Today in my Criticism class we watched, and discussed, the Nine for IX documentary, Venus vs. The tennis icon took on a years long fight for equal pay in women’s tennis. This is a great documentary, a documentary which, itself, was the beginning of a momentary effort by ESPN to correct a gender imbalance. This was the debut of the Nine for IX series. It debuted as ESPN carried their first installment of Wimbledon, and just a few years from the resolution of this long campaign.
So, if you’re keeping score, last week we went from a 1999 doc produced about a 1968 event, the Olympics, to a 2013 doc today which focuses on parts of the early 21st century career of Venus Williams. Next week we’ll watch a program produced this year.
And, also next week, I think I’ll take some stills from the Venus vs. program and talk for a moment about shot composition. I’ve given the class a primer on critiquing techniques and one of the points is about visuals. That documentary, produced and directed by Ana Duvernay before she’d become a huge hit-maker, has some things to say, visually.
In Org Comm today we continued our conversation on branding, which features a lot of sports commercials, and will somehow go into Tuesday.
My favorite one of the bunch isn’t even a real commercial.
And also this one, just because of how Peyton Manning trades on his referent power, and his incredibly philanthropy through the meaning transfer model …
Don’t tell the students, but all of the star power things we’ve been talking about this week are on an assignment they’ll have to conquer on Tuesday. That’s when we’ll start to see if I’m making any sense.
Rowan / video / Wednesday — Comments Off on And if that wall asks anything of me … 24 Sep 25
It turns out that we streamed the Charles Barkley conversation last night. You can watch it here, if you like.
If that doesn’t automatically jump to the right moment, just scrub to about 13:00 to get to the talking.
I’ve got nothing for you, but a day of timeless email tales, and trying to figure out how two days of branding talk will become three days of branding talk, and working on an assignment for next week. And also re-watching a documentary we’ll watch in class tomorrow. One must make notes so one can have something insightful to say.
Also this morning there was a Zoom meeting. And all afternoon, a faculty meeting. So enjoy Sir Charles, I want to blankly stare at a wall now.
It was a long day and a long night on campus. About 10 hours, in total, I think. I had two classes, of course. We talked about sports stories in the criticism class, of course. And in org comm we discussed branding, of course, which we’ll do for another two days, of course. When classes were over it was back to the office, where I did some work. And then we went over to one of the auditoriums for … well, you can see for yourself.
We were sitting some distance away, but in reserved VIP seats. Very Important Professors. The good seats went to our students, as it should be. Charles Barkley hasn’t played in the NBA in their lifetimes, but he’s still a hugely important sports figure locally, and nationally. Being on Inside the NBA doesn’t hurt that, nor does his huge personality.
The guy up there with him is one of of our faculty members, and an institution in local sports media. They go way back, and from time to time Barkley comes to share his wisdom and good humor. He was very generous with his time tonight. They started taking questions from two microphones on either side of the stage, this went on for a good long while, with young people nervously reading their questions from their phones for some reason. There was still no way that they were going to answer all of the questions, almost all of which is stuff Barkley probably fields a dozen times a week, but still, some of them were good, and the man has a way of making everyone feel welcome around him. As the time was drawing late, they said, we’ll just take one more, and Charles said, no no, how about we take three more questions from each side of the room, and that was another 20 or 25 minutes.
After that, there was the after-party, where you feel a bit like a hanger-on between the tables and the gladhanders and the oddly lit photo room and bar, and the more-than-reasonable food spread. Charles Barkley stood there and took pictures with everyone who wanted one. It’s not work, and he knows it, but they love him and he knows that, too. So it is work, and he’s gracious about it all. Tomorrow, he said, he has to fly to Atlanta to finally find out what his broadcast schedule will be for the upcoming season.
He does a riff about college, opportunity, cost and how we limit some people by design. I’d honestly rather get more of that than the next question about some famous funny bit from a chat he had on Inside the NBA. Where would you rather be?
(Yes, he drags Galveston. And then picks San Antonio.)
“I love sports because sports has given me every single thing I have in my life.”
He lists his bucket list, sitting on the green monster, football at Notre Dame, Michigan … tells a story about playing two days of golf at Augusta National.
At the after-party, surrounded by brilliant scholars and talented educators, I talked volleyball and ChatGPT with our new dean. It felt just as natural as you’d imagine.
It was a busy day on campus. In my Criticism class we watched a documentary about the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City. It’s titled “Fists of Freedom.” You can find it in a few places online, including on the HBO app, but here’s a little tease from the night the doc won a Peabody.
Watching it took the full class. Tuesday we’ll talk about it, both the story they told, but also the craft of documentaries. We’ll watch a lot of documentaries in this class, and for these first two we’ll talk a tiny bit about the filmmaking as a format of criticism, too. I have worked diligently to create a wildly varied menu of documentaries. This one is historical and about track and field. (Good as it is, Bob Beamon’s world record long jump is my favorite part of that film.) The next one is contemporary and about tennis. We’ll look at an unconventional documentary centering on a diver after that.
In org comm today we discussed the overarching concept of the uniqueness of sport communication. Anyone that comes back next week will get to laugh at a lot of commercials as we talk about branding.
My godniece-in-law (just go with it) is a high school senior and playing some of her last field hockey games. So we went to see one of them this evening. Her little sister, my other godniece-in-law (again, go with it) played in a JV game, so we got to see both.
Now, I’d hoped to take a few photos of the senior, thinking maybe I could get one or two of her to share with her. The problem is I know nothing about field hockey. I’ve been to, I think, three or four games, and it’s still largely inscrutable to me. Fortunately, one of my students is a field hockey star. She gave me some tips today.
So we went to the games, I followed the suggestions of my field hockey folk hero. The game is played on the school’s football field, which serves quadruple duty as football field, soccer pitch, field hockey pitch and some of their field events for track. The field has a play turf surface, which feels like it’d be fun to run on.
I can say that because I set up shot behind the cage, which sits under the mobile soccer goal, which rests under the football field goal. The game is getting underway, I sneak back there. Sneak by walking at a normal pace. And as I’m fiddling with the settings on my camera, my godniece-in-law scores a goal. Missed it.
At the start of the second half the two teams swapped sides, so I walked over to stand behind the other goal. And back there, was this, which covers the high jump pad. For some reason, they’re really quite serious about staying away from this cover, which is just all kinds of dangerous.
Soon after, a gentleman walked over and told me to leave. So I walked back over to the stands, properly chagrined. It was the first time I’ve gotten in not-trouble at a high school in decades. Such a rule breaker am I.
Leaning against the post of the soccer goal felt comfortable. I haven’t done that since I was 20 or so. And, from back there, watching the game come toward me, I understood what was going on much better than the side-view you get from the bleachers. I have been assured by the people I’ve asked — including a chat tonight with my godniece-in-law’s grandfather, who is my godfather-in-law (just go with it) — that there many rules about what you can and can’t do in field hockey. They mysterious and inscrutable rules to us mere fans, but grounded in safety. He was a field hockey coach for 20 years. He’d know the rules, right? He did not tell me all of the rules. I’ve come to conclude they’re meant to be secret.
Most importantly, the home team won both games.
photo / Rowan / Tuesday — Comments Off on Cats and adverbs, and verbs 16 Sep 25
The cats insisted they go first today, since they got bumped for space yesterday. They triggered a key part of their contract, which is that I’m getting claws in my face until we make it happen here. And these cats need their need their nails trimmed.
This week they’re also executing their soft focus clause. Phoebe, you can see, was very excited about that.
She’s sitting my lap as I type this. Just jumped up, in fact. She insisted on the “very” above. She likes her adverbs.
Poseidon does not approve. It is unclear if he disapproves of adverbs, or of Phoebe getting lap time.
They are competitive and jealous.
Phoebe says very.
So the cats are doing well, and looking forward to Catober. We’re just two weeks from all cats all the time around here.
Today, in my Criticism class, I tried to lead the class through a discussion of two stories. We’re reading a lot of sport media and I’m asking them to start reading these things critically, hence the title of the class. It’s a process, and this is our first week of doing this. (Week one was getting to know you. Week two was about criticism. Now we are beginning to practice the craft. We’ll do this throughout the term and before long they’ll get a feel for it.)
One of the stories was a piece from the Philadelphia Inquirer about one of their recent pitchers.
It’s such an incredible story that ESPN produced a package on it the next spring, and they were able to add a crucial and necessary update. And here’s that piece.
My next task will be to convince them that the criticism doesn’t have to just be about the stories with huge emotional tolls.
In org comm, we talked about communication, what it was, and why it is … no wait, that’s not right. Communication, what it is, and why we will look at it in these particular ways. This is a slowdown from the first two weeks of getting to know you and then group work. Next week, that class will be 19 percent more interesting. We just had to get through today and Thursday. But then we can talk about things like branding, storytelling and audiences, all of which will carry us through mid-October at least. But first, we must slog through this week.
