Empire in Waves (eBook)

A Political History of Surfing

Scott Laderman (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2014
256 Seiten
University of California Press (Verlag)
978-0-520-95804-3 (ISBN)

Infos

Surfing today evokes many things: thundering waves, warm beaches, bikinis and lifeguards, and carefree pleasure. But is the story of surfing really as simple as popular culture suggests? In this first international political history of the sport, Scott Laderman shows that while wave riding is indeed capable of stimulating tremendous pleasure, its globalization went hand in hand with the blood and repression of the long twentieth century. Emerging as an imperial instrument in post-annexation Hawaii, spawning a form of tourism that conquered the littoral Third World, tracing the struggle against South African apartheid, and employed as a diplomatic weapon in America's Cold War arsenal, the saga of modern surfing is only partially captured by Gidget, the Beach Boys, and the film Blue Crush. From nineteenth-century American empire-building in the Pacific to the low-wage labor of the surf industry today, Laderman argues that surfing in fact closely mirrored American foreign relations. Yet despite its less-than-golden past, the sport continues to captivate people worldwide. Whether in El Salvador or Indonesia or points between, the modern history of this cherished pastime is hardly an uncomplicated story of beachside bliss. Sometimes messy, occasionally contentious, but never dull, surfing offers us a whole new way of viewing our globalized world.

Inhalt

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS       

INTRODUCTION.  A Political History of Surfing
       
CHAPTER 1.  How Surfing Became American: The Imperial Roots 
  of Modern Surf Culture

CHAPTER 2.  A World Made Safe for Discovery: Travel, Cultural  
  Diplomacy, and the Politics of Surf Exploration

CHAPTER 3.  Paradise Found: The Discovery of Indonesia and the 
  Surfing Imagination

CHAPTER 4.  When Surfing Discovered It Was Political: Confronting 
  South African Apartheid

CHAPTER 5.  Industrial Surfing: The Commodification of Experience 

EPILOGUE.  A New Millennium      

NOTES

INDEX          

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 18.1.2014
• Reihe/Serie: Sport in World History
• Reihe/Serie: Sport in World History
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Sport ► Segeln / Tauchen / Wassersport
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte
• Schlagworte: American foreign relations • American imperialism • Apartheid • Athletes • Beaches • blue crush • Cold War • commodification • Diplomacy • Empire • Gidget • Globalization • Hawaii • History • history of surfing • imperialism • individual sports • Indonesia • industrial surfing • International Politics • long 20th century • low wage labor • modern surf culture • ocean • political history of surfing • Politics • Repression • South Africa • Sports • Surfing • surfing today • The Beach Boys • Tourism • United States of America • wave riding • Waves
• ISBN-10: 0-520-95804-7 / 0520958047
• ISBN-13: 978-0-520-95804-3 / 9780520958043