What role does sport serve when tragedy strikes?

I have been invited to blog for the Journal of Sports Media, which focuses on sports media issues. The JSM is an academic journal published annually by the University of Nebraska Press and the University of Mississippi Department of Journalism. The Journal also publishes academic research that "adds to the understanding of sports media in terms of their practice, value and effect on the culture as a whole."

I just posted some commentary on the role of sports when a tragedy, like the shootings at Virginia Tech, strikes. You can check it out by clicking here.

Here is the beginning:

On a day like this, it is difficult to think about sports. Nothing much matters when you hear 31 people have been massacred on a college campus. Nothing matters except taking care of family and connecting with friends. So your school softball team wins 3-2, or the local high school takes the conference title. That doesn�t mean much on a day like this. Instead of worrying about pitch counts or golf strokes, we�re too busy counting blessings. Thank God for the people who survived the shootings. We give thanks for the nurses and physicians who plugged and sutured and saved the lives of bullet-riddled young (and old) bodies and for the people we know in Blacksburg, Va., who were not injured and for the police and EMTs who rushed in to save so many others.

You can click here to read the entire posting at JSM. Our thoughts are with the Virginia Tech students, faculty and their families.

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