Sports & Leisure in the US

Catalog description

This course examines the histories of American sport as not only a form of exercise, leisure, competition and entertainment but also as a form of monopolistic business, nationalism, and contesting identities of race, class and gender. We trace the multiple histories of sport (including colonial notions of play, bare-knuckle boxing in the early republic, the Victorian bifurcation of \201Camateur\201D and \201Cprofessional,\201D the rise of folk heroes, racial inclusion and exclusion, the nationalistic struggles of the Olympics, the industry of sport, gender equality and inequalities, and medical understandings of brain injuries dating back to the 19th century) because sport and sport culture serves as a useful mirror of American society. Course Attributes: Solidarity & Kinship Flag, ERS Focus Elective, Humanities Elect/Integrations, History - US Region, Population Health College of Arts & Sciences History