Forging the Masculine and Modern Nation: Race, Identity, and the Public Sphere in Cuba and Mexico, 1890s - 1930s
David C. LaFevor
This dissertation explores the gendered, nationalist, and racial ideas around the introduction of boxing in Cuba and Mexico in the early twentieth century. This transnational history traces the movement of cultural ideas and the appropriation of novel conceptualizations of the body, modernity, and masculinity against the backdrop of the enormous social and cultural upheavals of Cuban Independence and the Mexican Revolution. Advances in media technology brought paragons of transnational virility in the form of modern athletes increasingly within reach of Latin Americans from across the class spectrum; governments were forced to legalize the once barbaric sport of boxing. In the nineteenth century pugilism was outlawed and interpreted as the detritus of American culture. By the 1920s, influential media, the popularity of masculine role-models, and the success of Cubans and Mexicans in the prize ring against foreign opponents transformed boxing from a raffish preserve of cosmopolitan elites into a means to express working-class masculinity and national pride.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VANDERBILT/oai:VANDERBILTETD:etd-03282011-151526 |
| Date | 05 May 2011 |
| Creators | LaFevor, David Clark |
| Contributors | Dr. Gary Gerstle, Dr. William Luis, Dr. Edward Wright-Rios, Dr. Jane Landers, Dr. Marshall C. Eakin |
| Publisher | VANDERBILT |
| Source Sets | Vanderbilt University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-03282011-151526/ |
| Rights | restricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Vanderbilt University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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