{"product_id":"when-mexicans-could-play-ball-basketball-race-and-identity-in-san-antonio-1928-1945-9781477302125","title":"When Mexicans Could Play Ball: Basketball, Race, and Identity in San Antonio, 1928-1945","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner, Al Lowman Memorial Prize, Texas State Historical Association, 2014\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn 1939, a team of short, scrappy kids from a vocational school established specifically for Mexican Americans became the high school basketball champions of San Antonio, Texas. Their win, and the ensuing riot it caused, took place against a backdrop of shifting and conflicted attitudes toward Mexican Americans and American nationalism in the WWII era. \"Only when the Mexicans went from perennial runners-up to champs,\" Garc?a writes, \"did the emotions boil over.\"\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe first sports book to look at Mexican American basketball specifically, \u003ci\u003eWhen Mexicans Could Play Ball\u003c\/i\u003e is also a revealing study of racism and cultural identity formation in Texas. Using personal interviews, newspaper articles, and game statistics to create a compelling narrative, as well as drawing on his experience as a sports writer, Garc?a takes us into the world of San Antonio's Sidney Lanier High School basketball team, the Voks, which became a two-time state championship team under head coach William Carson \"Nemo\" Herrera. An alumnus of the school himself, Garc?a investigates the school administrators' project to Americanize the students, Herrera's skillful coaching, and the team's rise to victory despite discrimination and violence from other teams and the world outside of the school. Ultimately, Garc?a argues, through their participation and success in basketball at Lanier, the Voks players not only learned how to be American but also taught their white counterparts to question long-held assumptions about Mexican Americans.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eIgnacio M. García is the Lemuel Hardison Redd, Jr., Professor of Western and Latino History at Brigham Young University and the author of five books, including \u003ci\u003eWhite But Not Equal\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eUnited We Win\u003c\/i\u003e, and\u003ci\u003e Chicanismo\u003c\/i\u003e. His book \u003ci\u003eViva Kennedy: Mexican Americans in Search of Camelot\u003c\/i\u003e won the Texas State Historical Association Coral Horton Tullis Memorial Prize for Best Book on Texas History.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"University of Texas Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50338035335442,"sku":"9781477302125","price":31.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_ccda4db0-b81c-4dec-b88f-9e4b797b4768.jpg?v=1727974710","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/when-mexicans-could-play-ball-basketball-race-and-identity-in-san-antonio-1928-1945-9781477302125","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}