America and Sports

Sports have a rich history in our culture and are now a major economic driver in our nation. This article was pretty interesting about how sports help track the seasons of life. For example, to many, the return of baseball each year means the coming of spring and summer. Even deeper, Christopher Hodge Evans says, “It symbolizes hope… it’s the sense of starting over, but it’s also the sense of continuity with the past.” Do you feel like this when baseball season comes around? Some say that sports reflect evolution of a culture. Baseball reflects the era of the 1920s to the 1950s; it is a “rural, agrarian, traditional sport, which harkens back to the past.” Football is said to be “the sport of factories and the machine age,” with emphasis on brute force, skill, and glory (reflecting the 1960s and 1970s). “Basketball (which gained international popularity in the 1980s and 1990s) is the post industrial sport…the sport of offices…and the networked society, suggested Mandelbaum. With the money and time that is spent in regard to the sports world, I would hope that there are some deep, emotional ties to this huge industry.