives within Canada. Given this, the most pervasively used definition of SFD came in 2003, from the United Nations Inter-Agency Task Force on Sport for Development and Peace, which recognized it as, “all forms of physical activity that contribute to physical fitness, mental well-being and social interaction, such as play, recreation, organized or competitive sport, and indigenous sports and games” (UN, 2003, pp. 5). In Canada, the Canadian Sport Policy, exemplified the institutionalization of this paradigm and formalized the perceived value of SFD initiatives as evidenced by the creation of a strategy specifically intended for Indigenous participation and prioritization in Canadian sport: the Aboriginal Participation Policy (Paraschak, 2012; Te Hiwi, 2014). This policy is significant because it is the primary means of guiding Sport Canada’s efforts as it works with both the Federal and Provincial levels of government to confront systemic inequities, which limit Aboriginal peoples’ participation in sport (Thibault & Harvey, 2013). Moreover, the APP was predicated upon the