Friday Night Lights,
, illustrates the
detrimental and beneficial effects of representative sports and the ways in which sports can both
unify and divide a community. Keep this in mind as you address one of the following questions:
1. To what degree to you agree or disagree with Bissinger’s statement, “Odessa also evoked
the kind of America that Ronald Reagan always seemed to have in mind during his
presidency”…(33). In what ways, does it (not) represent the legacy of the Reagan
presidency?
2. Frank Deford states, “It is time to recognize the truth, that sports in the United States has,
in fact, never been so divisive. Uniquely today, sports have come to pit race against race,
men against women, city against city, class against class and coach against player.”
Analyze either class, race or gender unit in the context of Deford’s statement. How is
football is used to create either class, racial and gender unity and/or division in Odessa,
Texas?
3. Friday Night Lights is an example of representative sports, in which “limited conflict
with clearly defined rules, in which representatives of towns, regions, or nations are
pitted against each other. It is primarily an affair for the spectators: they are drawn to it
not so much as the mere spectacle, by the ritual, or by an appreciation of the skills
involved, but because they identify themselves with their representatives.” Examine the
function of representative sports in Odessa, Texas in the 1980s. How and why is
identification with their sports representatives so important to the people of Odessa?
Objectives:
! To demonstrate a clear understanding of representative sport and its effects.
! To demonstrate that you have read and understood Friday Night Lights
! To write a clear and effective evaluative essay
i. Strong clearly defined criteria for evaluating your subject
ii. Including an effective thesis
iii. Clearly organized supporting body paragraphs, with
1. Credible, logical, thoughtful evidence to support your thesis
! To effectively use MLA format and properly cite sources
! To properly select and incorporate secondary sources
Requirements: This assignment has a minimum five-page requirement and maximum of seven
pages. You are required to use, at least four different sources. This must include Friday Night
Lights, the excerpt from Sports Unites, Sports Divides by Stanley Eizten, one of the supplemental
articles from Unit 01 of this course and one scholarly article you research and find on your own.
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