Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2017
Publication Title
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Volume
3
Issue
2
Pages
1-24
Abstract
This paper traces the relationship between the shifting representations of masculinity in professional wrestling programs of the 1990s and the contemporaneous shifts in conceptions of masculinity, examining the ways each of these shifts impacted the other. Most important among these was a growing sense that the biggest enemy in wrestling and in day-to-day life is one’s boss. Moreover, the corporate corruption theme continues to underscore the WWE’s on-screen and off-screen coverage, well into the second decade of the twenty-first century. Thus, the paper provides a template for considering a widely consumed popular cultural form in ways that challenge the determinism of sex, violence and fakery.
Original Publication Citation
Ouellette, M. (2017). "If you want to be the man, you've got to beat the man": Masculinity and the rise of professional wrestling in the 1990s. Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy, 3(2), 24 pp.
Repository Citation
Ouellette, Marc, ""If You Want To Be The Man, You've Got To Beat The Man": Masculinity and the Rise of Professional Wrestling in the 1990's" (2017). English Faculty Publications. 90.
https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/english_fac_pubs/90
Comments
Published under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share-Alike License.
Publisher's version available at: http://journaldialogue.org/issues/if-you-want-to-be-the-man-youve-got-to-beat-the-man-masculinity-and-the-rise-of-professional-wrestling-in-the-1990s/