Paper Proposal and tentative annotated bibliography

580 Paper Proposal and Annotated Bibliography

My paper aims to explore the function of sports, primarily basketball, in relation to racial melodrama, and the manner in which sports related melodramas operate to promote discussion, or even to express the “inexpressible” in society. As Linda Williams notes in Playing the Race Card, racial issues essentially became a taboo topic once America enacted equal civil rights, but despite sublimation of such controversial topics, the need for dialogue persists. The racial sports film may be seen as melodramatic in the sense that it offers a potential medium of communication for society to examine and discuss racial issues in somewhat of a “safe” place. Sports and race have been inextricably linked in American history and society, from the national disgrace of slavery, to Jesse Owens’ triumphant performance in the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games and Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in baseball, to the firings and/or public excoriation of sports commentators like Jimmy the Greek and Howard Cosell who belatedly realized that the topic of race had become inexpressible, and were consequently fired for their inflammatory words. The examples of these sports commentators served irrefutable notice that derogatory racial stereotypes were no longer topics for public discussion, yet racial issues undeniably continue to simmer just beneath the surface of sports, and currently find one important outlet in the racial sports melodrama.

Issues explored in contemporary sports films include the potential of sports as a means of racial uplift and the related yet oppositional use of sports films as a means to perpetuate racial stereotypes and further entrench racism as an American institution. My paper will examine how sports films can represent athleticism either as a means of racial uplift or an illusory trap, and to what extent they either further institutionalize racism or attempt to subvert it. In this discussion, I intend to focus on the films Hoop Dreams, He Got Game, Finding Forrester, and Love and Basketball in order to address such issues as: whether sports films perpetuating the myth of basketball as the only avenue out of poverty for young black males serve to inspire reflexive action or preserve the status quo? Are sports movies melodramatic in the sense that Williams uses the term, and how effective is this medium as an instigator of either meaningful change or solidification of norms? To what extent do sports movies blend genres in order to create their own genre? What do we make of films such as “Love and Basketball” and “Finding Forrester” that seem to disturb many preconceptions about sports, masculinity, and athleticism by evoking questions related to intellectualism and feminism? Finally, in applying the issues derived from film study to contemporary sport-inflected race relations and race-inflected sports relations, I will investigate what we can discern from the public dialogue of the recent NBA lockout where team owners were likened to slave-owning plantation figureheads, and players self-identified as chattel.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary sources:

1) Williams, Linda. Playing the Race Card: Melodramas of Black and White From Uncle Tom to O.J. Simpson. Princeton University Press (2001).

a. I intend to use Williams’ discussion of melodrama to examine whether sports films can be classified as racial melodramas, and if so, whether this lends credence to their ability to promote progressive discussion, at least at some level. On the other hand, I will question whether Williams’ discussion of melodrama reveals a danger that sports films can serve to perpetuate and institutionalize racial prejudice and stereotypes.

2) Bordwell, David and Thompson, Kristin. Film Art: An Introduction. McGraw-Hill, NewYork, 8^th Ed. (2008).

a. I will use Film Art to discuss the racially influenced sports film as a genre or blend of genres, as well as the possible reasons we seem to need to identify films as belonging to a particular genre, and the potential motives film studios may have for blending sports and melodrama (such as appealing to a wider audience). I may also employ this source for technical discussion of sound, shot, narrative, and other film terminology as it becomes relevant to my paper.

3) Finding Forrester – Directed by Gus Van Sant (2000). This film will function as a lens to explore a reversal (or attempted questioning at least) of the stereotype regarding basketball as the primary or only way out of a life of poverty. The film focuses on a 16 year old black male who is a talented basketball player, but also a gifted and intelligent writer with high moral integrity.

4) He Got Game – Spike Lee’s 1998 film centers on the relationship between the best high school basketball player in the nation and his incarcerated father. It will likely prove impossible to examine this film without addressing the fact that the basketball player is named Jesus and is seen as a savior figure to everyone in his life – they all want something from him, and make various bids for his services/loyalty/attention, etc. Does this perpetuate the stereotype of black athlete as a commodity or does it disturb such notions? He Got Game also draws interesting parallels between the regulated confines of the basketball court and the prison yard/cell that prompts exploration of the idea of basketball as an imprisoning institution to many young black males (who paradoxically see it as their primary means of escape).

5) Hoop Dreams – Directed by Steve James (1998). This documentary achieved great critical acclaim and is often praised as a realistic depiction of the impact of basketball on the lives of young black males and their families. While this film certainly injects a needed sense of reality into the genre of the sports film/melodrama, it is also worthwhile to critique the degree to which it may perpetuate institutional stereotype by taking a close look at what filmmakers chose to show and emphasize from thousands of hours of footage.

6) Love and Basketball – Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood (2000). This film adds the topic of feminism to discussions of race and may serve as an interesting counter-example to some sports films, while simultaneously mirroring and reinforcing others. I would also like to take a look at what this film accomplishes in terms of melding genres.

Potential secondary sources:

7) Beck, Bernard. “What Price Glory? He Got Game, Bulworth, and Black American Dilemmas.” Multicultural Perspectives, Vol. 1, Issue 1 (1999).

a. This article will supplement my discussion of He Got Game by virtue of its explanation of basketball as a powerful social force.

8) Howley, Colin. “Ball and Chain: The Basketball Court and the Trope of the Prison Yard in Contemporary African-American Narratives.” Aethlon, Vol. 21 Issue 1 (2003).

a. This article posits a symbolic and structural relationship between the basketball court and the prison yard that is most explicitly connected in juxtaposed scenes of Jesus Shuttlesworth on the basketball court and his father on the basketball court inside prison in He Got Game. I am interested in seeing whether this comparison translates to other films and to what extent it reflects historical and societal realities.

9) Friday Night Lights:

a. Friday Night Lights originated as a non-fiction book by H.G. “Buzz” Bissinger in which he spent a year in the West Texas town of Odessa and followed the high school football team, while also exploring the relationship between the team and the town. It was later adapted to film, and finally morphed into a 5 season television series. Whereas the original book dealt largely with racial issues in a factual and unapologetic manner, the relative de-racialization of the film and series evokes complicated questions regarding the ability to explore controversial topics in journalistic print vs. Hollywood vehicles. I would seek to use this example to illustrate how the medium of sports melodrama in film can be considered lacking in relation to other sources, and how the size and demographics of target audiences plays into this equation (however, I am afraid this could be a separate paper unto itself).

10) Glory Road—Directed by James Gartner (2006). This film depicts the historical victory of an all-black starting lineup for a college basketball team (Texas Western) over an all-white college team (Kentucky) for the 1966 national championship. While ostensibly a true story of overcoming racial oppression, this film arguably reinforces racist assumptions that a white messiah figure is required to facilitate racial uplift and help blacks overcome hurdles they would be unable to conquer otherwise.

11) No Crossover: The Trial of Allen Iverson: Directed by Steve James (the director of Hoop Dreams) (2010)— This documentary examines the trial of high-school basketball star Allen Iverson on charges of Assault that stemmed from a racially tinged brawl in a bowling alley. The incident and subsequent trial bought unspoken racial tensions bubbling to the surface and essentially divided the town of Hampton, Virginia along racial lines in 1993. This incident could be used to discuss the need for racially influenced sports melodrama as a means of expression and modernization in the sense articulated by Linda Williams, in order to potentially mitigate these types of events.

12) White Men Can’t Jump – Directed by Ron Shelton (1992). This story follows two basketball street “hustlers,” one white and one black. Race is explicitly discussed throughout the film and the overt racial themes are obviously evoked in the title, but how is race represented? The film explores stereotypes about the differences in how blacks and whites play the game, such as the belief expressed by the white character that whites only want to win the game, but black players “would rather look good and lose than look bad and win.” This film could represent a transitional time period where racial issues were discussed more openly, but it is difficult to say whether that discussion combated racial stereotypes or reinforced them.

Clearly, there is an obvious need to narrow the focus of the paper, but I hesitate to start paring it down without input from Lysa and others. What sounds most interesting? What would people focus on? Get rid of? Link? Thanks!