Lesson Plan

What Jesse Owens’s Story Tells Us About Sports and Politics – Mini Lesson

Overview

This short documentary video explores the intersection of sports, politics and race through the story of Jesse Owens, an African American track and field athlete who defied racial barriers and competed in the 1936 summer Olympic Games in Berlin.

Mini Lesson: What Jesse Owens’s Story Tells Us About Sports and Politics

Objectives

Students will:

  • Examine the role of sports as a platform for challenging racial discrimination.
  • Discuss the impact of Owens’s achievements on the perceptions of race on the national and international stages.
Subjects
  • U.S. History
Topics
  • World War II
  • Franklin Delano Roosevelt
  • Race in America
  • Race in U.S. History
For Teachers

Introducing the Lesson

The 1936 summer Olympics took place in Nazi Germany, where Adolf Hitler was perpetrating the first stages of what would become the Holocaust. Hitler and the Nazi Party hoped to showcase the superiority of their Aryan athletes. But Jesse Owens, an African American track and field star, quickly disproved Nazi racial ideology of Aryan supremacy by winning four Olympic gold medals. Owens’s success in Berlin led to international acclaim, but at home, Owens continued to face discrimination because of his race.

The story of Jackie Robinson, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, and more recently Colin Kaepernick, offer a lens through which to explore the complex relationships between sports, civil rights, and broader social and political change.

Sports and the ongoing fight for equal rights is well documented. This short film can launch further investigation into historical or contemporary examples of athletes who used their platform to raise awareness and effect change. Some examples are Muhammad Ali and Vietnam War protests, the Black power salute of Tommie Smith and John Carlos, the equal pay campaigns spearheaded by tennis star Billie Jean King in the 1970s and more recently by the United States Women’s National Soccer Team.

Essential Questions

  • In what ways do sports serve as a platform for addressing issues of racial or gender equality?
  • How were Owens’s achievements recognized on the international level, compared to his reception in the United States?

Lesson Procedure

This mini-lesson consists primarily of comprehension and discussion questions for students.

Questions for students:

  • How did Jesse Owens’s performance in the 1936 Olympics contradict the racial ideology promoted by Nazi Germany?
  • What impact did Jesse Owens’s success in the Olympics have on the perceptions of African Americans in the United States?
  • How did Owens’s achievements contribute to the discussions about racial discrimination and equality during the 1930s and 1940s?
  • In what ways can athletes use their platforms to address political or social issues?
  • In what ways does Jesse Owens’s story connect to more modern protests for equality?

Additional Resources

Transcript for "What Jesse Owens's Story Tells Us About Sports and Politics"Retro Report 
Luther King, Jr., and the Black Athlete Protest Tradition National Civil Rights Museum 
Black Athletes and Civil RightsFacing History & Ourselves 
We Won’t Shut Up and Dribble Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective 

Standards (National Council for the Social Studies C3 Framework)

Analyze multiple factors that influenced the perspectives of people during different historical eras.

Identify the differences between historical facts and historical interpretations.

More like this

Image from The Civil Rights Movement: Black Power and Sports
Lesson

The Civil Rights Movement: Black Power and Sports

Students will learn about protests in the 1960s among black athletes including Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali and members of the 1968 U.S. Olympics team, and how their actions relate to modern protestors like Colin Kaepernick.
Image from Why the Supreme Court Endorsed, Then Limited Affirmative Action
Lesson

Why the Supreme Court Endorsed, Then Limited Affirmative Action

Students will examine contemporary and historical Supreme Court cases dealing with affirmative action.
Image from Suffrage for Black Women
Lesson

Suffrage for Black Women

Students will learn how Black women have often been at the forefront of activism and advocacy relating to ballot access, voter suppression, and the right to vote.
Image from Whites-Only Suburbs: How the New Deal Shut Out Black Homebuyers
Lesson

Whites-Only Suburbs: How the New Deal Shut Out Black Homebuyers

Students will learn how race-based federal lending rules from New Deal programs in the 1930s kept Black families locked out of suburban neighborhoods, a policy that continues to slow their economic mobility.
Image from Dr. Martin Luther King at Gee’s Bend
Lesson

Dr. Martin Luther King at Gee’s Bend

Students will learn the history of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s fight for voting rights in Gee’s Bend, Ala., a town whose status today shows both the achievements and unfinished work of King’s movement.
Image from American Reckoning
Lesson

American Reckoning

Students will learn about a little-known story of the civil rights movement told using excerpts from “American Reckoning," a Retro Report and PBS Frontline collaboration.
Image from Protests For Racial Justice: A Long History
Lesson

Protests For Racial Justice: A Long History

Students will learn how current protests against police violence and racial inequality are connected to the past, and about the White House commission that released a report in the aftermath of the major urban disorders of 1967.
Image from The Moral Panic Over “Superpredators”
Lesson

The Moral Panic Over “Superpredators”

Students will learn how politicians of both parties used flawed predictions about the rise of a new class of youthful offenders known as superpredators to justify a series of dramatic changes to the nation’s criminal justice system during the 1990s.
Questions? Tips? Concerns? Reach out to our Director of Education, David Olson: dolson@retroreport.com