Download or read book Democracy at the Ballpark written by Thomas David Bunting and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2021-11-01 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is the relationship between sports and politics? Often, politics are thought to be serious, whereas sports are diversionary and apolitical. Using baseball as a case study, Democracy at the Ballpark challenges this understanding, examining politics as they emerge at the ballpark around spectatorship, community, equality, virtue, and technology. Thomas David Bunting argues that because spectators invest time and meaning in baseball, the game has power as a metaphor for understanding and shaping politics. The stories people see in baseball mirror how they see the country, politics, and themselves. As a result, democracy resides not only in exclusive halls tread by elites but also in a stadium full of average people together under an open sky. Democracy at the Ballpark bridges political theory and sport, providing a new way of thinking about baseball. It also demonstrates the democratic potential of spectatorship and rethinks the role of everyday institutions like sport in shaping our political lives, offering an expanded view of democracy.
Download or read book Pitching Democracy written by April Yoder and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2023-03-14 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book focuses on the history of baseball in the Dominican Republic, especially the sport's political ramifications. Yoder argues that Dominicans kept their sense of democratic idealism in part because they were intertwined with the aspirations of baseball as it developed into a transnational industry. Baseball became economically central to the Dominican Republic at the same time as the country was turning toward concerns of development, resulting in an economic and political "Third Way" that drew from both the Cuban and US models"--
Download or read book Ballpark written by Paul Goldberger and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exhilarating, splendidly illustrated, entirely new look at the history of baseball: told through the stories of the vibrant and ever-changing ballparks where the game was and is staged, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning architectural critic. From the earliest corrals of the mid-1800s (Union Grounds in Brooklyn was a "saloon in the open air"), to the much mourned parks of the early 1900s (Detroit's Tiger Stadium, Cincinnati's Palace of the Fans), to the stadiums we fill today, Paul Goldberger makes clear the inextricable bond between the American city and America's favorite pastime. In the changing locations and architecture of our ballparks, Goldberger reveals the manifestations of a changing society: the earliest ballparks evoked the Victorian age in their accommodations--bleachers for the riffraff, grandstands for the middle-class; the "concrete donuts" of the 1950s and '60s made plain television's grip on the public's attention; and more recent ballparks, like Baltimore's Camden Yards, signal a new way forward for stadium design and for baseball's role in urban development. Throughout, Goldberger shows us the way in which baseball's history is concurrent with our cultural history: the rise of urban parks and public transportation; the development of new building materials and engineering and design skills. And how the site details and the requirements of the game--the diamond, the outfields, the walls, the grandstands--shaped our most beloved ballparks. A fascinating, exuberant ode to the Edens at the heart of our cities--where dreams are as limitless as the outfields.
Download or read book Baseball and the American Dream written by Robert Elias and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-15 with total page 373 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating look at how America's favorite sport has both reflected and shaped social, economic, and
Download or read book The Stadium written by Frank Andre Guridy and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2024-08-20 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The "deep and impactful" story of the American stadium (Howard Bryant, author of Full Dissidence)—from the first wooden ballparks to today’s glass and steel mega-arenas—revealing how it has made, and remade, American life. Stadiums are monuments to recreation, sports, and pleasure. Yet from the earliest ballparks to the present, stadiums have also functioned as public squares. Politicians have used them to cultivate loyalty to the status quo, while activists and athletes have used them for anti-fascist rallies, Black Power demonstrations, feminist protests, and much more. In this book, historian Frank Guridy recounts the contested history of play, protest, and politics in American stadiums. From the beginning, stadiums were political, as elites turned games into celebrations of war, banned women from the press box, and enforced racial segregation. By the 1920s, they also became important sites of protest as activists increasingly occupied the stadium floor to challenge racism, sexism, homophobia, fascism, and more. Following the rise of the corporatized stadium in the 1990s, this complex history was largely forgotten. But today’s athlete-activists, like Colin Kaepernick and Megan Rapinoe, belong to a powerful tradition in which the stadium is as much an arena of protest as a palace of pleasure. Moving between the field, the press box, and the locker room, this book recovers the hidden history of the stadium and its important role in the struggle for justice in America.
Download or read book The Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture 2013 2014 written by William M. Simons and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-02-12 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Generally acknowledged as the preeminent gathering of baseball scholars, the annual Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture has made significant contributions to baseball research and pedagogy. This collection of 17 new essays is selected from the approximately 100 presentations of the 2013 and the 2014 symposia, covering topics whose importance extends beyond the ballpark. Presented in six themed parts, the essays consider the congruence of culture and baseball, the importance of ballpark itself, the myths, legends and icons of the baseball imagination, international and ethnic game variations, the work of baseball museum curators and a context for the game's rules of play and labor.
Download or read book Going Out written by David Nasaw and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1999-04-15 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: David Nasaw has written a sparkling social history of twentieth-century show business and of the new American public that assembled in the city's pleasure palaces, parks, theaters, nickelodeons, world's fair midways, and dance halls. The new amusement centers welcomed women, men, and children, native-born and immigrant, rich, poor and middling. Only African Americans were excluded or segregated in the audience, though they were overrepresented in parodic form on stage. This stigmatization of the African American, Nasaw argues, was the glue that cemented an otherwise disparate audience, muting social distinctions among "whites," and creating a common national culture.
Download or read book Touching Base written by Steven A. Riess and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 2023-12-11 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The revised and expanded edition of Touching Base examines the myths, realities, symbols, and rituals of America's national pastime. Steven Riess details the relationships among urban politics, communities, and baseball while exploring how Progressive Era sensibilities shaped debates over issues like Sunday games, ballpark construction, and promotion of the games. Focusing on Atlanta, New York, and Chicago, Riess looks at all the participants--from spectators to owners to players--in analyzing how baseball both influenced and mirrored broader society.
Download or read book Four Threats written by Suzanne Mettler and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2020-08-11 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An urgent, historically-grounded take on the four major factors that undermine American democracy, and what we can do to address them. While many Americans despair of the current state of U.S. politics, most assume that our system of government and democracy itself are invulnerable to decay. Yet when we examine the past, we find that to the contrary, the United States has undergone repeated crises of democracy, from the earliest days of the republic to the present. In The Four Threats, Robert C. Lieberman and Suzanne Mettler explore five historical episodes when democracy in the United States was under siege: the 1790s, the Civil War, the Gilded Age, the Depression, and Watergate. These episodes risked profound, even fatal, damage to the American democratic experiment, and on occasion antidemocratic forces have prevailed. From this history, four distinct characteristics of democratic disruption emerge. Political polarization, racism and nativism, economic inequality, and excessive executive power – alone or in combination – have threatened the survival of the republic, but it has survived, so far. What is unique, and alarming, about the present moment is that all four conditions are present in American politics today. This formidable convergence marks the contemporary era as an especially grave moment for democracy in the United States. But history provides a valuable repository from which contemporary Americans can draw lessons about how democracy was eventually strengthened — or in some cases weakened — in the past. By revisiting how earlier generations of Americans faced threats to the principles enshrined in the Constitution, we can see the promise and the peril that have led us to the present and chart a path toward repairing our civic fabric and renewing democracy.
Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to Baseball written by Leonard Cassuto and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-02-21 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Babe Ruth to the Black Sox scandal, this Companion examines baseball's history, global identity, current challenges and memorable personalities.
Download or read book Baseball History from Outside the Lines written by John E. Dreifort and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of essays which "describe developments in the game's past, assess their impact, and explain how they reflect the period in which they occurred; ... explore baseball's influences outside the field of play as well as the effect of external factors on the game; ... [and] discuss such key issues as demographics, communities, social mobility, race and ethnicity."--Cover.
Download or read book Finding America in a Minor League Ballpark written by Harris Cooper and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2024-02-06 with total page 498 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over forty million people attend minor league baseball games each season. Who are they? Why do they come? Let’s find out! Noted social scientist Harris Cooper took a job as a Seating Bowl Host for the most famous minor league baseball team, the Durham Bulls. As a host, he helped fans find seats and other stadium amenities, made sure everyone was safe, took pictures, and chased kids from the aisles. He got to talk with a wide-ranging assortment of people, from regular attendees to those at their very first baseball game, from retired judges to middle school students. Minor league baseball games draw a broader array of Americans than any sport. The fleeting moments spent talking baseball with the fan sitting next to you or with a ballpark employee disguise the remarkable variety of people who call themselves “baseball fans.” Dr. Cooper brings these people to life. In addition, the book presents a brief history of minor league baseball, the Bulls, and the city of Durham, so typical of small American cities. It profiles the ballplayers, focusing not on their on-field statistics but on who they are and where they come from. The book also profiles twelve baseball movies, all of which focus on baseball not played in the major leagues. Throughout the book, Dr. Cooper draws on his knowledge of social science to extract from his experiences a description of the inhabitants and goings-on at a ballpark. It illuminates not just baseball writ large, but also provides a compelling portrait of Americans as a people and their shared love of our national pastime.
Download or read book Take Me Out written by Richard Greenberg and published by Dramatists Play Service, Inc.. This book was released on 2020-12-15 with total page 71 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE STORY: Darren Lemming, the star center fielder of the world champion New York Empires, is young, rich, famous, talented, handsome and so convinced of his popularity that when he casually announces he's gay, he assumes the news will be readily a
Download or read book Modern Coliseum written by Benjamin D. Lisle and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2017-07-05 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Modern Coliseum, Benjamin D. Lisle tracks changes in stadium design and culture since World War II. Featuring over seventy-five images documenting the transformation of the American stadium over time, Modern Coliseum will be of interest to a variety of readers, from urban and architectural historians to sports fans.
Download or read book Ten Innings at Wrigley written by Kevin Cook and published by Henry Holt and Company. This book was released on 2019-05-07 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dramatic story of a legendary 1979 slugfest between the Chicago Cubs and the Philadelphia Phillies, full of runs, hits, and subplots, on the cusp of a new era in baseball history It was a Thursday at Chicago’s Wrigley Field, mostly sunny with the wind blowing out. Nobody expected an afternoon game between the Philadelphia Phillies and Chicago Cubs on May 17, 1979, to be much more than a lazy early-season contest matching two teams heading in opposite directions—the first-place Phillies and the Cubs, those lovable losers—until they combined for thirteen runs in the first inning. “The craziest game ever,” one player called it. “And then the second inning started.” Ten Innings at Wrigley is Kevin Cook’s vivid account of a game that could only have happened at this ballpark, in this era, with this colorful cast of heroes and heels: Hall of Famers Mike Schmidt and Bruce Sutter, surly slugger Dave Kingman, hustler Pete Rose, unlucky Bill Buckner, scarred Vietnam vet Garry Maddox, troubled relief pitcher Donnie Moore, clubhouse jester Tug McGraw, and two managers pulling out what was left of their hair. It was the highest-scoring ballgame in a century, and much more than that. Cook reveals the human stories behind a contest the New York Times called “the wildest in modern history” and shows how money, muscles, and modern statistics were about to change baseball forever.
Download or read book Baseball and Rhetorics of Purity written by Michael L. Butterworth and published by University of Alabama Press. This book was released on 2010-08-13 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Butterworth argues that baseball cannot be viewed as an innocent diversion or escape and that by promoting myths of citizenship and purity, post-9/11 discourse concerning baseball ironically threatens the health of the democratic system. Instead, he highlights how the game on the field reflects a more complex and diverse worldview, and he makes a plea for the game's recovery, both as a national pastime and as a site for celebrating the best of who we are and who we can be. --Book Jacket.
Download or read book Field of Schemes written by Neil deMause and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2015-03 with total page 479 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: