Learning Culture through Sports

On school playgrounds and sporting fields, the words "you throw like a girl" are often used to denigrate particular players. Caricatures on Native Americans continue to fill billboards and sport stadiums, even in our nation's capital, despite the outcry of many American Indian organizations and supporters. These words, images, and the actions associated with them have meanings, and say much about the role of sport in our world and in our lives. Yet sport is rarely examined critically, despite the fact that it is an integral part of our society, and an important force in our lives. While we often complain about certain aspects of sport, rarely are solutions explored.

This book provides coaches, educators, parents, and others dealing with students and athletes with an engaging and critical venue by which to examine contemporary issues and controversies surrounding sport. In this text, authors take up the challenges faced by sport in our world, especially as it relates to the lives of young people, providing multiple perspectives on the issues, problems, and possibilities of sport in contemporary American society. The authors represent a variety of positions—scholars, coaches, teachers, athletes, and community members—providing readers with different lenses through which to examine sport and its role in our society. This book helps readers to recognize that sport is not just a game, but also a serious piece of our culture that needs to be examined critically from multiple perspectives.

Sandra Spickard Prettyman is an assistant professor at the University of Akron where she teaches courses in Cultural Foundations of Education and Qualitative Research.

Brian Lampman is a secondary educator at Saline Middle School (MI) where he teaches eighth grade social studies, integrating sports sociology concepts into his course. Brian also coaches the varsity boys' soccer team in Saline.