In a Communication and Sport course (CMNS350) at Okanagan College last semester, students were tasked with writing an event analysis of a live sporting event. A critical reading for the course is based on Roland Barthes' semiotic analysis of wrestling, so it was only fitting that students analyze a professional wrestling event: Thrash Wrestling's "Final Demise," held in Kelowna on March 2, 2024.
Marc Arellano, Communications Professor at Okanagan College, contacted the event promoter who came to his class with a wrestler before the event. Students asked questions, and the wrestlers did a mini lecture on wrestling discourses and narrative structures.
Students in Arellano's class got the best of both worlds: theory and application.
"The event hosted by Thrash Wrestling was an amazing evening, because the students experienced what was theoretical and could apply it to a practical situation," said Arellano. "It was a sold out show with energetic matches. I was super excited as the students had all these epiphanies during the bouts and then related them to their analytical event papers."
The Communication and Sport course at Okanagan College is offered by the Department of Communications. The department offers courses in two streams: Communications and Media Studies, which provides a theoretical approach to current media and culture, as well as Professional Communications that feature professional and technical communications courses.