AFR 217
Race(ing) Sports: Issues, Themes and Representations of Black Athletes
Last Offered Fall 2013
Division II
Cross-listed ENGL 215 / SOC 217 / AMST 217
This course is not offered in the current catalog

Class Details

Althea Gibson to the Williams Sisters. Julius (Dr. J) Irving to Michael Jordan. Jesse Owens to Tommie Smith and John Carlos. Throughout the 20th century, black athletes have broken through Jim Crow restraints, challenged racial stereotypes, and taken their sports to new heights of achievement. In this course, students will explore a range of black athletes in the 20th century, paying particular attention to the attitudes, stereotypes and experiences they endured. In addition, this course will prompt students to analyze the representation, perception, and commodification of black athletes in popular media forms. Students will trace trends, shifts and themes in representations of blackness across different sports and historical periods. Topics under study may include resistance against and affirmation of athletes as role models, racial slurs in sports broadcasting, common themes in commercialized images of the black male athlete, and distinctions in media coverage based on race and gender. Texts will include everything from critical essays and sociological studies to commercials and documentary films. In their final projects, students may put their newfound knowledge to the test by exploring their campus or hometown to investigate the role that race plays on their own playing field.
The Class: Format: lecture/discussion
Limit: 25
Expected: 20
Class#: 1114
Grading: yes pass/fail option, yes fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: evaluation will be based upon class participation, short weekly reading and/or listening assignments, one 5-page paper, final group project
Prerequisites: none; open to all
Distributions: Division II
Notes: meets Division 1 requirement if registration is under ENGL; meets Division 2 requirement if registration is under AFR, AMST or SOC
This course is cross-listed and the prefixes carry the following divisional credit:
AFR 217 Division II ENGL 215 Division I SOC 217 Division II AMST 217 Division II
Attributes: AMST Comp Studies in Race, Ethnicity, Diaspora

Class Grid

Updated 11:49 am

Course Catalog Search


(searches Title and Course Description only)
TERM




SUBJECT
DIVISION



DISTRIBUTION



ENROLLMENT LIMIT
COURSE TYPE
Start Time
End Time
Day(s)