Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty
Once again I’m teaching Writing the Sporting Body and once again the core text for the course is Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht’s In Praise of Athletic Beauty. I’ve made reference to this work in some other...
View Article“Everyfan” (Reading in Praise of Athletic Beauty)
As promised, I’m sharing my reading notes, thoughts, and questions on Hans Gumbrecht’s In Praise of Athletic Beauty. Today, I want to look at the opening section of the book, entitled “Everyfan,” which...
View Article“Praise” (Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty)
“Why,” Hans Gumbrecht begins by asking, “should sportslovers learn how to praise athletes and their achievements?” His meditation upon and response to this question occupies the first of the three...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Beauty” (Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty, Post 3)
What are we saying when we say that an athletic play is “beautiful”? This is the question to which Hans Gumbrecht turns in the second subsection of the “Definitions” chapter of In Praise of Athletic...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Athletics” (Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty, Post 4)
Having arrived at definitions of “beauty” and “praise,” Hans Gumbrecht moves in the final section of the “Definitions” chapter of In Praise of Athletic Beauty to the question to the task of defining...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Demigods” (Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty, Post 5)
Having defined the key terms of his investigation, “praise,” “beauty,” and “athletics,” Hans Gumbrecht proceeds, in the “Discontinuities” section of his In Praise of Athletic Beauty, to provide an...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Why I Hate “the Warriors”
I’m annoyed. Here’s the thing: I thought I was gonna write a quick explanation of why I hate the Warriors, hot take click bait for contrarians. Because: I do, I hate them! See, it’s easy for me to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“Gladiators” (Reading In Praise of Athletic Beauty, Post 6)
Hans Gumbrecht continues his brief history of sports in the West by turning from the ancient Greek games at Olympia to the very different events held hundreds of years later at the Colosseum in Rome....
View ArticleInventing Basketball Autonomy
Allen Iverson was recently elected into the basketball Hall of Fame. To honor his inspiring career, I offer this excerpt from my new book Ball Don’t Lie! Myth, Genealogy, and Invention in the Cultures...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Radical Free Agency of LeBron James
I spoke recently to the Department of Comparative American Studies at Oberlin College. I enjoyed reframing and revising the work on LeBron James’s “Decision” and “Return” that I published in Ball Don’t...
View Article