Examine various media outlets to observe how corporate media in particular, uses sport and other physical activities to promote, inhibits and reinforce the dominant beliefs among locally, national and global communities.
Students will use the following procedures to develop this assignment:
a. Select two (2) recent articles from major corporate media outlets (do not use “social media” sites). These should be long recognized newspapers or magazines (e.g., New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Wall Street Journal, Time, Sports Illustrated, GQ, People, Vogue etc.,) and not televised networks (i.e., ESPN, NBC, FOX, ABC, NBC). Only one of the two choices you select may be from a sport specific or exercise/fitness related media source. If you are uncertain about the appropriateness of your article selection, contact the professor at least one week before the assignment is due for approval.
b. Conduct a content analysis of each article, noting the following to include within your written report:
Media outlet name & complete reference
Lead character(s) or team name in primary visuals
Background/periphery visual field images
Sport/activity
Sex of individual or sport/activity
Youth/adolescent/college/professional/other
Race/ethnicity of primary character(s)
c. Following your analysis, synthesize the data into a report that includes information comparing and contrasting your data to data which was included within the chapter on media in sport (Chapter 12). Also, reflect on to what extent the information you examined by reading the articles and viewing the relating photos promote the conventional and current racial, gender, social class and ableist ideologies discussed in the opening chapters of the required textbook. Regardless of your personal opinion, which may differ from those individuals demographically different than you, highlight what data you collected supports or questions the dominant beliefs of society and hegemony as described within Chapter 3 of the course textbook. Finally, provide a brief reflection of your feelings and what you learned as you uncovered the initial “truths” about the nature of sport sociology and why we study it.
