Abstract This paper examines the movie McFarland, USA (Caro 2015) and the sport psychology themes identified in this movie, produced in 2015. This movie depicts a cross country team going through the trials and tribulations of starting as a new team among other established teams. The sports psychology themes identified in this movie include motivation, mental toughness, and cultural consideration. Keywords: movie, sport psychology, themes, motivation, mental toughness, cultural consideration. In the movie, McFarland, USA, Coach White gets fired from his football coaching and teaching position at his preppy school. The only job he can get is teaching in a low-income, highly Hispanic area in McFarland, California. The only way he can coach is by …show more content…
He realizes how privileged he has been and uses his hard upbringing to help these runners succeed. Being successful runners is the first good thing that they have had their whole lives. The kids are tougher than any of the other country club kids and have more heart and grit and surprise everyone by qualifying for state. The whole town rallies behind this team and Coach White comes to appreciate the people of this town and their culture. Despite all odds, McFarland’s cross country team won state. He has the chance to leave for another preppy school, but his love for the people despite their economic hardships and cultural differences keeps him in McFarland. Coach White is introduced to the new school he will be teaching at by another teacher. Welcome to McFarland's website. This is a farming town. These kids working here are invisible. They come from the fields, and they go back to the fields. These are good kids, smart kids. They just need a chance at a better future. Mr. White, if we're going to reach them, now is the time." It is obvious that these kids had a hard upbringing, having to work for everything they ever got: a better future
The beliefs and values held by many of the characters change over the course of the film as a result of Coach Boone and Coach Yoast’s work. It is clear that their belief in racial equality and love for football helped a team, and ultimately a town, begin to come to terms with the issue of race in America’s schools.
Coach Herman Boone is the main African-American character in this film. He is a football coach who is brought in by the newly diversified T.C. Williams High School as a form of affirmative action. This character struggles throughout the movie with dealing with the prejudices of his players, of other football coaches, of parents, and even of the school board who hired him in order to try to create a winning football team. Another key black character is Julius Campbell. He plays a linebacker who ends up becoming best friends with a white linebacker on the team. He, too, struggles with prejudices from some of his teammates and people in the town because of the new desegregation of the team. The remaining black players on the T.C. Williams High School had very similar roles in the film. Petey Jones, Jerry Williams (quarterback), and Blue Stanton all are shown facing racial inequality by players, citizens, and even other football coaches. The attitudes of ...
“It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game” is a quote by Grantland Rice which suggests that winning is not important as long as one tries their best. In the movies “Chariots of Fire” and “Next Goal Wins”, the notion and meaning of sport is explored in both similar and dissimilar ways. Although “Chariots of Fire” and “Next Goal Wins” both follow the journey of sport and competition, the characters in the respective films show contradicting views on the idea that winning or losing sport is unimportant in light of the best effort.
Mr. Davis started at Hempfield as a middle school physical education teacher, soon being swept away by fate to the place he finds himself most content. He has the school district to thank for moving him to the high school, where he finally found a solid place of comfort. Never once was he disappointed teaching in a middle school, but it wasn’t until he moved to the high school that he found where he knew he wanted to be. Continuing in the path of physical education, he continued to teach for seven years before he would really find that path that he belonged
Herman Boone is brought in as an assistant coach to join the all-white coaching staff. When Herman Boone is appointed head coach over a winning white coach he is reluctant to accept because the same things had happened to him when a white coach had been appointed over him in South Carolina. He finally accepts the head coach position when he sees that the black residents
Interview with Mr. Scott William in the Field of Sport Science My interviewee was Mr. Scott William, a well-known professor in the field of sport psychology. My discipline is sport science, and although William does not teach at the university, he has a sport psychology degree. He is a close friend of my father’s and my mentor. He has been working in sport and recreation industry for the last ten years before I even knew him; so it seemed like he had a good understanding of sport science and the use of drugs in sports.
Boone faces the challenge of being accepted by the community, encouraging them to work together rather than judging and persecuting one another. At that time in Alexandria, Virginia there was an active atmosphere of racial tension within the community between both the African American and Caucasian population. Boone, a black coach, faces the challenge of taking on a new position as head coach of the T.C Williams High School football team. This is fraught with conflict and peril however due to the opposition of those that do not and will not accept the integration of black and white students into mixed race schools. In a move by the school board coach Boone is now unknowingly threatened by the loss of his job if The Titans loose a match. If The Titans are to loose a match Coach Boone will not only loose his job, both himself and the community will loose the hope of ever having this system of integration work. Boone in an effort to be accepted by the community uses his work with the football team to support the system of integration by emphasizing that he is in fact a valued ...
The age of overwhelming strength and stamina governing sports is over, and the age of the mentally tough athlete has arrived. Athletes are no longer the superficial jocks and robots programmed to accomplish one goal, victory. Modern athletes ranging from the high school to professional levels are faced with many pressures and temptations, normally outside the realm of their sport. These pressures can inhibit an athlete’s performance substantially; therefore, the pressures need to be dealt with by psychologists. The effectiveness of sports psychology is demonstrated through the fields many theories, applications, and variety of techniques and procedures.
Cool Running’s is a 1993 American sports film based on the true story of the Jamaica national bobsled teams and their debut in the bobsled competition that took place at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Alberta Canada. This movie puts together quite a few sport psychology qualities such as motivation, determination, leadership, imagery and goal setting. The movie showcases how an underdog Jamaican team who lives in a constant summer can compete in a winter sport due to the fact that they never gave up and used every resource they had available to them including sport physiology. Throughout this summer I will talk about the certain aspects of sport psychology and how the movie sheds light on them. Motivation is seen throughout the entire movie from Derice to coach Irv Blitzer.
Sports Psychology Today. Mental Edge Athletics, 4 Sept. 2012. Web. 28 Oct. 2013. Forde, Pat.
To What Extent Might Courage be an Effective Tool to Enhance Athletic Performance? Introduction In the realm of sports, courage stands as a fundamental virtue that is crucial for development and performance targeted towards athletes. This essay delves into the multifaceted nature of courage, highlighting its role in navigating challenges such as parental expectations, societal pressures, and internal struggles like self-doubt and mental health concerns. The concept of courage is deeply intertwined with present modern sports culture, highlighting not only physical strength but also mental resilience, ethical judgment, and integrity when confronting challenges.
Sports are an important aspect of society. They help people to strive to reach certain goals and join people together, but they also can divide people and turn a fun game into the main purpose of someone’s life. Taking sports games too seriously can be harmful to both the athlete and the spectator. The attitude of always winning at any cost in sports has managed to distract us from other important parts of our lives, such as health and education. This importance of the value of sports can heavily influence the way that we see ourselves as both the spectator and the athlete by creating a positive self image and distilling confidence and discipline within the player, or by embedding self doubt and inversion.
This model of health can look at people as if they were or their body was a machine. The medical model of health views health as the body parts functioning in the correct way and ill health as a malfunction of this and needing medical intervention. This model of health can view health quite narrowly as it only looks at the medical aspects of health. The central activity of the medical model of health is treating disease. The reasons for why the illness occurred in the first place, is not the centre of medical model but instead how to treat the illness.
Sports psychology is the study of how psychology influences sports, athletic performance, exercise and physical activity. Some sports psychologists work with professional athletes and coaches to improve performance and increase motivation. Other professionals use exercise and sports to enhance people’s lives and well-being. While finding ways to help athletes is certainly an important part of sports psychology, the application of exercise and physical activity for improving the lives of non-athletes is also a major focus.
Sport and exercise psychology is a mandatory aspect of the sport science discipline. This discipline contributes to the various professional practices associated with physical activities such as - teaching of physical education, recreation and health promotion, and kinesiology related professions - because it plays a mental role for the participants. Sport and exercise psychologists view physical activity in several different ways: physical activity as a tool for health, physical activity as a tool for human potential, and physical activity as a tool for social change. This aspect of psychology may be the most important aspect of physical activity, because of the contributions of exercise and sport psychology to health, human potential, and social change.