Page 160 - Sport Culture and the Media

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TAKING US THROUGH IT || 141

‘race’ involving ‘hurdles’, then elements of sports language and culture are
being insinuated into other texts, with the meanings and mythologies of sport
invoked. Some print media sports texts – ‘amateur’ or ‘semi-professional’
fanzines – are now in circulation that (also as noted in Chapter 2) make few
claims to technical excellence. Stapled publications like What’s the Story,
England’s Glory! (dedicated to the English national soccer team), Come in
No. 7 Your Time is Up (Bristol City), Rub of the Greens (Plymouth Argyle) and
Up the Arse! (‘Arsenal’s Premier Spurs-Bashin’ Fanzine’) have small circula-
tions, poor production values and (to be kind) uneven writing quality, but they
form a not insigniﬁcant part of a print media sports text ‘scene’ (Haynes 1995;
Rowe 1995) characterized by multiple modes and expanding spaces – and with
spoken live sports commentary for satirical inspiration.

Conclusion: from script to still

In this chapter, I have analysed elements of the sports spoken and written word
in attempting to understand something of their formal properties and the types
of textual relations that they generate. Live broadcast sports commentary,
for all the enthusiastic lampooning to which it is subjected, is a potentially
powerful instrument for the symbolic uniﬁcation and denigration of nations
and peoples at moments of high sporting excitement. Print media sports texts,
however, have greater ﬂexibility of form – from a ‘straight’ results service to
shrill ‘tabloid speak exclusives’ to tranquil poetic reﬂection – if less immediacy
of impact. Broadcast commentaries and print stories devote much time and
space to description of events and places that cannot be or have not been seen,
or are seeking to enhance what has been or is simultaneously being seen. The
next chapter examines, then, the visual aspects of media sports texts, turning
ﬁrst to the memorable image frozen in time – the still sports photograph.