Table of Contents

Acknowledgments PART ONE: THE WORLD OF THE BODYBUILDER Introduction 1. Breaking and Entering: Presupposition and Faux Pas in the Gym 2. Caste and Class in a Western Gym 3. The Good, the Bad and the Indifferent 4. Muscle Moguls: The Political-Economy of Competitive Bodybuilding 5. Little Big Men of Olympic PART TWO: SUBCULTURE ANALYSIS OF BODYBUILDING 6. Pumping Iron: Crisis and Contradiction in Bodybuilding 7. Sally's Corner: The Women of Olympic 8. The Hustler Complex: Narcissism, Homophobia, Hypermasculinity, and Authoritarianism 9. Comic-Book Masculinity and Cultural Fiction Appendix A Appendix B Notes Index

About the Author

Alan M. Klein is Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Northeastern University. He is the author of Sugarball: The American Game, The Dominican Dream.

Reviews

"Alan Klein's splendid ethnography is a vivid description of the bodybuilding cult, but is far more as well. It gives us important lessons about masculinity and men's bodies, about tangles of identity and sexuality, and-above all-about the contradictory character of gender in the contemporary world. Fascinating reading and a notable contribution to knowledge." - Bob Connell, University of California, Santa Cruz "This is an important work that will make a significant contribution to sport sociology. I like its readability, its use of vivid, rich portraits, and its location within a scholarly body of literature on the body. In the best tradition of ethnography, we are provided a 'portrait of the people,' while at the same time adding to our theoretical knowledge about culture and society." - Peter Adler, University of Denver

"Alan Klein's splendid ethnography is a vivid description of the bodybuilding cult, but is far more as well. It gives us important lessons about masculinity and men's bodies, about tangles of identity and sexuality, and-above all-about the contradictory character of gender in the contemporary world. Fascinating reading and a notable contribution to knowledge." - Bob Connell, University of California, Santa Cruz "This is an important work that will make a significant contribution to sport sociology. I like its readability, its use of vivid, rich portraits, and its location within a scholarly body of literature on the body. In the best tradition of ethnography, we are provided a 'portrait of the people,' while at the same time adding to our theoretical knowledge about culture and society." - Peter Adler, University of Denver