Remember the Titans

Culture formulates a lot of conclusions and assumptions in our society especially in sports. The culture that one belongs to, gives a brief description of who one is in a sense of way. Ideology plays a huge importance in culture as well. American football. A sport invented in 1869 by Americans and played by Americans who were predominantly white. In the Walt Disney film, “Remember the Titans”, it portrays several themes centered around race. This film takes place in Alexandria, Virginia during the 1970s when the United States was slowly trying to get rid of segregation by joining whites and blacks as one.

Like most Disney films there is always a happy ending to look forward to. But throughout the film, it portrays the struggle and hardship of segregation between the whites and the blacks during 1970s. In the article “Tiger Woods at the Center of History”, Yu writes, “Race was metaphorically a way of branding the human body, so that some bodies had more value than others- blackness became equated to being legal property owned by others and whiteness, on the whole to the power to treat others as property or potential property and the right to a number of others as property or potential property and the right to a number of other legal protections denied those branded as black.” (345). During the segregation period, a black person was known as the lower class, uneducated, and slaves to the white people. White people had all control over the blacks until society started to change and slowly got rid of the separation between the two.

In this clip, the Titans are on their way to a football camp for two weeks. As they board the buses, Coach Boone played by Denzel Washington, realizes the separation and decides to mix it up by making the team sit with the person that plays the same position as them. The person who they sat on the bus with is also the person they would be sharing a room with for two weeks at the camp. Towards the end of the scene when they get to the camp and move into their dorms, it shows the confliction between the two races. For example, the part where the black player wanted sleep on the lower bunk but the white player insisted that it was his bed. Showing that as a white player on the team  has dominance over the black player on the team.

Since this was the beginning of integration the fans and the student body of the school were not okay with mixing the races. In Michiko Has’s article, “Race in Soccer as a Global Sport”, he writes, “On the one hand, according to Garland and Rowe, a common puzzle to many in debates about racism in contemporary football is the tendency for spectators to racially abuse black players on opposing teams while remaining loyal and supportive towards black members of their own side.” (306). Even though there is a colored person on the fan’s favorite team, he or she will still support him or her. Meanwhile, the opponent team playing against their team also has colored players- it is as if the rules change because the colored person is not on his or her team so he or she does not deserve the respect from them.

The following scene starts off with an interview with the coach from the other team. The coach uses the term “chocolate” to describe the interracial Titans team. This portrays the idea of how the blacks are so dark colored that they are the same color as a chocolate bar.

As the scene goes on to showing the game, it is known that the referees were just calling random violations on the black players on the Titans team because they did not want the Titans to win due to having black players on the team. Another example of this prejudice idea being portrayed is the next clip. Here is a scene of protesters that do want interracial schools but the Titans football players are fine playing with a mixed team. When one of white players introduced his girlfriend to another player on the team that was black, she refused to shake his hand.

This film in general incorporates a lot culture in way that focuses on the ideology of race back in the 1970s. Since this movie was based on a true story, it is interesting to see how the sport of football has changed over the years. Back then it was a predominately white man’s sport. Now comparing it today, the NFL has a huge up percentage difference of African American players than it did when the sport was first played.