Reading Challenge Suggestions: Sports History and Ethnography

For those of you participating in my 2016 academic reading challenge, I've got recommendations for  U.S. sports history and ethnography, with special thanks to my friend, L.!

Let's start with some sports history. Going way, way back in the music archives, here's Kurtis Blow for my generation of sports' fans.

For a general overview of sports in American history, labor historian, Elliot Gorn and Warren Goldstein have updated their Brief History of American Sports, which begins with games played by the English colonists, and ends with chapters on debates about performance-enhancing drugs. If you are looking for a brief, readable survey written by historians, this might be a good starting point.

Anyone interested in the study of popular culture should read the Trinidadian Marxist, C.L. R James' book about cricket:  Beyond a Boundary. The book is a collection of essays that explore colonialism and anti-colonial activism through the West Indian adoption and transformation of the English sport of cricket. It is one of those few outstanding books of cultural studies that captures cultural interaction and historical transformation through the deep study of some seemingly "unpolitical" cultural activity. Originally written in 1963, it connects West Indian cricketers to James' struggle to build a West Indies Federation at that time.

Since James' time, cultural studies scholars and historians have written a ton of interesting books that explore the roles of race, gender, and social class in the performance, practice, and spectacle of sports.

Jack Johnson was a Black American U.S. prize-fighter in the early 1900s, and his career has become symbolic of the obstacles Black athletes faced because of white racism.  Because he dated white women, he was charged with the violation of "white slavery" laws. He's been the subject of more than one biographical study, including a documentary film by Ken Burns. My friend L highly recommends Theresa Rundstetler's biography:  Jack Johnson, Rebel Sojourner: Boxing in the Shadow of the Global Color Line, which, as the title suggests, explores Johnson's travels to France, South and Central America, and Great Britain.

Katherine Mooney's Race Horse Men is another of L's recommendations for recent books. This study, by a historian from Louisiana State University in New Orleans, is about the development of American horse-racing through slavery and plantation society. The "Race Horse Men" of the title were enslaved men who became celebrities in the 19th century for their expertise with training and racing horses. This appears to be an excellent book giving insight into a surprising piece of the history of slavery in the United States.

Also about racing, with an emphasis on social class and regional culture is, Gwynneth Anne Thayer, Going to the Dogs: Greyhound Racing, Animal Activism and American Popular Culture.This book is part of an excellent American Studies series from the University of Kansas press, and tells the history of dog-racing, which began as an elite sport connected to the British aristocracy, and has become increasingly seedy and suspect in the present.  This book bridges sports and animal studies.

On my own personal to-read shelf for this challenge because I'm a basketball fan, is Aram Goudsouzian's King of the Court: Bill Russell and the Basketball Revolution, a biography of Celtics' player, Bill Russell, who was the first major African-American basketball star. This book provides a  history of the sport of basketball and the NBA, and how it went from being a "Jewish game" in the 1920s and 1930s to an increasingly Black-identified game a generation after the Great Migration of African-Americans into Northern and Western cities. The reviews of the book also say it has great "white-hot game narratives,"and Gousouzian is an avid pick-up basketball player who loves the sport.

Another tempting sports biography is by feminist historian, Susan Ware. Game, Set, Match; Billie Jean King and the Revolution in Women's Sports is likely to speak to a whole generation of (mostly white) girls who grew up watching Billie Jean King demonstrate what it meant to be a powerful woman. I know it's cheesy, but Helen Reddy and Billie Jean King go together in my childhood memories of the second wave era of feminism.

Jennifer Lansbury's book A Spectacular Leap is a history of great Black women athletes who were less often in the limelight than Black men or white women, starting with high-jumper, Alice Coachman and continuing with such greats as Althea Gibson and Jackie Joyner-Kersee, another 70s icon. whose sister-in-law, the famous Flo-Jo also features in the book.

*****

I know next to nothing about football. Looking at the Rutgers U. Press series on sport and society, I was intrigued by the description of Jeffrey Montez De Oca's book Discipline and Indulgence described by its reviewers as a blend of sociology and history to understand the relationship between the Cold War and college football.

Another sociological/historical account of a sport, is this book by softball mom and political scientist, Jennifer Ring. Stealing Bases gives a history of how baseball became a male sport, and where softball came from.

For Sports Ethnography:

I can't wait to read Lucia Trimbur's Come Out Swinging: The Changing World of Boxing at Gold's Gym, a recent book on men who box at Gleason's Gym. Trimbur, a sociologist, trained as a boxer at the gym, so this is an immersive as well as interview-based study that uses the window of the gym  and the sport of boxing to understand transformations of race and gender in urban spaces.

Stanley Thangaraj's Desi Hoop Dreams: Pickup Basketball and the Making of American Masculinity is another book I've been looking forward to. Thangaraj's book explored the complicated dynamics of race and gender formation among South Asian men who play basketball in several different cities between the U.S. and Canada.

Michael Messner's It's All for the Kids is an ethnography of children's sports in the United States by a sociologist who's also a Soccer-dad.  This book looks at the persistence of gender norms in sports, whether they apply to coaches, parents or kid athletes, as well as racial and class dynamics within the world of children's sports.

Sociologist and athlete Eric Anderson's book In the Game: Gay Athletes and the Cult of Masculinity tells the individual stories of Gay male athletes navigating the hyper-masculine world of sports through the lens of sociology. This book is also part of an academic press series on sports and society. This one is at SUNY press.
   ***   Maybe it's overplayed in this context, but this is a classic closer for a reason.

For all those Who Feel the Bern.....Here's books for you

I have an older blog called lefter warmer where I haven't been posting much, but I've been inspired by the primary season to start working out my ideas on the significance of the Sanders campaign and assorted left reactions to it that I've seen around the internet. Based on some of the abrupt switches in tone I've seen among even some very staunch electoral skeptics, I think it might be worth considering if it's time to start partyin' like it's 1905, or maybe like it's 2011.

  It sounds a little crazy to turn back the wheel to 1905, but what the New Yorker called "nostalgia" for 2012, might be the return of the political "moment" that began in 2011. Remember that?   The enthusiasm for Sanders, which I see as a direct outgrowth of Occupy and to some extent Black Lives Matter, might be something that could lead into the growth of a general left revival on a scale beyond supporting an individual candidate, and which could take the role of effectively pushing whoever is elected in November to make policy that we believe in  (not just the president, but congress, and lawmakers at local and state levels) rather than just checking the box by their name, hoping for the best, and then becoming their cheerleaders no matter what.

  Part of pushing effectively is knowing some history and some theory, and all that, so here's a primary season list of book recommendations.

If this is something like a 1905 moment, regardless of what conclusions you draw from it, it's a good idea to read and discuss Lenin's What is to Be Done?   both as a historical document, and as a political analysis.

Another landmark political document that people might want to consider reading is The Port Huron Statement which was the founding document of the  Students for a Democratic Society in 1962.  I saw an effort to revive SDS about 11 years ago, and I don't necessarily think that's the way to go, but reading this document might be helpful in thinking about the kind of visionary writing that a student or youth movement can do.

My own favorite US movement model is the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the radical Southern student movement against Jim Crow that began with the lunch-counter sit-in in Greensboro, NC.  One collection that I have not read myself, but which looks good is Hands on the Freedom Plow, a group of essays by women from SNCC about their organizing experiences.
   Not a book, but a great movie about SNCC, is Freedom on My Mind which I used to show every year in my U.S. history survey.

On the more academic side of things, check out Robin D.G. Kelley's Freedom Dreams, in which you will find a compelling and fairly detailed argument for reparations. If you don't have time for the whole book, there is an excerpt with that position laid out here.
   If you are thinking, "wait, hasn't everyone who supports Sanders  agreed that reparations is a Black nationalist demand that won't help the rest of the working-class?" not so fast. Some of us think that racial justice remains central to progress for the entire working class, and that reparations is a demand with long historical roots. On that note, check out David Roediger's most recent book, Seizing Freedom, which is inspired by W.E.B. Du Bois' argument about the General strike of the slaves following the Civil War from Black Reconstruction. .

For reading relevant to thinking about our two biggest youth social movements of recent years, I suggest these two books:

If you want to know more about Black Lives Matter, Christina Heatherton and Jordan Camp's edited collection Policing the Planet brings together a bunch of writing about the police from scholars and activists who have been involved in movements in Ferguson, Baltimore and elsewhere.

If you want to know more about Occupy Wall St., N+1's collection Occupy! Scenes from Occupied America is a collection of writing that emerged during the Wall St. Occupation. N+1 also produced the Occupy Gazette while it was happening, and provide a good "on the ground" perspective.

Going back to the more recent past of electoral politics and the present day fix we're in there, here are some reaches back to a couple of relevant election challenges:

Sheila Collins, The Rainbow Challenge. This book is about Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow coalition of the 1980s, to which a few people are beginning to compare the present-day Sanders campaign. I read it in college when I was taking a class with Mike Honey (also the author of a number of good books) and found it pretty inspiring at the time.

Another comparison that people are making to the Sanders campaign now is the McGovern vs. Nixon match up of 1972. Joe Lowndes, whose book I recommend as a way to understand the contemporary Republican party more generally, has a chapter about that election in his book,  From the New Deal to the New Right.  I'm going to read Bruce Miroff's The Liberals' Moment about that campaign, as it seems to provide a different analysis than the one I am most familiar with, which is "You can't support a real liberal or left candidate because the outcome will be the same as with McGovern in 1972."  On that election, see also the data on voter turnout at this link.

It is also still relevant to read anything by Frances Fox Piven when you're thinking about what goes into Democratic movement building.  her book, Poor People's Movements is a classic with great insights that we should keep in the front of our minds when engaging in any electoral campaign. She also has given one of the best answers to the question of Why Americans Still Don't Vote that can get you way beyond tsk-tsking your more apathetic friends and acquaintances.

Researching the opposition is also important. Matt Taibbi's Griftopia which brings together his writing on the relationship between Wall St. banks, the 2008 crash, and our elected representatives is still required reading. We are still living in the aftermath of the Great Recession of 2008. Another useful couple of books for understanding the electoral right and its own grass-roots origins, along with Joe Lowndes' book noted above, are Lisa McGirr's Suburban Warriors and Kevin Kruse's White Flight. 

If you are thinking from voting from fear of the Republican party in particular: I do not always agree with Doug Henwood, whose arguments about "identity politics" earn my ire, but his book on Hillary Clinton, My Turn is one that anyone considering supporting Hillary Clinton should read. Henwood has been attacked for it, needless to say, but the book is inexpensive, and not too long. Throw it in the mix. Also forthcoming is an edited collection of writing by socialist feminists who oppose Clinton,  Liza Featherstone's, False Choices: The Faux Feminism of Hillary Clinton.

 Here's one feminist who's got this to say to the opposition. When I saw Lucinda Williams in Atlanta, she dedicated this song to the Sanders campaign as a response to the senator's fear-mongering, lying opponents.