Steel Chair to the Head

The Pleasure and Pain of Professional Wrestling

Author: Sammond, Nicholas; Barthes, Roland; Jenkins III, Henry; Mazer, Sharon; Monsivais, Carlos
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822334033
eISBN Pdf: 9780822386827
Place of publication: Durham , United States
Year of digital publication: 2005
Month: January
Pages: 384
DDC: 796.8/12
Language: English

Caption

The antagonists—oiled, shaved, pierced, and tattooed; the glaring lights; the pounding music; the shouting crowd: professional wrestling is at once spectacle, sport, and business. Steel Chair to the Head provides a multifaceted look at the popular phenomenon of pro wrestling. The contributors combine critical rigor with a deep appreciation of wrestling as a unique cultural form, the latest in a long line of popular performance genres. They examine wrestling as it happens in the ring, is experienced in the stands, is portrayed on television, and is discussed in online chat rooms. In the process, they reveal wrestling as an expression of the contradictions and struggles that shape American culture.

The essayists include scholars in anthropology, psychology, film studies, communication studies, and sociology, one of whom used to wrestle professionally. Classic studies of wrestling by Roland Barthes, Carlos Monsiváis, Sharon Mazer, and Henry Jenkins appear alongside original essays. Whether exploring how pro wrestling inflects race, masculinity, and ideas of reality and authenticity; how female fans express their enthusiasm for male wrestlers; or how lucha libre provides insights into Mexican social and political life, Steel Chair to the Head gives due respect to pro wrestling by treating it with the same thorough attention usually reserved for more conventional forms of cultural expression.

Contributors. Roland Barthes, Douglas L. Battema, Susan Clerc, Laurence de Garis, Henry Jenkins III, Henry Jenkins IV, Heather Levi, Sharon Mazer, Carlos Monsiváis, Lucia Rahilly, Catherine Salmon, Nicholas Sammond, Phillip Serrat, Philip Sewell

Contents
Acknowledgments
Nicholas Sammond: Introduction: A Brief and Unnecessary Defense of Professional Wrestling
Roland Barthes: The World of Wrestling
Henry Jenkins III: "Never Trust a Snake": WWF Wrestling as Masculine Melodrama
Sharon Mazer: "Real Wrestling"/ "Real" Life
Carlos Monsivais: The Hour of the Mask as Protagonist: El Santo versus the Skeptics on the Subject of Myth
Heather Levi: The Mask of the Luchador: Wrestling, Politics, and Identity in Mexico
Nicholas Sammond: Squaring the Family Circle: WWF "Smackdown" Assaults the Social Body
Catherine Salmon and Susan Clerc: "Ladies Love Wrestling, Too": Female Wrestling Fans Online
Laurence De Garis: The "Logic" of Professional Wrestling
Lucia Rahilly: Is "RAW" War? Professional Wrestling as Popular S/M Narrative
Phillip Seerato: Not Quite Heroes: Race, Masculinity, and Latino Professional Wrestlers
Douglas Battema and Philip Sewell: Trading in Masculinity: Muscles, Money, and Market Discourse in the WWF
Henry Jenkins III: Afterword, Part I: Wrestling with Theory, Grappling with Politics
Henry Jenkins IV: Afterword, Part II: Growing Up and Growing More Risqué
Glossary
Contributors
Index
- A
- B
- C
- D
- E
- F
- G
- H
- I
- J
- K
- L
- M
- N
- O
- P
- Q
- R
- S
- T
- U
- V
- W
- X
- Y
- Z

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Steel Chair to the Head

The Pleasure and Pain of Professional Wrestling

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