Anderson, Ryan K. Frank Merriwell and the Fiction of All-American Boyhood: The Progressive Era Creation of the Schoolboy Sports Story. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 2015. Pp. xxiv+220. Notes, photos, images, appendix, and index. $27.95 paper. Reviewed by Russ Crawford My first review for Sport in American History was of a book about the…
Fondren, Kristi M. Walking on the Wild Side: Long-Distance Hiking on the Appalachian Trail. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2016. Pp. x+150. Map, photographs, appendix, references, and index. $80 cloth, $24.95 paperback, $24.95 ebook. Reviewed by Dain TePoel Turn on the radio, watch TV, stream a podcast, or open up a web browser and…
Longhurst, James. Bike Battles: A History of Sharing the American Road. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Pp. xi + 241. Notes, bibliography, index, and 32 illustrations. $34.95 hardcover. Reviewed by Lindsay Parks Pieper I used to ride my bike to campus. While I wish I could say that my transportation choice stemmed from a desire…
This post is a part of the series, “Sport History Rewind.” In this series, contributors revisit and reevaluate important texts to determine the degree to which their analyses, arguments, research, and influence resonate in the field today. Of particular concern is how well the works fit into historiographical debates and compare with more recent sport-related…
Colás, Yago. Ball Don’t Lie!: Myth, Genealogy, and Invention in the Cultures of Basketball. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2016. Pp. 226. Notes and Index. $79.50 cloth, $19.95 paperback, $19.95 ebook. Reviewed by Cat Ariail The Golden State Warriors-Cleveland Cavaliers Finals rematch has reinvigorated debates about whether Steph Curry has surpassed LeBron James as the best…
McNess, Matthew James. Sport Philosophy Now: The Culture of Sports after the Lance Armstrong Scandal. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. Pp. 288. Bibliography, Index, and Notes. $80.00 hardback, $79.99 ebook. Reviewed by Cat Ariail Throughout the 2016 Democratic Party primary, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has railed against the institutions and policies that produce economic…
Regalado, Samuel O., and Sarah K. Fields, eds. Sport and the Law: Historical and Cultural Intersections. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 2014. Pp. ix+166. Notes, contributors, and index. $34.95 paperback Reviewed by Erica Zonder Sport is a multi-billion dollar industry, and college sport in particular generates staggering amounts of revenue. In 2011-12, the NCAA…
Krüger, Michael, Becker, Christian, and Stefan Nielsen. German Sports, Doping, and Politics: A History of Performance Enhancement. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. Pp. xliii + 201. Bibliography, Index, and Notes. $70 hardback, $69.99 ebook. Reviewed by Lindsay Parks Pieper In December 2014, the German broadcast consortium ARD aired “Top-Secret Doping: How Russia Makes Its…
Reviewed by Alex Parrish Schultz, Brad, and Mary Lou Sheffer, eds. Sport and Religion in the Twenty-First Century. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2016. Pp. xi+260. Bibliography, index, and contributor biographies. $95 hardback. Spend any time in the South during the fall, and you will likely hear the old cliché, “football is religion down here.” This…
Elzey, Chris, and David K. Wiggins, eds. DC Sports: The Nation’s Capital at Play. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 2015. Pp. xix+ 317. Notes, Index. $24.95 paperback. Reviewed by Lindsay Parks Pieper It was another bad start to the season. The Nationals entered the April 17, 2009, game against the Marlins with a…
Sport in American History 