All Articles Tagged "soccer"
The Rundown: Census Suggests Ending Use of the Term ‘Negro’; No Need to Be Invited to Pinterest
Image: Hemera
-So maybe the economy is doing as poorly as we thought? It’s an emotional roller coaster! Now The Washington Post is saying there are indications that things are moving in a lasting, positive direction. New homes are being built and sold at a higher clip. Those jobs numbers improved with yesterday’s Labor Department numbers showing 361,000 fewer people filing for unemployment insurance. And U.S. exports were up. Experts question whether this will make a difference in the Presidential election.
-We talked about some of the trends in retail in this story yesterday. Today we have a story from The New York Times outlining the ways in which personalized shopping is heading to the supermarket as well. Grocers, using data collected on loyalty cards and apps, are reaching out to customers in a variety of ways with personalized coupons and offers.
-The Census Bureau has proposed an end of the use of the term Negro, leaving black and African American. The suggestion is one of a few that the Bureau has made following research it conducted during the 2010 census in which some questions, when worded differently, got better response rates. The other suggestions include a separate category for “Hispanic” and different ways of identifying Arab-Americans. Hispanics are concerned that changes will short-change the count. But other groups, including the National Urban League, are in support of the rewording.
-Couldn’t get an invite to join Pinterest? Now you don’t need one. And here’s our story with a few pointers for using Pinterest to grow your business and your personal brand.
-And in the final Olympics update of this year’s Games, Usain Bolt won gold in the 200-meter race, becoming the first to ever defend both the 100-meter and 200-meter titles in back-to-back Games. For many, the win earns him the title of “best sprinter in history.” He’s also competing in the 4X100 relay competition. Separately, Bolt took issues with comments US Olympian Carl Lewis has made, suggesting that Jamaica’s drug testing program needs to be strengthened.
Ashton Eaton became “the best athlete in the world” with his gold-medal win in the decathalon. Another American Trey Hardee took silver, the first time the U.S. took the top two spots since 1956.
And the U.S. women’s soccer team took gold for the third straight time, beating Japan. The game was a rematch of the 2011 World Cup in which Japan was the victor.
Soccer More than Play for African Immigrants
(The Grio) — Jennifer Brumskine, a native of Liberia, is pacing the sidelines of a high school football field watching a soccer tournament she organized. Teams Liberia and Nigeria are battling it out for the right to move on to the next round. Liberia won in a blow out. Off to the far side the field under shade-bearing trees sat their friends and family, all casually outfitted out in their American, non-ethnic clothing, cheering when goals were scored and barking at the referee for calls they felt were missed. On the opposite end was a woman selling African dishes in Styrofoam carryout containers. The smell of Ghana was in the air. In a borough where nearly 80 percent of the residents self-identify as white, this was not a typical Saturday afternoon.
Owner Sets High Goals for Soccer Team
(Uptown Magazine) — T. Fitz Johnson’s twin daughters, Jordan and Whitney, have quite expensive tastes. Two years ago, when the pro soccer team Atlanta Beat (which operated from 2001 to 2003 as part of the Women’s United Soccer Association) became available to be a part of Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS), they urged Johnson to look into it. Aside from coaching his daughters in soccer in grade school, nothing in the German-born, Virginia-raised Johnson’s 21-year military background suggested he’d one day own a pro team.
Lebron James Gets in on the Soccer Game
(Bloomberg) – LeBron James is joining the group that owns soccer’s Liverpool Football Club and baseball’s Boston Red Sox, adding a marquee athlete to two of the biggest brands in sports. Under terms of the agreement between LRMR, James’s marketing company, and Fenway Sports Group, which is owned by John Henry, a commodities hedge-fund billionaire, FSG becomes the exclusive representative for the two-time National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player. James of the Miami Heat gets an undisclosed minority stake in Liverpool, an 18-time English champion. The union of James and Fenway Sports Group, which also owns 80 percent of New England Sports Network and half of Nascar’s Roush Fenway Racing, will help each to extend its brand globally, Paul Swangard, managing director of the University of Oregon’s sports marketing center, said in a telephone interview. “It’s an interesting marriage of two brands with global ambition,” Swangard said. “For Fenway, it continues to diversify the notion of not just being about the stadium they’re named for. They’re now into soccer, leveraging into basketball.”
Thierry Henry – Mouthwatering Man of the Week
Every once in a while, sophisticated women of society need to entertain their eyes with some appetizing, handsome men (who of course were only placed on this earth for the sole purpose of catering to us queens). Thus, this week, we’ve selected a fine piece of shirtless goodness to whet the palates of our distinguished madames, and help your Friday run just a little bit more smoothly. Without further ado, we present to you, Madame Noire’s Mouthwatering Man of the Week…
World Cup 2010: By The Numbers
(The Week) — World Cup fans inject $5 billion into South Africa’s economy and were sending 4,000 Tweets per second at the height of the action. That’s just the beginning…The World Cup is over: Spain are champions, South Africa won the respect of nearly everyone with its hosting prowess, and Paul the “psychic” octopus became a global sensation. But that’s not the whole story. Here, a look at the tournament through a numerical lens:
Shakira to Honor African Women at World Cup Closing Ceremony
World renowned musician Shakira says her performance in the World Cup closing ceremony will be a tribute to African women.
Global Workplace Productivity Takes a Dive During World Cup
(AP) — Nearly 15 million Americans tuned in to ABC for the team’s 2-1 loss to Ghana, with 4.5 million more watching on the Spanish-language Univision — making it the most-watched men’s World Cup game ever in the country.
The World Cup is the fourth-biggest “top productivity sapper” in the U.S., based on a nonscientific ranking of sporting events by workplace consultancy Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The NCAA men’s basketball tournament ranked No. 1.
Algerian Player Slaps Reporter & She Punches Him Back!
Talk about being sore loser and a punk. Algeria striker Rafik Saifi has been involved in an altercation with a journalist after his team was eliminated from the World Cup.
The Peculiar Case of African-American World Cup Watching
Every four years, I suffer from a condition. I feel confused, disconnected from friends and co-workers, yet strangely compelled to engage foreign matters. These feelings are brought on by the arrival of the World Cup. Through conversations with a number of my black American friends I’ve learned that I am not alone in this sentiment. While the World Cup represents one of the most important events to take place around the globe, it remains far from sacred to Americans; even less so to many black Americans.
I recognize that the World Cup is very significant to many of my brothers and sisters throughout the African diaspora, but I wonder if it will ever hold deep meaning for most of us. While it may just seem like a sporting event, mending our disconnection from the World Cup holds great promise for African-Americans; learning to appreciate it could usher in a new period of global citizenship.
As I recently sat watching the United States v. England match someone asked, “Who are you rooting for?” “Neither! I don’t like colonizers or oppressors,” I responded. Off the cuff, I quickly realized that my comment spoke to a dilemma the sport presents to many black people in this country. My disengagement with the World Cup wasn’t just about politics, it was also about how I was socialized.
In the United States soccer is an overwhelmingly middle class, suburban and predominantly white activity. Images of plush green fields, orange slices and minivans rush to my mind when I hear the word soccer.
By contrast, around the world, children mired in poverty find football, as the majority of the world calls it, an ideal athletic outlet. Whether it is played on the plush fields of London or the dusty expanses of Dakar, soccer is a language for communication and competition. Sadly, it is an international language from which many black Americans have been barred.
Sports are not foreign to black Americans, but over the years there has been a continued narrowing of sporting options. Sports like hockey and golf attract few black youth because of their high costs. But soccer is economically accessible, so if it’s not about the money, then what’s the problem?
Sociologist Scott Brooks finds that black youth, particularly boys, are socialized heavily toward basketball. While many try to argue that black boys are naturally talented at hoops and view it as their only option out of poverty, neither could be further from the truth. We have the potential to excel at any sport, but outside factors have shaped our interests and abilities over time. Need proof? Look no further than the declining presence of African-Americans in baseball. The messages we pass and the opportunities we present dictate the paths that we take to recreation and beyond. While there are many barriers to linking black Americans to the globe, such as poverty, segregation and unequal access to technology, soccer could provide an alternative path to connection.
I began watching the World Cup when my friends from college began pestering me to check it out. I wasn’t completely unexposed, having been the lone black kid on a handful of soccer teams growing up. But I didn’t realize the global importance of the Cup, particularly to the African diaspora. As anthropologist Michael Ralph has pointed out, in places like Senegal soccer is often about more than simple sport — it represents historical and contemporary political battlegrounds. I am slowly coming into an appreciation for the World Cup, not just as a sport, but also as an opportunity to foster camaraderie throughout the diaspora. The work of uniting the diaspora doesn’t have to be limited to politics and protest. It can also be linked in play.
R. L’Heureux Lewis is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Black Studies at the City College of New York – CUNY. His research concentrates on issues of educational inequality, the role of race in contemporary society, and mental health well-being.
