The Representation of American Football in Austria in Selected Media
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Touchdown: The Representation of American Football in Austria in Selected Media Diplomarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades eines Magisters der Philosophie an der Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz vorgelegt von Florian PÖLZL am Institut für: Amerikanistik Begutachter(in): Univ.-Prof. Dr. M.A Stefan Brandt Graz, 2020 Declaration on Plagiarism I hereby confirm that this term paper entitled Touchdown: The Representation of American Football in Austria in Selected Media is the result of my own independent academic work. All sources (books, articles, essays, dissertations, the internet, etc.) are cited correctly in this paper; quotations and paraphrases are acknowledged. No material other than that listed has been used. I also certify that this paper or parts thereof have not been used previously as examination material (by myself or anyone else) in another course at this or any other university. Your name in capital letters: FLORIAN PÖLZL Your signature: Place: Graz Date: 18.05.2020 Danksagung An dieser Stelle möchte ich mich bei all denjenigen bedanken, die mich während der Anfertigung dieser Diplomarbeit unterstützt und motiviert haben. Zuerst gebührt mein Dank Univ.-Prof. Dr. M.A. Stefan Brandt, der meine Diplomarbeit betreut und begutachtet hat. Für die hilfreichen Anregungen und die konstruktive Kritik bei der Erstellung dieser Arbeit möchte ich mich herzlich bedanken. Diese Arbeit ist all jenen gewidmet, die sich aktiv für den American Football Sport engagieren und dabei helfen, ihn zu verbreiten. Table of contents 1. Introduction 1 2. America’s Game – an Overview 4 2.1. American Football in Austria 6 2.2. The Origins of Austrian Football 7 2.3. Patriotism in Austria 8 2.4. Leagues, Clubs and Seasons 10 2.5. Demographics of the Austrian Football Divisions 11 2.6. The Rise of a Foreign Sport 12 3. An Introduction to Representation 14 3.1. Semiotics 17 3.2. Language 18 4. Approaching Media Analysis – Fundamental Aspects of Selected Media 19 5. PULS 4 Football Programme Commercial 21 5.1. Sensationalist Physicality 22 5.2. The Male Body as a Tool 23 5.3. Breaking the Old, Establishing the New 25 5.4. The Message 27 6. The Image in Social Media 28 6.1. Self-Representation in a Masculine Sport 30 6.2. (Hyper) Masculinity 32 7. Representing Football in Print Media 38 7.1. Hard-Boiled – and Confused 39 7.2. Names and Rules 42 8. Summary of Findings 43 9. Conclusion 44 10. Works Cited 48 11. Electronic Sources 50 1. Introduction Sport is an essential part of various cultures and its omnipresence in society is undeniable. Moreover, certain sports seem to fascinate us more than other. One may keep watching a specific type of sport and begin to question oneself why exactly this type of sport seems to be so highly appealing. From a personal point of view, I am attracted to American football. Before I entered the football sphere by chance, I thought of it as the most competitive and violent sport I could have imagined. However, since I actively started playing in a Styrian football club located in the south of Austria, my perception of the sport drastically. My knowledge of football as a team sport was not as developed as it has become over the past few years. When I reflect upon my previous assumptions of football and how my concept of football changed into what it is as of now, I began to question certain aspects of this sport. How do others perceive football in Austria? How could a foreign sport like football ever be established in a different country? How is football depicted in the media? Are there other perceptions of football instead of the one-dimensional aspect of a brute sport? If so, how are they shown? Which aspects of the sport are implied through representation? In order to find answers to these questions, I made the decision to analyze a selection of Austrian media which represent football in their respective content. The first media outlet under scrutiny will be a commercial for the broadcast programme of a private TV channel, PULS 4. Secondly, the social media post of an Austrian football team, which depicts a run play accompanied by co-text in the form of hashtags. The third medium which I considered as relevant for this paper is a news article in the Kleine Zeitung, covering a typical training of a Styrian football club consisting of a photograph and an article text. The main goal of this paper is to analyze, interpret and eventually compare the content of the different types of media. It is in this sense the aim to both locate differences and similarities regarding the way of representing football as a sport in Austria. In order to understand the sport as a whole, it is necessary to begin with an overview and a short historical introduction to American football. Since the emphasis of this paper lies on the representation of football in Austrian media, the second chapter will include the history, emergence and establishment of 1 football in Austria. However, since it is not a sport that originated in Austria, it is a necessary for this paper to approach the historical aspects of football in America. Since the selected media outlets strongly differ from another, I chose to include an overview of the different media types in order to provide a sensitization of their respective key characteristics. In order to analyze the media content within the same frame, I chose to include a theoretical framework of semiotics. The third chapter will provide an overview of the utilization of signs, which range from photographs, to texts and even clothing. Therefore, an introduction to signifying practices and their respective role regarding representation are crucial to purpose of this paper. One must first understand how signs work before one can understand how far the vast concepts of signs reach. The second goal of this paper is to determine how the media outlets chosen for this paper represent football. In other words, an analysis of the presentation of the content will be executed. This analysis in turn will be interpreted according to the messages and meanings that are conveyed. In order to understand basic features of the media in this paper, chapter four will outline key features of the selected media outlets. Considering the aspect of the strongly differentiating types under scrutiny in this paper, I will approach the reader towards a broad sensitization of the characteristics of the different media included in this paper. Chapter five will revolve around a television commercial promoting the broadcast of the National Football League (NFL) NFL in the Austrian private TV channel PULS 4. The commercial advertises the live broadcasting of the NFL in Austrian TV, drawing on certain stereotypical assumptions about football. Television programmes have slowly but steadily begun to show football on live TV. German TV channels such as Pro7 were among the first ones to incorporate NFL games into their TV programme. Recently, even the state owned ORF Sport+ started to broadcast games of the Austrian Football League on national television. The PULS 4 commercial will be analyzed according to its content and the resulting message. Social media – a relatively young medium compared to the others in this paper will be examined in chapter number six. With a broad reach within social networks, content not only easily spreads, but is also suggested to users. Algorithms detect user behavior and in turn create tailor made proposals for potentially interesting sights. Since social media has established itself within the new media, it appears to be of interest to analyze football related content on 2 Instagram. In order to do so, a social media posting of a division 4 team called Huskies Wels will be scrutinized. Social media posts are particularly interesting because the content is user generated, therefore there is more direct sense of self-representation within these posts, since profiles are generally managed by members of the team. In the final chapter regarding the analytical part of this paper, an online newspaper article will be analyzed. Newspapers are still one of the most consumed media in Austria. A newspaper article about the Styrian Reavers in the Kleine Zeitung is in the focus of this chapter. The article covers a typical training day of the football club. Curiously, newspaper articles in general do not cover as much football content compared to other media. Since football is not considered to be a mainstream sport in Austria, it is therefore the more interesting how football related content appears in a newspaper. The findings of these aforementioned analytical chapters will be summarized and wrapped up in order to receive a more condensed view on basic similarities and differences regarding representation of football in Austrian media. I consider my research as a contribution to the better understanding of football as a sport. My individual goal for this paper is to demonstrate how the Austrian media depicts the sport and to provide more information about other positive aspects of football. My assumption is that the general population of Austria considers football as a sport of perfected violence within a legal framework, mainly because of the lack of information about the fascinating facets it potentially has. Finally, I would like to provide a short disclaimer about the nature of the topic. Since football is a fringe sport in Austria, there are in turn few sources that directly relate to the topic. My main sources consist of secondary works and internet resources, since otherwise the writing of this paper would not have been possible. To my knowledge, there does not exist a similar paper within the sphere of Austrian scholars, therefore I consider this writing as pioneering work in cultural studies.