Raise a fist, take a knee: the intersection of interscholastic sports and democratic education

Abstract

This study explores the ways in which controversies in U.S. interscholastic sports raise questions about race, gender, democracy, and citizenship. Drawing on a conceptualization of critical and multicultural citizenship, the authors use thematic analysis to analyse media coverage of two recent cases involving incidents in high school sports in the U.S. that highlight tensions among democratic values including equality, diversity, liberty, and patriotism. Findings suggest both patterns and differences across the cases that reveal important implications for ways that controversies in U.S. interscholastic sports have relevance to democratic education.

Keywords:

• Democratic education
• gender
• high school
• interscholastic sports
• race

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable feedback on this manuscript and Dr. Aliya E. Holmes and Dr. Jeremy Stoddard for their valuable comments and suggestions on earlier drafts.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.