Sports have evolved significantly from the days when basketball was played using milk crates and flat balls in both wealthy and impoverished neighborhoods. One might question why they should care about the seemingly pointless perspiration and extensive training of sports enthusiasts. However, the answer to this query will make you realize the immense satisfaction that sports can offer, whether engaged in for leisure or competition. Engaging in sports provides a range of enduring qualities and grants participants an unparalleled sense of joy.
Jennie Yabroff, the author of “In Defense of Cheering,” and Felisa Rogers, the author of “How I Learned to Love Football,” both express their love and admiration for their respective sports. Yabroff argues that cheering should be taken as seriously as any other sport, while Rogers shares a personal story of how she came to appreciate football. Both authors aim to inspire others to embrace these sports, utilizing ethos and pathos in their writings. Pathos, in particular, proves to be more influential in establishing an emotional connection. Cheerleading, a well-known physical activity, is the focus of Yabroff’s discussion.
Some consider cheering to be on par with basketball in terms of notoriety, while others dismiss it as mindless women dancing for their health. In the past, I too had doubts about the legitimacy of cheering as a sport, but I have since changed my mindset and now hold cheering to the same standards as other sports. Jennie Yabroff shares similar sentiments and defends the sport throughout her essay, addressing those who doubt its credibility.
Football, an American sport with international recognition, is acknowledged by the majority despite a few who may not consider it a sport. Felisa Rogers was once indifferent to the outcome of the Superbowl, which holds the record as the most watched program in television history. Nevertheless, it is difficult to deny the game’s magnificence.
Rogers uses her texts “How I Learned to Love Football” and “In Defense of Cheering” to guide readers toward recognizing the advantages of football. Both texts utilize ethos as a rhetorical appeal, with the goal of establishing credibility and convincing the audience to embrace their perspectives. Rogers successfully proves her expertise by providing evidence to support her claims, employing storytelling as a means to engage her audience.
Personal accounts or narratives enhance an author’s ethos by providing a detailed account of their own experiences. Rogers accomplishes this in her account of her journey from disliking football to admiring it. Similarly, Yabroff’s essay also carries weight as she was a cheerleader in her teenage years. Although she doesn’t narrate the story from a first-person perspective, her credibility is just as strong as Rogers’ due to her thorough research on the topic of cheering.
Both essays begin with a direct introduction of their topics. Rogers starts by stating, “Rich likes to tell me about football” (529). Rich, Rogers’ husband, is an avid supporter of the Green Bay Packers, an NFL football team, and their quarterback Brett Favre. This sentence suggests that Rogers does not have much interest in football based on her casual tone. In the next paragraph, Rogers briefly mentions some of the things she has heard from her husband about the Packers and then reveals, “After a while my eyes would glaze over and I’d find myself thinking about Thursday’s dinner plans or perhaps Alexander Hamilton” (529).
Rogers dismisses her husband’s rants about football with a simple assertion, “You’re talking about football!” (529). By dismissing him, Rogers demonstrates both her initial doubt and ignorance towards football, as well as the beginning stages of her developing interest in the sport. This improvement in her ethos becomes apparent throughout her argument. In Yabroff’s essay, the first two sentences state, “The team is in bad shape. One member has a broken rib. The other, a possible concussion from a nasty fall” (524).
Yarbroff employs descriptive language to paint a vibrant image and narrate a story for her audience. The author highlights the team’s dedication and commitment, noting that they have been practicing throughout the night. It is difficult not to appreciate their diligent efforts. Traditionally, cheerleaders are known for motivating a team and boosting morale. However, Yabroff portrays the exhausted team members as also facing the obstacles of strain, perseverance, and hard work that any other sports team encounters. This narrative serves as an example that cheering demands the same qualities as any other sport.
Both authors use emotion or pathos to effectively engage readers in their arguments. Yabroff employs this technique by highlighting the challenges faced by a cheerleading team during a rigorous practice. When you learn about the team’s sacrifices, it evokes sympathy and admiration for their dedication. This admiration should extend beyond popular sports like football to include cheerleading as well. On the other hand, Rogers incorporates a slightly different appeal to pathos in her essay. Shortly after getting married, her husband Rich goes through a personal crisis.
During a difficult period when he lost his job, his family faced illness, and their cat was involved in a car accident, Rich found solace in discussing the Green Bay Packers. According to Rogers (532), football had a remarkable ability to ease Rich’s worries. Despite his current circumstances, talking about football brought happiness to his life. Recognizing the positive impact that football had on him makes us appreciate the game and its effects on individuals, regardless of its other aspects.
The tone of these essays differ somewhat. One is a narrative which has an informal tone and the other is a persuasive essay and more conventional. Rogers essay is written for a blogging website, uses simple diction and is conversational. It walks us through a transformation in her perspective on football through her simplistic thought process. Roger’s essay, being told in first person, gives insight to her personal feelings on her subject. In Defense of Cheering was written for a newspaper. The tone in Yabroffs essay is written more formal.
In her essay, Yabroff introduces and defends cheering as a sport, providing a list of reasons to support her argument. Rogers, on the other hand, relies on her personal experience to express her passion for football. Both authors use arrangement as an important component in their arguments. Yabroff dedicates a significant portion of her essay to explaining the history of cheering and the criticism it has faced.
She refers to Kate Torgvnick, the author of Cheer, who spent a year with four random cheer teams. She emphasizes that none of the teams matched the stereotype of mindless blondes doing splits on the sidelines. She also argues that the image of a cheerleader is a delicate balance between being a virtuous prom queen or a provocative and promiscuous girl.
This negative portrayal of cheerleading helps explain why it is often disregarded as a sport, and it invites her audience to question the fairness of this perception. In a similar vein, Rogers shares with her audience why she initially didn’t enjoy football.
Roger’s upbringing led her to have negative views towards football and baseball, considering them as only for “Neanderthal types” (530). She attributes her dislike of football to genetics. In her story, Roger explains and justifies her reasons for not enjoying football, contrasting with Yabroff who simply states them. Both authors utilize negative perspectives towards football to express their point. Yabroff uses the sport’s stereotypes of cheering as a starting point to explain why one should not adopt these stereotypes. They both begin with negative opinions and utilize them to develop their arguments.
