{"product_id":"steel-chair-to-the-head-the-pleasure-and-pain-of-professional-wrestling-9780822334385","title":"Steel Chair to the Head: The Pleasure and Pain of Professional Wrestling","description":"The antagonists-oiled, shaved, pierced, and tattooed; the glaring lights; the pounding music; the shouting crowd: professional wrestling is at once spectacle, sport, and business. \u003ci\u003eSteel Chair to the Head\u003c\/i\u003e provides a multifaceted look at the popular phenomenon of pro wrestling. The contributors combine critical rigor with a deep appreciation of wrestling as a unique cultural form, the latest in a long line of popular performance genres. They examine wrestling as it happens in the ring, is experienced in the stands, is portrayed on television, and is discussed in online chat rooms. In the process, they reveal wrestling as an expression of the contradictions and struggles that shape American culture.\u003cp\u003eThe essayists include scholars in anthropology, psychology, film studies, communication studies, and sociology, one of whom used to wrestle professionally. Classic studies of wrestling by Roland Barthes, Carlos Monsiv?is, Sharon Mazer, and Henry Jenkins appear alongside original essays. Whether exploring how pro wrestling inflects race, masculinity, and ideas of reality and authenticity; how female fans express their enthusiasm for male wrestlers; or how \u003ci\u003elucha libre\u003c\/i\u003e provides insights into Mexican social and political life, \u003ci\u003eSteel Chair to the Head\u003c\/i\u003e gives due respect to pro wrestling by treating it with the same thorough attention usually reserved for more conventional forms of cultural expression.\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eContributors.\u003c\/i\u003e Roland Barthes, Douglas L. Battema, Susan Clerc, Laurence de Garis, Henry Jenkins III, Henry Jenkins IV, Heather Levi, Sharon Mazer, Carlos Monsiv?is, Lucia Rahilly, Catherine Salmon, Nicholas Sammond, Phillip Serrat, Philip Sewell\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eNicholas Sammond is Assistant Professor of Cinema Studies at the University of Toronto. He is the author of \u003ci\u003eBabes in Tomorrowland: Walt Disney and the Making of the American Child, 1930-1960\u003c\/i\u003e, also published by Duke University Press.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Duke University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50492159492370,"sku":"9780822334385","price":28.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_78682195-bc72-49b1-9c0c-48281a934060.jpg?v=1730573914","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/steel-chair-to-the-head-the-pleasure-and-pain-of-professional-wrestling-9780822334385","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}