We Average Unbeautiful Watchers
Fan Narratives and the Reading of American Sports
Seiten
2019
University of Nebraska Press (Verlag)
978-0-8032-9594-0 (ISBN)
University of Nebraska Press (Verlag)
978-0-8032-9594-0 (ISBN)
Sports fandom determines how millions of Americans define themselves. In We Average Unbeautiful Watchers, Noah Cohan examines contemporary sports culture to show how mass-mediated athletics are in fact richly textured narrative entertainments rather than merely competitive displays.
Sports fandom—often more than religious, political, or regional affiliation—determines how millions of Americans define themselves. In We Average Unbeautiful Watchers, Noah Cohan examines contemporary sports culture to show how mass-mediated athletics are in fact richly textured narrative entertainments rather than merely competitive displays. While it may seem that sports narratives are “written” by athletes and journalists, Cohan demonstrates that fans are not passive consumers but rather function as readers and writers who appropriate those narratives and generate their own stories in building their sense of identity.
Critically reading stories of sports fans’ self-definition across genres, from the novel and the memoir to the film and the blog post, We Average Unbeautiful Watchers recovers sports games as sites where fan-authors theorize interpretation, historicity, and narrative itself. Fan stories demonstrate how unscripted sporting entertainments function as identity-building narratives—which, in turn, enhances our understanding of the way we incorporate a broad range of texts into our own life stories.
Building on the work of sports historians, theorists of fan behavior, and critics of American literature, Cohan shows that humanistic methods are urgently needed for developing nuanced critical conversations about athletics. Sports take shape as stories, and it is scholars in the humanities who can best identify how they do so—and why that matters for American culture more broadly.
Sports fandom—often more than religious, political, or regional affiliation—determines how millions of Americans define themselves. In We Average Unbeautiful Watchers, Noah Cohan examines contemporary sports culture to show how mass-mediated athletics are in fact richly textured narrative entertainments rather than merely competitive displays. While it may seem that sports narratives are “written” by athletes and journalists, Cohan demonstrates that fans are not passive consumers but rather function as readers and writers who appropriate those narratives and generate their own stories in building their sense of identity.
Critically reading stories of sports fans’ self-definition across genres, from the novel and the memoir to the film and the blog post, We Average Unbeautiful Watchers recovers sports games as sites where fan-authors theorize interpretation, historicity, and narrative itself. Fan stories demonstrate how unscripted sporting entertainments function as identity-building narratives—which, in turn, enhances our understanding of the way we incorporate a broad range of texts into our own life stories.
Building on the work of sports historians, theorists of fan behavior, and critics of American literature, Cohan shows that humanistic methods are urgently needed for developing nuanced critical conversations about athletics. Sports take shape as stories, and it is scholars in the humanities who can best identify how they do so—and why that matters for American culture more broadly.
Noah Cohan is a lecturer in American culture studies at Washington University in St. Louis.
Introduction
Chapter 1. ""So We Fabricate"": Baseball and the Unfriendly Confines of History
Chapter 2. ""It was My Fate, My Destiny, My End, to be a Fan"": Football, Mental Illness, and the Autobiographical Novel
Chapter 3. Race in the Basketball Memoir: Fan Identity and the Eros of ""a Black Man's Game""
Chapter 4. ""It's Been a Problem with Me and Women"": Failed Masculinities in Depictions of Sports Fans on Film
Chapter 5. Reimagined Communities: Web-Mediated Fandom and New Narrative Possibilities for Sport
Epilogue: ""Always a Man at the Ready to Tell You that You Got It Wrong"": Feminist Rewritings of Sports Fan Culture
Works Cited
| Erscheinungsdatum | 30.05.2019 |
|---|---|
| Reihe/Serie | Sports, Media, and Society |
| Zusatzinfo | index |
| Verlagsort | Lincoln |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 152 x 229 mm |
| Themenwelt | Sozialwissenschaften ► Kommunikation / Medien ► Medienwissenschaft |
| Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Mikrosoziologie | |
| ISBN-10 | 0-8032-9594-4 / 0803295944 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0-8032-9594-0 / 9780803295940 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
| Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt? |
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