1st Edition

The History of American College Football Institutional Policy, Culture, and Reform

Edited By Christian Anderson, Amber Fallucca Copyright 2021
    228 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    228 Pages 15 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    This volume provides unique insight into how American colleges and universities have been significantly impacted and shaped by college football, and considers how U.S. sports culture more generally has intersected with broader institutional and educational issues.

    By documenting events from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries including protests, legal battles, and policy reforms which were centred around college sports, this distinctive volume illustrates how football has catalyzed broader controversies and progress relating to race and diversity, commercialization, corruption, and reform in higher education. Relying foremost on primary archival material, chapters illustrate the continued cultural, social, and economic themes and impacts of college athletics on U.S. higher education and campus life today.

    This text will benefit researchers, graduate students, and academics in the fields of higher education, as well as the history of education and sport more broadly. Those interested in the sociology of education and the politics of sport will also enjoy this volume.

    Chapter 1: Myths and Stories from College Football’s First One Hundred Years

    Christian K. Anderson

    Chapter 2: "As Good as the Best": Gallaudet Football and the Battle Against Normalization at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

    Richard Ian Kimball

    Chapter 3: Football Culture at New South Universities: Lost Cause and Old South Memory, Modernity, and Martial Manhood

    J. Hardin Hobson

    Chapter 4: "The Great Dartmouth Team is No Longer": The 1925 Dartmouth Big Green, "The Present Evil," and the Transformation of College Football

    Derek Charles Catsam

    Chapter 5: Redefining Reform: Presidents, Football, and Athletic Policy in the Southeastern Conference, 1929-1936

    Eric Moyen

    Chapter 6: Saints Embrace Savagery: BYU Football and the Making of Modern Mormonism

    Hunter M. Hampton

    Chapter 7: Football, Althletic Protest, and Reform at Cal State Campuses in the 1960s

    Marc A. VanOverbeke

    Chapter 8: Mugs, Jugs, Bells, and Bowls: Traveling Football Trophies as Campus Traditions and Windows into Institutional Culture at Division III Institutions

    Deborah Worley

    Chapter 9: Last Stand for a Less Commercialized Game: Contesting Football’s Place in Higher Education in NCAA v. Board of Regents, 1984

    Robert L. Kerr

    Chapter 10: Conclusion: Understanding Current Controversies in College Football through Its Colorful Past

    Amber C. Fallucca

    Biography

    Christian K. Anderson is Associate Professor of Higher Education in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policies at the University of South Carolina, USA.

    Amber C. Fallucca is Director of the Quality Enhancement Plan and Associate Director for the Center for Integrative and Experiential Learning at the University of South Carolina, USA. She is also an affiliate faculty member in the Higher Education and Student Affairs Program.

    "Readers should pay particular attention to the subtitle because this book is not a history of college football written from the standpoint of the sport's development, traditions, major programs, and the like. Although some aspects of these topics are interwoven throughout the collection, the ten essays Anderson and Fallucca (both, Univ. of South Carolina) bring together have a different purpose. This volume is part of a broader series on the history of higher education and focuses a critical lens on the impact of football on colleges and universities, specifically in relation to "policy, culture, and reform." Beyond this commonality, the essays offer a truly quirky hodgepodge of football-related subjects. This is not meant as negative criticism. Rather, it is fair to recognize that this relatively short volume covers a lot of ground, including discussions of deaf football players who were students at Gallaudet College at the turn of the 20th century, protests at Cal State campuses in the 1960s, Division III traveling trophies, and Mormon identity as intertwined with BYU football. Every chapter is well written, cites primary sources, and features at least one illustration. Libraries with extensive collections on the history of higher education or college athletics, especially football, should acquire this book." - B. D. Singleton, California State University, CHOICE Recommended