The Associated Press has found a school in Maine that offers three units for a history class about baseball.
About Boston Red Sox baseball, in particular, but I could stand that.
Name of the Bates College class: Red Sox Nation: Baseball and American Culture.”
Where was this class when I was going to school?
How hard could this be? The story paints a picture of 16 students sitting around talking about baseball big topics. Not all of them Red Sox-oriented, thankfully.
I could do a thesis off the top of my head. I could write a paper as long as I had access to some statistics. I would kill this class.
Perhaps there should be others like it. Perhaps an entire major devoted to team sports.
“The NFL and the West Coast Passing Game.”
“The Super Bowl as America’s Secular High Holy Day.”
“The NBA and Hip-Hop Culture.”
“Fighting in the NHL and What It Means”
We could go on at length.
Perhaps some small school keen to gain some students will come up with a major like this. I’m not sure what you do with it, when you’re done. Maybe pitch yourself as an analyst for TV? Or a sports writer?
Well, yes. Now that I think of it.
Historically, sports writing has rarely been considered a separate form of journalism. Most students who hope or plan to write sports, after college, slog through the same general journalism classes as those who want to cover the Supreme Court or City Hall.
There’s quite a bit of apples and oranges there. A specialized course of study — for sports — makes sense.
It would entail history of games, their rules, their financial footing. All that. Very little of which is taught, now, in any J school.
So, instead of assuming or hoping that a journalism grad actually knows the sports he or she wants to cover … maybe Bates College or someone like it can have sports journalism majors.
Something a lot wider and deeper than “Red Sox Nation” — but just as fun to study.
4 responses so far ↓
1 Dave Gaytan // Oct 1, 2008 at 6:42 PM
This class makes a helluva lot more sense then diagramming sentences.
2 George Alfano // Oct 2, 2008 at 11:48 AM
I studied these subjects in school.
Of course, I was supposed to be doing math or English when I was studying baseball.
3 Joseph D'Hippolito // Oct 2, 2008 at 4:30 PM
This class makes a helluva lot more sense then diagramming sentences.
Of course it would, considering the sub-par intelligence of 90 percent of the people involved in journalism (let alone sports writing). I really don’t think most reporters know writing, let alone grammar.
4 Brian Robin // Oct 3, 2008 at 9:16 PM
I would LOVE to teach a class like that.
Charles Alexander, who wrote the definitive biographies on Ty Cobb, Rogers Hornsby and John McGraw, taught a class at the University of Ohio on the History of Baseball.
Melanie Hauser, who used to cover golf at the Houston Post and now is the secretary of the Golf Writers Assn. of America, teaches a sports writing class at the University of Texas. Having seen the syllabus, it’s a pretty cool class.
Given some of the other classes they offer, why SHOULDN’T they offer this?
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