Archives - Page 4

• Vol. 23 No. 247 (2018)

  Many modern sports were created in Britain in the 19th century. Participation was originally reserved for upper class men. An exclusive code ensured their elitist characteristics: the ambiguous rules of fair play and amateurism.
  Colonialism through, the English expanded their culture across the planet, along with football, rugby, rowing, tennis and other sports. The local inhabitants transformed sports to their idiosyncrasies; economic interests transformed many sports forever.
  Ayrton Senna, well-known Formula 1 driver who died in the middle of a race in Italy, expressed that The second is the first of the losers. Those who promote extreme ideas affirm this idea. But there are also those who recognize the effort and merit of reaching the top, even when the jackpot cannot be won. And that is something that we should also applaud and celebrate.

  Tulio Guterman, Director - December 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 246 (2018)

  When we perform a teaching task, is there a need to contextualize the practices? It seems an obvious question that any person, teacher or not, would answer yes. However, when we inquire on a recently developed proposal that suggests to take into account social, cultural or geographical facts, offers rarely abound.

  Paulo Freire, Brazilian educator, proposed to fight for an education that teaches us to think and not for an education that teaches us to obey. Even so, education still follows homogenous proposals, despite the enormous progress made towards a world that seeks respect for diversity and acceptance of heterogeneity.

  During these times, it is a great challenge to be able to create the conditions so that we all have the same opportunities of being different.

  Tulio Guterman, Director - November 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 245 (2018)

  A few days ago, the Youth Olympic Games ended in Buenos Aires. In the context that there is very little information circulating, it is known that the expenses were considerably higher than expected.

  Now, is it worth such an outlay? Does getting some medals justify it? Or it is like Will Smith says: We spend money we do not have, on things we do not need, to impress people we do not care.

  Is it really beneficial to host large sporting events? Opinions vary. For some, when a candidacy is launched, the crowds are attracted by the event, the sponsors contribute so that the expenses are minimal and the consumption that is generated justifies such an investment. Others argue that the earnings for the arrival of visitors are relative, the sponsors are scarce and some of them even take advantage to charge for some services and that the expenses become uncontrollable.

  Following this last trend, many citizens have rejected the possibility of being an Olympic venue. Hamburg, Boston and Toronto turned their backs on being hosts due to the high costs. In the 2015 Hamburg referendum, citizens voted to invest money in social projects instead of organizing an Olympic Games.

  Before any initiative of this nature it is always convenient to ask ourselves the question of rigor: By whom and how is the party paid?

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - October 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 244 (2018)

  When it comes to understanding a phenomenon, are statistics enough? Is it possible to approximate with certainty and get closer to the truth with the invaluable help of numbers? The norm, the normal, is neither more nor less the tendency of what happens the most, the most usual in a universe. But then what do we do with the rest? Do we discard it? Do we label it as abnormal, forget about it and send it to a specialist to turn it - with time, patience and treatments - to normal. Undoubtedly the understanding of diversity requires other comprehensive tools.

  Nicanor Parra, Chilean mathematician and poet, explained them like this: There are two loaves. You eat two. I do not eat any. Average consumption: one bread per person. In other words, someone ate in excess and another does not cover his basic needs. The world has untiringly abused of statistics to explain the inexplicable, and to make true the unusual.

  So today a selected group can pay a round trip ticket to the Moon, but there are people who walk miles to go to work because what they are paid (the astronauts?) is not even enough to pay for the bus ticket. The media title with fascination every month that they have found water on Mars while a recent report by the World Health Organization reports that 2100 million Earthlings lack drinking water at home.

  Maybe someone is currently saving for a long trip, one way.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - September 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 243 (2018)

  No immigrant is a criminal, especially if we assume that the history of humanity is the history of the journeys of human groups seeking for better lands, gradually occupying all the planet's geography and beyond. But still some people -less and less, luckily- continue to negatively value people for their most visible characteristics: their skin color, physical appearance and gender.

  But that valuation is due to convenience, by social, cultural and political factors. And this occurs mainly in those regions where those who consider themselves more "civilized", those who for centuries faced colonization processes that were always based on ideas of superiority, dominate. It was not about invading, but collaborating; It was not preying, it was free trading. It was not submitting, but legitimately evangelizing. Mario Balotelli, son of Ghanaian immigrants, born in Italy and player of the national team azzurro said it very clearly: Racism flourishes from ignorance.

  Imagine for a moment that the French team, recent champion du monde, had been disqualified in the first matches. Surely the media criticism would not have been for their game but for having built the national team with many Africans. The same media that in the middle of the triumph, now that benefits them, celebrate the multicolored country.

  Tulio Guterman , Manager - August 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 242 (2018)

  Why no women play in any team?  This was the awkward question about the World Cup. Whatever his skin color, height, ethnicity, social status, as long as he has been selected by the coach, no man is forbidden from integrating a team. Could not a woman represent her nation as decently as men do regardless of their condition? 

  The answer to this question is very simple: it is expressly prohibited by the International Football Federation (FIFA). Women can only play among women, as in most sports created in the 19th century. Even though they have performed extraordinary sporting feats in disciplines such as rowing, shooting, swimming, mountaineering and others, even surpassing mens. Referring to those times that seem distant, Ivan Illich said: I do not know any industrial society where women are economically equal to men. I still consider at this point that everything that measures the economy, allows us to realize that those who receive less, are always women.

  A woman is unfairly denied access to the highest sport awards even though she spends all the time and effort to acquire the necessary talent. Millions of women watched, screamed, suffered. Surely, if the prohibition did not exist, some would have played. Gianni Infantino: In order to make the world we live more just, we must update this regulation item. It would be necessary not to legitimize this anachronistic segregation.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - July 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 241 (2018)

  It's time for the World Cup. It's just about winning, against all, with goals or without them, screaming and suffering, at penalties or however, with the VAR or with "Fair Play", even if it is holding the ball several minutes so no one plays.

  While I eat my nails and see the game, Vincent Lombardi comes to mind, an NFL "winner", a visionary who, several decades ago and with enormous convictions, expressed one of his most remembered phrases: Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing.

  Thus the tribalism of these weeks smashes everything we have learned from teachers: rationality, reflection, equanimity, critical point of view, solidarity, empathy, the search for truth, the sense of the aesthetic. The epic overrides the ethical, in only 90 minutes.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - June 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 240 (2018)

  We conceive education as a universal human right. However, its complete application is still full of obstacles and excuses that come from the sectors of supremacy: material, social and cultural.

  In this sense, coercion, symbolic violence and threats are implemented, which only seek the submission and discipline of people, wich usually develops over sectors that are perceived as weaker: women, salaried and marginalized population, ethnic and religious minorities.

  Listening, dialoguing, sharing, cooperating, are words in concordance to the meaning of an education that tries, as Michel Foucault quotes, that Each individual should lead his life in such a way that others can respect and admire. It is undoubtedly in that direction the road we have to keep pursuing.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - May 2018

• Vol. 23 No. 239 (2018)

  Nobody lives and develops alone, we are product of our environment and our time. Hence, an environment that values and stimulates effort and creativity will always encourage more valuable and socially relevant people. We also know that giving permission to make mistakes is a way to correct them and move towards better achievements.

  Will we be more successful if we were born with natural talent? Is luck a key factor in the final result we seek? To question and give some answer to things that for many are universal truths, Gary Player, the famous South African golfer, coined the phrase The harder I practice, the luckier I get.

  This indicates that, without denying the multiple factors that intervene, the recognition of the effort must have a much greater value in the educational field, in sports and at work, if we want to obtain the best medium and long-term results.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - April 2018

• Vol. 22 No. 238 (2018)

  For some people it as part of the culture, since the origins; others claim that it is a product of the Industrial Revolution in Britain in the 19th century. The truth is that sport (or some form of recreational competition or organized body practice) comes from our ancestors.

  Is there a particular sport that stands out? Undoubtedly, soccer, due to its incredible media coverage, has become a sort of universal language. But there will always be diverse and discordant opinions. Like Ernest Hemingway's who said that There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.

  It is a huge scenario where party, joy and healthy passion can be showed but also violence, social and racial struggles, and the representation of nationality. It could be for all and for an elite at the same time. For us, it is still a field full of elements to keep questioning and thinking about reality.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - March 2018

• Vol. 22 No. 237 (2018)

  We go through a time when human beings need more and more of the others to develop and prosper. Linear and obvious and direct causality views often lead us to dead ends and repetitive errors.

  Sport is an interesting space to represent this idea. The multilateral and multidisciplinary training and preparation seems to give more and more fruits to those who cultivate it. Michael Jordan himself recognized that the talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships.

  There are countless examples where the most expensive times does not always win or those that a priori seem superior. Sometimes those who spent time and effort to know and expand their potential, those who enjoy the game, those who are motivated with goods and immaterial rewards win, the unexpected that give an intense and inspiring sense to our existence.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - February 2018

• Vol. 22 No. 236 (2018)

  Should we be technological? What doubt fits! It seems the condition of daily survival. Those who were born in the last decades are testimony of a submersion, almost a submission to the logic of technology, attention to cyberspace, the use of almost magical resources without the slightest questioning.
  Marshall Mcluhan known for the titles of three of his books: The medium is the message, The Gutemberg Galaxy and The Global Village stated that All technology tends to create a new human environment... Technology environments are not merely passive recipients of people, are active processes that reconfigure people and other similar technologies.
  In these global times, it is also valuable to look around, to link creatively with others and with nature, to operate not only materially but culturally and socially in the Networks. It is about building experiences and feelings that are alternatives to build spaces that are more participative, supportive and inclusive, more human.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - January 2018

• Vol. 22 No. 235 (2017)

  Our beginnings were more than 20 years ago, when the global village and cyberspace were words that were extracted from science fiction. The World Wide Web was very slow, almost everything was in the English language. Telephones were used to talk from one line to another. Nobody imagined then the barrage of words (Googling, Blogger, Hacker, Wifi and thousands more) that were going to designate objects, values ​​and practices of this new culture.

  In this context, Lecturas: Physical Education and Sports, which soon installed at www.efdeportes.com, began to be a reference for many in the field of Physical Education and Sports Sciences, expanding and opening the field of intervention, study and research.

  In our productive space, every day in front of the screen, for quite some time we have been working to move the contents to a new platform that provides a new space for the growing mass of authors that seeks to improve standards. Things always seem impossible until they are done, said Nelson Mandela. We must admit that it was not easy to carry out and demanded almost two years of work. But here we are, as long ago, in contact.

  Tulio Guterman, Manager - December 2017