Contact Zones Within College Sports

Contact Zones Within Collegiate Sports

The definition of sports is physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively. However to fully understand sports, especially collegiate sports, you must acknowledge the existence of contact zones. Contact zone is a term used to "refer to social spaces (teams) where cultures (players and coaches) meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in the contexts of highly asymmetrical relations of power (coaches overpower the players)..." In watching higher level sports you often times see players and coaches, mainly the coaches though, yelling at the other. You will see the coaches take the player off to the side of the field to talk. This talk is not a chat between the two, it is primarily the coach telling the player they are doing something wrong, what they are doing wrong, and how to fix what they are doing wrong. Little player input is ever initialized. The players that can register and then adjust to the situation presented are the players that achieve more success. This kind of receive, memorize, and repeat method is almost identical to Freire's banking concept of education. So one can assume that successful collegiate athletes can only truly excel within the diversity of the existing contact zone, if they can accept their inferior role to coach in the asymmetrical relation, and then take instructions given by coach to adjust their play accordingly.

I've played sports since I was four and now play in college. Through the years many things have changed as I switched from team to team but many things never change. You will always have things you disagree with the coach about whether it is drills, communication factors, or playing time. However, despite the differences I learn to adapt in order to play. I accept that no matter how much I disagree with the coach's ways, he or she is the coach and therefore I must obey. If I choose not to follow the coach's orders he will retaliate by now putting me in the game. Also in my teams, my teammates have all been different each bringing a unique and special aspect to the game that I or any other player could not bring. Each player helps the team in different ways. Some games call for brute strength, some for speed, some for skills, some for height, and still others for endurance. The diversity makes our team hard to beat by not making us one dimensional or as Pratt puts it "homogenous." Along with diverse styles of play come diverse attitudes. Some players listen to coach and are what coaches call "coachable" meaning you listen and adapt to whatever coach throws your way. Coachable players are the kind of players coaches look for. They blend well with teams and in games if something isn't working coachable players can change to the situation where as players who don't adapt wont react well therefore will not play. Hence, coachable players will become more successful.

Often, players must complete a process known by Pratt as "transculturation." This process is where, "members of a subordinate or marginalized group (players) select and invent from materials transmitted by a dominant or metropolitanized culture (coaches)." Basically players must take what coach tells or shows them and incorporate it into their own play. Players who do not accept what coaches say are incapable of meshing well with a team. Collegiate athletes all come from different teams with different styles of play and when they get to the college team the way they are use to playing may or may not be the way the coach wants to play. However, players know what coach says goes due to them being the inferior party. This is exactly what the contact zone entail, players and coaches