Takes a humorous look at expectations versus reality in pop culture, sports, and media, exploring such topics as pop culture's obsession with time travel and what Kurt Cobain and David Koresh have in common.

"Fueled by her years as an elite runner and advocate for women in sports, Lauren Fleshman offers her inspiring personal story and a rallying cry for reform of a sports landscape that is failing young female athletes Lauren Fleshman has grown up in the world of running: one of the most decorated collegiate athletes of all time and a national champion as a pro, she was a major face of women's running for Nike before leaving to shake up the industry...

"The Black Athlete Revolt is the first book to take a historical and contemporary look at how Black athletes have used their influence to move beyond protests and create substantial change for Black Americans. Spanning from the civil rights movement to today, this book reveals the ever-evolving and important role of Black athlete activism"--

"Part play-by-play, part op-ed, The Game Is Not a Game is an illuminating and unflinching examination of the good and evil in the sports industry. Liberating and provocative, with sharp wit and generous humor, Jackson's essays explore the role that sports plays in American society and the hypocritical standards by which the athletes are often judged. The Game Is Not a Game is distinctly intended to challenge accepted ideology and to push the boundaries...

Cultural historian Dave Zirin, whose influential blog and bestselling books have offered searing insights into the politics of American sports, examines the myriad ways sports culture has worked both to reproduce and challenge the wider culture's dominant ideas about race and racial difference. Interviewed by Communication scholar Sut Jhally, whose own work has sought to clarify the relationship between popular culture and racial attitudes, Zirin's...

"The intersection of sports and politics has been making headlines over the last few years, but the reality is that this clash has been going on for decades. This book examines the history of sports as a means to advance social change and connects that history to today's world"--

"This book contextualizes the latest rise in athlete activism against racial inequality by surveying the history of protest in American sports. Steele reveals that the platform sports stardom affords has always come with the responsibility to speak out against injustice even if not all athletes have answered that call"--

"Breathtaking tales of climbers and hunters, runners and racers, winners and losers by the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter. New York Times reporter John Branch's riveting, humane features on ordinary people doing extraordinary things at the edges of the sporting world have won nearly every major journalism prize. Sidecountry gathers the best of Branch's work for the first time, including classic pieces like "Snow Fall," about skiers caught in an avalanche...

"A captivating chronicle of the pivotal decade in American sports, when the games invaded prime time, and sports moved from the margins to the mainstream of American culture. Every decade brings change, but as Michael MacCambridge chronicles in THE BIG TIME, no decade in American sports history featured such convulsive cultural shifts as the 1970s. So many things happened during the decade-the move of sports into prime-time television, the beginning...

"A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist pulls back the curtain on the extraordinary inner lives of America's most obsessive sports fans. There are fans, and then there are fanatics. In this wondrously immersive look at American sports fandom, George Dohrmann travels the country to find out what distinguishes an ordinary, everyday enthusiast from that special breed of supporter known as the superfan. In Minnesota, Dohrmann meets newly minted generals...