An epistemological examination of the offense and defense in ball games

Abstract

Generally, ball games are classified into several types such as “goal type,” “net type,” or “baseball type,” based on the close relationship among the tactical behaviors of attacking and defending. In this approach, some games are selected as representative activities to teach the typical tactical behavior of “how” to attack and defend. Then, “what” is an offense or defense? Are they essentially just function constructed to act as products of interaction between opposing sides? This paper clarifies the connotations of the words “offense” and “defense” in a game from an epistemological perspective.

Any type of game has one of the two distinctive objectives: transferring either the ball or the player to the destination. The ball transferring action is interpreted as any one of the two opposing task-executions: ball-possession or ball-progression. The game proceeds only with ball-progression when a player secures the ball. If ball-possession is indefinite, then the game’s task-executions proceed in either a parallel or a cyclical way. A cyclical way can in turn be differentiated into the “united type” or “divided type.” On the other hand, the transfer of a player is regarded as an advance-tag between a runner and ball-holder.

Considering these features, the state of such a task-execution helps us distinguish one game from the others. Further, it is actualized that the classification of games is not established objectively but constructed intersubjectively among the concerned persons.

These findings as the universal theory of games provide an original and deliberated classification in which we specify the content that is to be learned. Consequently, this will help teachers improve their physical education lessons wherein many different kinds of games have to be handled.