Professional Wrestling

I don’t know what to say about something like that. To me that’s bullshit coming from someone who is really trying to stir up something. [. . .] I think she’s overthinking things . . . two guys going out there wrestling. Stone Cold Steve Austin, Rolling Stone

Sharon Mazer knows professional wrestling, from Gleason’s Gym where wrestlers train to Madison Square Garden and television where they perform their rough-and-tumble shows. In this vivid study, Mazer explores an American sport that is also a body-slamming, crowd-roaring entertainment. Mazer uses her performance studies skills to reveal what’s really going on when these big-bodied heroes and villains collide. Richard Schechner, professor emeritus, New York University, and editor of TDR/The Drama Review

Sharon Mazer’s groundbreaking ethnography insightfully applies a performance studies approach to look at how wrestlers are trained, how fans participate in the performance, and how we assess what makes ‘sports-entertainment’ such a compelling experience. Along the way, she reflects on the ways masculinity and femininity get constructed in the ring and through the hoopla which surrounds wrestling within the culture. And if this were not enough, I regularly draw on her insights about the power dynamics informing the ethnographic process to help guide graduate students wanting to apply these methods to their own projects in contemporary communications and culture. Henry Jenkins, University of Southern California