Social Environment Field Study
In sociology, a field study may involve an analysis of a social event using various sociological perspectives. In this case, the public event that will be analyzed is the high school girls’ state basketball tournament that was held in our school. The purpose of this event was for various schools to compete in basketball where the winner was to be awarded. There were many people who attended the event but most of them were students, teachers, coaches, and some government officials. Moreover, several parents also attended the event to cheer their children.
Since it was a girls’ school tournament there were very few males who mainly included teachers and some invited guests. However, the attendants included whites, Africans and Asians among other ethnic groups. Participants in this event had ages that ranged from 12-18 years. However, teachers and the other invited guests were in the age bracket of 25-50 years with women being the majority. Based on their ethnic backgrounds, it was possible for the attendants to have varying cultural values but in this event they had common cultural beliefs in regard to sports promotion. This was evident because all the attendants appeared to agree on the need to engage in healthy competition as a way of enhancing teamwork among the players. Besides, the attendants also mentioned that this event was becoming extremely popular and needed to be held more frequently.
Ideally, the culture of a basketball tournament involves the belief that the achievements of girls should not only be realized through education but also in extra curricular activities such as sports. To emphasize this, there were strong values associated with this event. These include, respect, trust, promoting teamwork, and development of interpersonal skills. The high school girls’ state basketball tournament is an annual event where participants mainly dress in sports attire. However, since the event was held on a Saturday, most of the invited guests were in casual dressing.
Since this event had become popular in various schools, the people who attended it were more than 1,000 but the stadium had a sitting capacity of 1,500 people. In essence, when people meet in this event, they get a chance to share ideas and inform one another about their general progress. Furthermore, people engage in informal interactions where they mainly focus on the achievements they have made in academics or in other sports. For teachers, they get an opportunity to meet with other teachers from various schools and share ideas on how they can balance sports and academics. Ideally, most people who attend such events are in a relaxed mood and are ready to have fun.
The social structure of the event played a big role in influencing the behaviors of the attendants. For instance, there were various dances conducted by girls as they cheered their teams to motivate them as they played. It was also due to the competitive nature of the event that various speakers were also invited to present their remarks before and after the tournament. Their short speeches encouraged girls to always engage in such events as it promoted teamwork among students. Similarly, students from various schools marched around the stadium while carrying their team banners to portray their patriotism to their school teams. From my observation, the participants in this event were highly psyched and were glad to take part in this tournament. However, there was no favorite team and all the teams had equal chances of emerging winners.
As the tournament proceeded, I observed that the majority of the participants in various teams were whites. This was a form of social inequality as it gave a perception that whites had better performance in sports than Africans and Asians (Dorling, 2011). Indeed, this was further affirmed by the fact that Africans were mainly involved in cheering their teams. For this reason, one of the leaders who spoke towards the end of the tournament encouraged school heads to discourage any form of racial discrimination and instead promote equality among students. Towards the end of the event, some students were so delighted and decided to mock participants from other schools that did not perform well in this tournament. As a result, they started shouting, insulting, and behaving recklessly. Eventually, other students retaliated by directing insults to them and it almost turned chaotic until the organizers intervened and saved the situation. In my opinion, this was a deviant behavior because it was disrespectful and portrayed some students as people who lack social control.
This public event can be described using the functionalist sociological perspective. According to this perspective, each aspect of society is interdependent and plays a role in the functioning of society as a whole (Lawler, 2008). For students to be successful, they depend on their teachers and coaches to provide them with the necessary skills. Upon completion of their schooling, girls get employed and may give back to the society by being role models for other students. If girls perform well in their academics, their schools and teachers receive recognition. This is also happens to the coaches who are highly appreciated when their teams perform well. Just like the functionalists are of the idea that society is held together by social consensus, students have to work together with their teachers and coaches to have constructive achievements in the society.
A social consensus that can be used in explaining this event is organic solidarity. This is a social cohesion where people in a given society are interdependent but have different beliefs and take part in varying types of work. In reality, it was observed in this event that students, teachers and coaches were engaging in different types of work (Cuff, Sharrock & Francis, 2006). For instance, teachers were the main organizers of this event while the coaches were instrumental in guiding their teams on the strategies to apply in the tournament in order to emerge victorious. Actually, the organizers of this event aimed to use it in bringing students from various cultural backgrounds together. In order for students to be successful in their endeavors, they should avoid working in isolation but instead strive to work in harmony with their teachers, parents and coaches. Equally important, is the need for students to understand that they can only succeed if they engage in healthy competitions where losers are not insulted or discouraged. To sum up, this tournament managed to create awareness on the need to promote sports in schools to enhance learning and equality in all aspects of social life.
References
Cuff, E., Sharrock, W. & Francis, D. (2006). Perspectives in Sociology. Michigan: Routledge.
Dorling, D. (2011). Injustice: Why Social Inequality Persists. New York: The policy Press.
Lawler, S. (2008). Identity: Sociological Perspectives. New York: Polity.
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