Ethnicity in Sports

This paper asks two main questions: Is sport relatively free of prejudice and discrimination found in other aspects of society? Is it a way toward upward mobility for underrepresented groups? The common belief these days is that the sporting world is integrated very well, and that athletes and people that work with them have put their prejudice aside. When African-Americans of a lower social class see the success of black athletes they think of it as a way of self-improvement and upward mobility in society. However, a closer look at the sports world shows that these beliefs may be false.

Historically, there are many examples of prejudice and discrimination in sport. There were very few non-whites in the major sport organizations before 1950. Blacks played sports but they played on their own teams, and in their own baseball and basketball leagues. When they did excel in sports, it was either ignored, minimized, or attributed to their “animal cunning.” According to experts, “seeing blacks as subhuman made it easier for whites to explain how and why blacks could defeat whites in contests of physical skill. After all, the argument went, blacks were mo

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It is a belief among some people that in today’s sports African-Americans are well represented and even over represented. However the danger is that young African-Americans tend to just focus on sports and not the future jobs they might have if they do not make it to the pros. There were two occurrences in 1987 of discrimination in sport. Basketball courts can be built in small amounts of space. (104)

Are sports a mechanism for upward mobility in society? Jackie Robinson said “ I think… professional sports have done more for minority groups than all the politicians, all the welfare, and all the other programs combined. So they rely on sports for upward mobility in society instead of trying to improve their place in society through education and hard work. As stated earlier, low income blacks have excelled in sports that require little and inexpensive equipment and training. So the coaches do not care who plays as long as the team is winning and they are getting their money. But the numbers show that in the United States there is an opportunity for only 1 out of every 18,000 black athletes to play at the professional level. What is stacking? It is the practice of placing players in certain positions based on their ethnicity. As shown in the movie very few young athletes make it to college level competition.

Even when blacks are over represented in sports there is a practice called stacking that is actually a form of segregation. ” (Figler and Whitaker, 1994: 301) Another explanation for stacking is sociological. Opinions like this influence who is even recruited for the position.

Approximate Word count = 1714
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)

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