We have discussed the intersection between sports and society on a variety of issues including race, gender, and social class. You are to trace a story involving sports and one of these key social concerns (or other major social concerns) from the last five years. Writing on an older story will lead to a zero on this assignment. You are to trace the entire “story” of one major sports event of the last five years. You are to follow the story’s trajectory from first report to last report. Thus, the story must (for the moment) be considered dead (ended).
Your analysis of the story will involve a critical discussion of the value systems the narrators brought to this particular issue. As we’ve noted, in some cases, sports have been well ahead of society in bringing about social change, in many other cases, sports have been way behind society and in most cases sports have followed their own unique value criteria in matters of race, gender, sexuality, disabilities, and social class. As we’ve also noted, media (the story-tellers---news services, broadcasters, sports talk sites) tend to be the arbiters of values in these cases.
That is, by telling the story, they set value expectations for audiences and motivate us to see some players as “right” and others as “wrong.” So, the tension between the values expressed within the sport and the values of the larger society are played out in the media coverage of the sports.
Sample Solution