Friday Night Lights, by H.G. Bissinger, follows the Permian Panthers, a successful high school football team in Texas, while they do everything in their power to win the state championship. Near the beginning of the book, we learn about the star running back on the Panthers, Boobie Miles, and how he has college coaches all over the state who are offering him scholarships to come and play for them. Unfortunately for both Boobie and Permian, Miles injures his knee before the season even starts which forces the team to fall back on the second string running back. Boobie’s knee injury was not the only thing that bothered him, he deals with a lot of racial discrimination also. “The black population in Odessa was quite small- about 5 percent” (102). This meant Boobie was surrounded by white people all day and most of the people tried …show more content…
In many of the chapters, the author tells you about something that happened in the past, but instead of setting aside one whole chapter for what has happened in previous seasons, he jumps around from past to present without much warning. Due to the fact that the book is like this, it can be hard to follow what's going on or what time period it is happening. Another issue with the book is how often the author uses derogatory terms. The book takes place in the Texas, so you can expect to see some racial discrimination at some point, but it seems like you see the n-word used about every other sentence. Bissinger explains to us how often the term is used and how people do not think it is offensive, but at the end of the book, one of the coaches from the team the Panthers are playing says, “Let's not say black” “Let's say mixed ethnic crew”(331). If someone does not think people will like being called black, how do you think their going to react to being called the n-word. These are some of the few weaknesses is the book but that does not mean the whole book is
Overall the book is very thorough, asking the tough questions (Is Jim Crow alive and well in America?) and trying to find a common solution. The main focus of the book is to provide a broad range of subjects involving race and to go in depth with each to outline the problem and the solution. There is extensive legal research throughout the book to back up the authors’ claims. The best aspect of the book is that is gives both perspectives behind every issue so that the readers can make the decision for
These shows, such as 2 Broke Girls, Cops, Friends etc. each portrays racism, and classism, we just don’t notice it. The shows Cops have focused its show in lower class areas, never upper class, Friends and other sitcoms always throw in those ‘stereotypical’ jokes that everyone seems to find so funny. These shows prove that we (society) still do not treat everyone equally, and that our justice system continues to use racial profiling and classism as a way of social control. Not only does the book focus on the colonization of blacks, but also of Hispanics and how they are affected.
The book was very informative of life when racism was more apparent. I think that books like this show that standing up to racism is an option. It shows that even children of a younger age were involved in the situation.
The Unexpected That Changed My Life for the Better Friday Night Lights not only refers to the stadium that football players play in, but it also refers to every Friday night in September through November. That simple phrase brings back several memories, that carry emotional weight. Memories that are exciting, awe-inspiring, and even painful, and frustrating. The poem “Friday Night Lights” by Gerald Locklin summarizes some of the emotions that come with playing a sport, and brings about a deeper thought process. Being a part of a sport becomes your life, it teaches life lessons, helps build your personality, and shows you passions you never would have dreamed of.
The lessons the readers can get from the book and the knowledge that they can get from this, will be able to be used in the current world state. The book has been banned in some places due to racist language and inappropriate situations. Now this may be true, but the book has to show and say stuff like this to show how racism can affect someone and a family. The book should not be banned in some places for the following reasons: the book shows the issues of racism, the book shows life lessons, and lastly the book shows character development and growth.
At first main character of the book is Rashad Butler, a 16-year-old junior R.O.T.C. member and young black man suffered mentally and physically discrimination
Many books have been placed on the banned book list, they have been placed on the list because concerned people fear that certain books have and leave an effect on the reader. America’s classic novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, has been placed on the banned book list ever since it was first published. To Kill A Mockingbird should absolutely remain on the banned book list because it shows racism throughout the entire book and teaches the reader that being prejudice is alright. As you read the novel To Kill A Mockingbird you notice that it is very racist. Throughout the novel you notice that it repeatedly uses the “n” word.
In Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger appeals to his audience’s sense of emotions in order to persuade his readers that the obsession with high school football negatively affects everyone’s future in Odessa, Texas. Bissinger relies on emotional appeals by employing devices and techniques to present individuals’ personal stories and experiences. His searing portrayal of Odessa, and its Permian High School football team, exposes the side of sports that severely impacts the people living in this society. Bissinger shows the long term consequences of this delusion on the people who are directly and indirectly associated with Permian football. This demonstrate how detrimental the burdens are for the children, which touches the reader’s heart.
In Texas, football is a way of life; people eat, sleep and breathe it. Specifically for the people of Odessa, Texas this is very true. The book Friday Night Lights follows the 1988 Permian High School football team as they made their run for the State Championship. This type of culture that puts football and, everyone involved in it, on a pedestal creates no room for anything besides football to succeed in a town like Odessa. In 1988, when this took place, gender, class and race all mattered a great deal.
Football is obviously an integral part of our nation’s identity. It’s the one sport that absolutely dominates the weekend, whether it be college football on Saturday, or professional on Sunday. However in some places in this country, the game of football is all that a community has. Award winning journalist and author H.G. Bissinger described in great detail such a community in his 1990 non-fiction book “Friday Night Lights.” Throughout the entirety of the book, we learned about what life was life in Odessa, Texas during the 1980’s.
The most prominent theme in the book Bifocal by Deborah Ellis and Eric Walters is racism. We see cases of racism in in many chapters of the book. One of them was when the football team egged Haroon's house. Characters are always discussing the topic of racism and the affects of it. There are people like Kevin, who are the ones being racist.
The one thing I would have done more differently in this book is getting more in detail as to how this is hurting our nation. It is not obvious that we still have a problem with race issues and hate crimes. There has been multiple cases where a white police officer commits murder against a young black or white woman, but walk away free with their hands clean. Of course not all of these cases tie into with racial differences, but now with videos being posted everywhere, it is obvious to see when an officer is in danger and when he makes a cruel act. Another example of crimes committed by hate is when people
The book was challenged by a middle school in Brentwood, Tennessee in 2006 because the book contains “profanity” and “contains adult themes such as rape and incest.” The complaints also say that the book promotes “racial hatred, racial division, racial separation, and promotes white supremacy.” The people that say that are people that are trying to ‘protect’ other people from knowing and understanding what happened in the past because they believe that if they do know and understand what happened in the past then they will become racist and believe in white supremacy. These kinds of people are like the Holocaust deniers who believe that six million Jews where not murdered despite all of the evidence against that. George Santayana once said “Those who cannot remember the past are bound to repeat it.”
The Journal of Biddy Owens is a very interesting book. Some of the characters in the book were fictional but most of the event were real. In this book it was very clear that the author Walter Dean Myers clearly did his research because most of the events that happened actually happened in history. In the book The Journal of Biddy Owens: The Negro Leagues the author Walter Dean Myers did a fantastic job of describing everything that happened in the book.
The problem is more than race, it is about how humans treat other humans and how little respect we give to those we deem lower than us. The author used the characters to show that the desire to be superior among others goes further than race. She also used a real tragedy, the murder of the NAACP Field Secretary, which allows readers to connect the novel to real life and making the novel more compelling. These key issues make the readers think deeper, allows the novel to surpass others like it, and connect to many human interactions even in today’s