Abstract
Developing novices’ proficiency in skilful activities is central to the reproduction of human societies. The interactional practices through which instruction is accomplished have provided a rich focus for ethnomethodological and conversation analytic studies examining classroom settings, and, more recently, non-classroom environments of instruction in practical and manual skills. This paper examines the work of instruction in basketball training and in particular the correction of player performances, which are a ubiquitous and central feature of instruction in basketball training sessions. A central part of this instructional action relies on the coach observing training activities to determine players’ competencies and to extract relevant correctables from the players’ embodied displays, which are in turn embedded within complex arrangements of rapidly moving bodies situated in material environments. In this paper we examine the visual-analytic work involved in both organizing and observing a basketball training activity, demonstrating the sequential layering of multiple membership categorization devices drawn upon in producing and recognizing actions in this setting. We argue that the coach deploys spatial orientations which function analogously to membership categorization devices, with players’ bodily positions relative to one another and the material structure of the surround generating category-like sets of rights, responsibilities, and sequential relevancies. As we demonstrate, these orientations provide crucial resources for the identification of players’ errors and thereby for the organization of instruction in interaction in this setting.
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Notes
While for descriptive purposes we use labels such as ‘coach,’ ‘player’ etc. to identify actors in the setting of basketball training sessions for the reader, these are our common sense descriptions of roles and are not part of the actual lived actions by the participants. That is, the focus of analysis is on how particular categories are made ‘operative’ (Sacks 1995, Vol. 2; Butler and Fitzgerald 2010) in the moment-by-moment unfolding of a sequence of action. Thus it is not that we treat the scene as made up of these categories, but rather seek to examine how any membership is made relevant and consequential in the course of particular episodes of interaction.
The drill thus involves a reduction of the usual 5-player unit comprising a basketball team.
‘Man-to-man’ defence involves each defensive player matching up with, and defending, an offensive counterpart. This system contrasts with ‘zone’ defence, in which each defensive player is responsible for defending a designated section of the court beneath the basket. The man-to-man system includes rules for what a defender should do when their player is in possession of the ball, and rules for playing ‘help’ defence, that is, what to do when a player other than their designated counterpart has the ball. Some of these rules will be explicitly outlined as they become relevant to the analysis.
The rules governing the drill are likewise outlined in the course of the analysis.
As is the case for many basketball training activities which pit one group of players against another, for this activity the players have been divided up into teams designated by the colour of their jerseys. The team issues reversible jerseys to the players to wear to training for this purpose, enabling flexibility in grouping players together. The ‘skins’ designator refers to the unlucky members of the third team who, given that jerseys only have two sides, plays shirtless.
This is a rare leniency towards offensive performance for this coach in the training sessions observed.
The area of the court near the free throw line extended out to the sidelines. In Fig. 2.
An attacking move to the basket, made while dribbling the ball.
The horizontal line demarcating the boundary of the court.
In order to easily represent court spacing and movement, we have used diagramming software developed by Coachbase Ltd. (which is itself modelled on the traditional chalk or dry-erase strategy boards used by coaches to draw up plays).
Referring to a player in terms of their number of passes away from the ball is a standard practice in basketball.
A quick move to a new court position made by an offensive player without the ball.
Under the rules of basketball, once an offensive team moves the ball across the half-court line into the opponent’s territory, they are forbidden from taking the ball back into their own half. Thus, a team’s possession takes place primarily in the single half-court where their opponent’s basket is located.
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Evans, B., Fitzgerald, R. ‘You Gotta See Both at the Same Time’: Visually Analyzing Player Performances in Basketball Coaching. Hum Stud 40, 121–144 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-016-9415-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10746-016-9415-3