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Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger is a story about a football town. The name of the town is Odessa. It is a small town on the west side of Texas and football is the only thing that matters. Bissinger gives the reader a glimpse of what life is like at an area high school called Permian. Very few towns are obsessed with sports like Permian and Ringgold when it comes to sports programs. In this essay, Permian and Ringgold sports will be compared by their programs and values that they place on sports. Permian football is the only thing that the people of Odessa, Texas looked up to every single day. They did not care about anything but Permian football, and they would spend any amount possible on the gear that the football program supplied.
It is a town with less than 5000 people, and it is not a location that has many jobs. People must commute to neighboring towns to make a living. Ringgold is a town in North Georgia and is looked over when people visit Georgia. It is not a vacation spot and does not have many recognizable landmarks. Throughout the year, the people of Ringgold only have one thing to look forward to on a given day. That one thing is sports, and for a small town like Ringgold, sports are the only thing on the townspeople minds after 6 p.m. Starting from the age of five kids are placed on recreational teams and taught how to play football. The kids learn about the tradition of Ringgold football and how to play with pride. They are taught to give 100% and never to give up. The parents wear all blue in support of the Ringgold Tigers. Fans will spend almost any amount on the gear just like the Permian fans. The area grocery stores even carry the gear and support the football team every Friday. The people of Ringgold fill up the stands every week and support the team even though the team has never in its history produced a state championship like Permian football has. The fans show up and have a fire in their eyes that would mirror that fire that is shown in the eyes of Permian football fans. Ringgold is willing to support its team at any cost, and that was on display when the school built a brand new football field and had
High school sports can have a tremendous effect on not only those who participate but the members of the community in which they participate. These effects can be positive, but they can also be negative. In the book Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger shows that they are often negative in communities where high school sports “keep the town alive” due to the social pressure. In this way, Friday Night Lights gives insight into the effects of high school football being the backbone of a community, revealing that the fate of the individual football players are inadvertently determined by the actions of the townspeople.
Is High School football a sport, or is it more than that to some people? I’ve learned that the book is more sociological, which means that it focused on our human society of racial issues and also emphasizes the economy and the divide between the wealthy residents of one city versus the more working-class denizens of another are all subjects that are given an in-depth examination. This is more of the main or focal point of the whole book and in not so much in the movie. Although Bissinger's story is a true-life recounting of the 1988 football season of the Permian High School team, it reads like fiction and even though I believe his book is superior, the theatrical adaptation still stands apart as one of the great football movies ever to see in theaters. In the movie it was that team unit that was most significant in the development of the tale. Almost 80 – 90% of the book is in the film but there still are some differentiated contrasts found in the book in comparison to the movie. It has the intensity and the realism that kids were and are and also captures the...
Bissinger states that “Athletics lasts for such a short period of time. It ends for people. But while it lasts, it creates this make-believe world where normal rules don’t apply. We build this false atmosphere. When it’s over and the harsh reality sets in, that’s the real joke we play on people. . .. Everybody wants to experience that superlative moment and being an athlete can give you that. It’s Camelot for them. But there’s even life after it.” (Bissinger). The idolization of the football players and the team creates a false sense of equality and a just society in Odessa when in reality athletics mostly contribute to this segregation in the society. Bissinger continues on the say "saw no great social motive in the desegregation effort. It had nothing to do with true assimilation of the races and everything to do with percentages—how many whites, how many blacks, how many browns—little numbers that could be written down and submitted to a judge as proof that there was no longer any racism. “There’s no integration,” said Moore. “There is desegregation.”(Bissinger) . The society is not fair nor is it equal, Bissinger's distinct word choice conveys his main message to showcase the clear inequality in this society, with the
Bissinger tackled the many problems in the town, such as extreme pressure to perform, racism, and the relationship between parent and child. While Bissinger had several preconceived notions, he was ultimately proven wrong and through analysis of themes and incorporation of comparisons in the form of conceits he was able to develop his understanding of the town and accurately depict the events that transpired. When examining Friday Night Lights, the book’s themes are quite clear. Bissinger explores the impact of adults’ living vicariously through their children. He introduces the typical football player’s parents in the form of Dale McDougal, who lives and breathes to see her son, Jerrod, play football.
Friday Night Lights is a non fiction book written in the late 1980’s and very early 1990’s. The book was written by H.G. Bissinger. H.G. Bissinger is an American author and is from New York City.
H.G. Bissinger’s Friday Night Lights brings to mind the cold, autumn nights of 1988 where a town, just like any other rural town in America, was brought together in such a raw and emotional way. From the rise and fall of Boobie Miles to the push for the playoffs, it is clear that 1988 Odessa was swept up in the glory of football to replace the grandeur of the 1950s, which seemed to deteriorate throughout that hectic decade. While a modern reader may view Bissinger’s masterpiece as a tale from a dated and faraway place, several factors have kept it in the public’s eye. What is it about Friday Night Lights that still resonates today? The answer can still be found in the same rural towns of America. Though it may seem incredible, Texas is still football crazy, and it may be fairly concluded that emotions have only slightly receded from the obsession they once held towards high school football. People’s inability to analyze themselves, the impact a community can have on younger generations, and the way priorities can easily be warped all struck me as subjects that have stayed true in Texas culture over the past 26 years. I will be discussing these topics throughout this dissection of Friday Night Lights.
The Soloist (Foster, Krasnoff & Wright, 2008), is based on a true story of Nathaniel Anthony Ayers Jr. who develops psychosis and becomes homeless. In the film, Nathaniel is considered a cello genius who is discovered on the streets by Steve Lopez, a journalist from the Los Angeles Times. Steve was searching for a city story and he decided to write a newspaper article about Nathaniel. Nathaniel always had a passion for music. He was a child prodigy and attended Juilliard School of Music. However, he faced many complications at Juilliard, particularly hearing voices speaking to him. Unable to handle the voices, Nathaniel dropped out and ended up living on the streets of Los Angeles. Steve and Nathaniel develops an unexpected friendship, in which Steve tries to help Nathaniel to live a normal life; having a home, treat his mental disorder, and to fulfil his dream of being a cellist again.
Bissinger creates empathy in the reader by narrating the lives of once Permian heros. Charlie Billingsley, a Permian football player, “was somewhere at the top” while he was playing. It was hard for the football town of Odessa to forget “how that son of a bitch played the game in the late sixties”(80). While in Odessa, Permian players receive praise unmatched by even professional football. This unmatchable praise becomes something Permian players like Billingsley become accustomed to, and when he “found out that...you were a lot more expendable in college(80). This lack of appreciation that is equivalent to the one that they have received their whole life makes them go from “a hero one day to a broken down nobody the next”(81). With the realization of this reality, Billingsley becomes one of the many to spend life as a wastrel, living in his memory of playing for the Permian Panthers. The reader becomes empathetic towards how the once likely to succeed Billingsley, becomes another Odessan wastrel due to the over emphasis and extreme praise the Odessan football team receives. Bissinger does not stop with a classic riches to rags story to spur the reader’s empathy but talks about the effect the Odessan attitude toward football has on the health of its players. Just like in many parts of the world, in Odessa, sports equates to manliness and manliness equates to not showing signs of pain. Philip, an eighth grade boy aspiring to one day be a Permian Panther is lauded by his stepfather as he “broke his arm during the first demonstrative series of a game ...[but] managed to set it back in” and continued playing for the rest of the game. It is noted that Philip’s arm “swelled considerably, to the point the forearm pads...had to be cut off”(43). By adding details such as these, Bissinger
The film Friday Night Lights, directed by Peter Berg explains a story about a small town in Odessa, Texas that is obsessed to their high school football team (Permian Panthers) to the point where it’s strange. Boobie Miles (Derek Luke) is an cocky, star tailback who tore his ACL in the first game of the season and everyone in the town just became hopeless cause their star isn’t playing for a long time. The townspeople have to now rely on the new coach Gary Gaines (Billy Bob Thornton), to motivate the other team members to be able to respect, step up their game, and improve quickly. During this process, racism has made it harder to have a success and be happy and the team has to overcome them as a family.
After experiencing a traumatic car crash, Michelle, the protagonist of director Dan Trachtenberg’s film 10 Cloverfield Lane, wakes up in an underground bunker owned by a man named Howard. Howard claims to have saved her from a widespread chemical attack that has contaminated the air, with his bunker being the only place to take refuge for the next couple of years. Yet as the film progresses, Howard’s controlling and threatening demeanor eventually brings Michelle to escape, allowing her to come across the actuality of the situation outside the isolated bunker. Throughout the production, Trachtenberg arranges close frames, manipulates the camera’s focus, and chooses specific lighting to create an ominous tone that mystifies and disturbs viewers.
Bissinger does a great job of revealing Permian High School’s insignificant focus on its educational priorities. Putting football first over educational priorities can lead a kid to a very dark future with minimal opportunities except for that in the football world. An English teacher Larue Moore had been at Permian high for twenty years and she was paid $32,000 a year by comparison “she noted the salary of Gary Gaines, who served as both football coach and athletic director for Permian but did not teach any classes, was $48,000.”(Bissinger 131). This quote revealing that the town’s obsession with football is not only invested spiritually and intellectually but also financially with the way they distribute their money. The money invested in the football team should be less than the money invested into the school systems but it’s not and that is damaging to the town because their education suffers as a result of lack of funding by the t...
Jacobson, Robert. Sports in America: Recreation, Business, Education, and Controversy. Wylie, TX: Information Plus, 2006.
The adage of the adage of the adage of the adage of the adage of the The African American quest for equity in sports. American sports: From the age of folk games to the age of televised sports (5th ed.). (pp. 62-63). The aforesaid aforesaid aforesaid aforesaid afores Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall. Spalding, Albert G. (n.d.).
the situation described in Odessa during the 80’s, football is a huge part of the society in
Imagine a world where a person cannot differentiate between what's real and what's not. Although it's hard to believe it's a real brain problem which effects a good portion of today's people, “Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that affects the way a person acts thinks and sees the world” (“Schizophrenia” 1). Most commonly in schizophrenics they feel and experience things that aren't really there and alter the way they hear and see things. In a fiction book, “ The Hitchhiker” written by Anthony Horowitz the main character Jacob does many things that lead the reader to have inquiries about what his problem is. Jacob obviously has schizophrenia because he has insane delusions and vivid hallucinations.