I found a very interesting article at Wikipedia when searching for a good definition of the American term "jock". Not only did I find a definition, I also found a very good description of our tendency to categorize people we feel threaten us. I quote:
Quote:
The term jock is a classic North American stereotype of a male athlete. The jock stereotype is attributed mostly to high school and college athletics participants who form a significant youth subculture. In sociology, the jock is thought to be included within the socialite subculture, which also contains the preppies and Ivy-Leaguers. As a blanket term, the jock is considered synonymous with an athlete.
Other words that may mean the same as "jock" include meathead, musclebrain, and the similar term musclehead. These terms are based in the beliefs that a jock is muscular, yet slower in the brain, and cannot carry a conversation on any topic other than one relating to weight-lifting or exercise.
and:
Quote:
The jock stereotype is often used in the mass media to portray a relatively unintelligent and unenlightened, but nonetheless physically and socially well endowed character. The stereotype is most prevalent in movies for teenagers such as College, American Pie, and Revenge of the Nerds.
The whole article can be found here, and should be read, it is very enlightening for the discussion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jock_%28athlete%29Quotation from the article on James Dean:
Quote:
American teenagers at the time of Dean's major films identified with Dean and the roles he played, especially in Rebel Without A Cause: the typical teenager, caught where no one, not even his peers, can understand him. Joe Hyams says that Dean was "one of the rare stars, like Rock Hudson and Montgomery Clift, whom both men and women find sexy." According to Marjorie Garber, this quality is "the undefinable extra something that makes a star."[39] Dean's iconic appeal has been attributed to the public's need for someone to stand up for the disenfranchised young of the era,[40] and to the air of androgyny[41] that he projected onscreen. Dean's "loving tenderness towards the besotted Sal Mineo in Rebel Without a Cause continues to touch and excite gay audiences by its honesty. The Gay Times Readers' Awards cited him as the male gay icon of all time.
As we can see, this is a very complex area, also involving homophobia and fear of appearing homophobic, very important values in our time. Humans have a need to simplify the world around them, and put other people in categories. Especially important is the need to categorize people who feel threatening to you.
The jock stereotype, or the athletic person, is very threatening to the nerd stereotype, or the physically weaker but intelligent person. Our modern culture is to a large degree defined by the nerd stereotype. As the wikipedia article states, the real revenge of the nerds is the fact that Hollywood and most cultural and entertainment institutions have put the athlete in a stereotype box that says: "stupid, muscular, homophobic, stealing the attractive girls, psychopatic"
But of course, this is not true. It's only an illusion, made by the nerds. There is actually a lot of research on this:
In 2005, Dr. Sabina Kleitman, a psychology professor at The University of Sydney and Herbert W. Marsh, employed at Oxford University for the same profession teamed together. The pair conducted surveys of over 12,000 American students to find a correlation between sports and grades. The following is a quote from their published results:
Quote:
"Achievement can be measured in many ways—grades, homework, attendance, standardized test scores, and enrollment in college. In all of these areas except standardized test scores, even after controlling for economic status, race, and other background variables, athletic participation was significantly correlated to academic achievement. Even after controlling for academic success in 8th and 10th grade, athletic participation was still associated with positive academic outcomes in 13 out of 21 measures in 12th grade and 2 years out of high school. This suggests that athletic participation itself may be responsible for some academic achievement—the later achievement isn't completely explained by earlier academic success."[9]
Despite the fact that many schools recruit for sports, they put stipulations in place that hold student athletes to high standards in order to maintain their scholarships. Schools such as Cornell College recruit students to their athletic teams, but require a student maintain a certain grade-point average in order to have the scholarship renewed. For many young athletes, this is imperative as they could not afford higher education on their own. Therefore, they balance proper study with the demands of their sport.
Wikipedia Quote.
I think it is safe to say that our modern culture idolizes the adolescent youth, especially the outcast and "rebel without a cause".
But what does the "aristocracy"? That is the modern upper class, jet set or our modern day idols? They exercise to become thin. Or to get a six pack. To look good on pictures or at the beach. The way you look is most important.
In addition you have the intelligentia that is exercising; they are running marathons, climbing mountains, in Norway they are going cross country skiing climbing "mountains". All about walking or running far, and all of them are getting thin.
But getting thin is not athletic.
Then what about the workers? Have they retained anything of the athleticism? Bah, they have digged the ground for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years, lately standing in front of machines or sitting in front of PCs. That kind of tiring long-time-lasting work does not create athletic humans.
We need to go to the barbarians to meet the real athletes, and I am afraid the western European culture has all but destroyed all of these cultures. But some islands are still retaining the knowledge in a more of less pure form. I will have to emphasize the Portugese people as a stubborn kind of gang, who actually have managed to keep up the essence of this athletic culture and all the knowledge of the training methods up to this day, despite all the pressure from the outside calling them barbarians, cruel to animals, etc. I do not intend to let this discussion end up in a fight over bull fighting, but I find it interesting that we usually do not see this aspect of the discussion. Perhaps it is not easy to see, as we are very influenced by the modern anti-barbaric ideal.
And what we do not know, we tend to simplify and look down upon.
We try to take the bits and pieces of the athletic culture and "cultivate" it, making "art" out of it. We make ballet, artful riding, fantastic movies, and we let stunt-people do the dangerous things. we think that by making art, we are able to retain the athleticism and stop being barbarians. But we lose the essence. Because by taking away the danger, you take away reality.
Without gravity, there would be no balance. Without the falling, there can be no learning.
Modern dressage riders would not last a second in the bull fighting ring. Even though they perform very advanced movents at competitions. Modern body builders or joggers would not last a day in a jungle. We smile and say "good heavens no, we never need it". But we need the athleticism to ride well.
Positioning ourselves prettily on top of a horse's back does not make us good riders. To really be "one" with the horse in all movements, we need to start being a bit more barbarian.
Hanne