This book explores the ways in which religion is observed, performed, and organised in skateboard culture. Drawing on scholarship from the sociology of religion and the cultural politics of lifestyle sports, this work combines ethnographic research with media analysis to argue that the rituals of skateboarding provide participants with a rich cultural canvas for emotional and spiritual engagement. Paul O’Connor contends that religious identification in skateboarding is set to increase as participants pursue ways to both control and engage meaningfully with an activity that has become an increasingly mainstream and institutionalised sport. Religion is explored through the themes of myth, celebrity, iconography, pilgrimage, evangelism, cults, and self-help.
A mix of Tony Hawk and Brian Welch comes together in skateboarding legend Christian Hosoi, who reveals everything about his rise, fall, and redemption, in this amazing tell-all—from being named the greatest skater of all time to bottoming out on drugs to finally finding redemption through God. Fans of Slater Kelly’s Pipe Dreams and Brian Welch’s Save Me From Myself, and followers of Tony Alva, Jay Adams, and Steve Caballero, will be captivated by this extraordinary, star-studded story, a gripping read that ranges from the heart of the 1980s skateboarding scene to the inside of a prison, from Hollywood parties to intense prayer sessions. Hosoi: My Life as a Skateboarder Junkie Inmate Pastor takes readers to the heart of one little-known world after another—and he portrays them in all their gore and glory for all the world to see.
This book explores God through the eyes of a skateboarder, using stories from the world of skateboarding to explain who God is and what God’s like. When a skater first learns to street skate, pop an ollie, or ride a ramp; there is a buzz of excitement! It’s the thrill of riding a skateboard joined with the fun of learning a new trick. There’s a similar thrill when someone begins a relationship with God. Each step into faith can brings fun and joy, like learning a new trick. Life’s journey is a bit like skating through a town. There may be high ledges and the ideal double-set but is there a purpose for it all? Is there a God who created us? What happens at the end of our lives? By exploring core issue (a skater’s identity, when a skate park feels so good it’s almost like heaven, the near miraculous nature of some skate tricks, the dark ‘slide’ of life, and whether we worship) this book aims to helps skaters and non-skaters alike take a fresh look at the God who is totally for all people, who calls us to come just as we are.
A National Book Foundation "5 Under 35" Honoree “An enchanting, sparkling book about the many meanings of sisterhood.” —Kristin Iversen, Refinery29 Claire Luchette's debut, Agatha of Little Neon, is a novel about yearning and sisterhood, figuring out how you fit in (or don’t), and the unexpected friends who help you find your truest self Agatha has lived every day of the last nine years with her sisters: they work together, laugh together, pray together. Their world is contained within the little house they share. The four of them are devoted to Mother Roberta and to their quiet, purposeful life. But when the parish goes broke, the sisters are forced to move. They land in Woonsocket, a former mill town now dotted with wind turbines. They take over the care of a halfway house, where they live alongside their charges, such as the jawless Tim Gary and the headstrong Lawnmower Jill. Agatha is forced to venture out into the world alone to teach math at a local all-girls high school, where for the first time in years she has to reckon all on her own with what she sees and feels. Who will she be if she isn’t with her sisters? These women, the church, have been her home. Or has she just been hiding? Disarming, delightfully deadpan, and full of searching, Claire Luchette’s Agatha of Little Neon offers a view into the lives of women and the choices they make.
"Jerry makes it look so easy. Every time I open this book, my camera gets heavier." -- Daniel Arnold Legendary skateboarder and artist Jerry Hsu started his blog NAZI GOLD in 2009 as a repository for the cell phone photos he'd been collecting alongside his more traditional photography and film practices: shots of friends and strangers, roadside curiosities, and anything else that seemed to merit instant sharing with both peers and the public. In the ensuing years, the site grew from an exercise in visual note-taking into a uniquely hysterical embodiment of both Hsu's keen artistic sense and his razor-sharp wit. Documenting his journeys through the high and low trappings of our culture, Hsu's work captures everything from bootleg t-shirts and bathroom stall graffiti to unexpected truths and the occasional startling moment of humanity. An unerringly creative and endlessly clever chronicle of the deep ironies of our modern world, The Beautiful Flower Is the World, now in a lush hardcover second edition, collects the best of Hsu's blog photography into a compelling and immersive whole.
This book examines how different stages of adult life affect participation in lifestyle sports and in the construction of identity. Drawing on multi-disciplinary perspectives, it explores how gender, sexuality, ethnicity, and location, in conjunction with age and stage in career, affect lifestyle sport practices and meanings. Tracing engagement with lifestyle sport across the lifecourse, from young adult to older age, the book examines the concepts of authenticity and identity in subcultural and alternative sports, exploring how individuals develop lifestyle sport identities, maintain authentic identities, and how they manage those identities as older adults. It presents a range of fascinating, cutting-edge case studies from around the world, covering sports as diverse as climbing, surfing, mountain biking, skateboarding and roller derby, and considers key contemporary issues such as professionalisation, sports labor, and digital technology. It also highlights political tensions and shifts that shape the identities of lifestyle sport communities. This is essential reading for anybody with a serious interest in alternative or lifestyle sports, the relationships between sport and wider society, or the development of subcultures and cultural identity.
This book explores God through the eyes of a skateboarder, using stories from the world of skateboarding to explain who God is and what God's like. When a skater first learns to street skate, pop an ollie, or ride a ramp; there is a buzz of excitement! It's the thrill of riding a skateboard joined with the fun of learning a new trick. There's a similar thrill when someone begins a relationship with God. Each step into faith can brings fun and joy, like learning a new trick. Life's journey is a bit like skating through a town. There may be high ledges and the ideal double-set but is there a purpose for it all? Is there a God who created us? What happens at the end of our lives? By exploring core issue (a skater's identity, when a skate park feels so good it's almost like heaven, the near miraculous nature of some skate tricks, the dark 'slide' of life, and whether we worship) this book aims to helps skaters and non-skaters alike take a fresh look at the God who is totally for all people, who calls us to come just as we are.
"Intellectually deft and lively to read, Skate Life is an important addition to the literature on youth cultures, contemporary masculinity, and the role of media in identity formation." ---Janice A. Radway, Northwestern University, author of Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy, and Popular Literature "With her elegant research design and sophisticated array of anthropological and media studies approaches, Emily Chivers Yochim has produced one of the best books about race, gender, and class that I have read in the last ten years. In a moment where celebratory studies of youth, youth subcultures, and their relationship to media abound, this book stands as a brilliantly argued analysis of the limitations of youth subcultures and their ambiguous relationship to mainstream commercial culture." ---Ellen Seiter, University of Southern California "Yochim has made a valuable contribution to media and cultural studies as well as youth and American studies by conducting this research and by coining the phrase 'corresponding cultures,' which conceptualizes the complex and dynamic processes skateboarders employ to negotiate their identities as part of both mainstream and counter-cultures." ---JoEllen Fisherkeller, New York University Skate Life examines how young male skateboarders use skate culture media in the production of their identities. Emily Chivers Yochim offers a comprehensive ethnographic analysis of an Ann Arbor, Michigan, skateboarding community, situating it within a larger historical examination of skateboarding's portrayal in mainstream media and a critique of mainstream, niche, and locally produced media texts (such as, for example, Jackass, Viva La Bam, and Dogtown and Z-Boys). The book uses these elements to argue that adolescent boys can both critique dominant norms of masculinity and maintain the power that white heterosexual masculinity offers. Additionally, Yochim uses these analyses to introduce the notion of "corresponding cultures," conceptualizing the ways in which media audiences both argue with and incorporate mediated images into their own ideas about identity. In a strong combination of anthropological and media studies approaches, Skate Life asks important questions of the literature on youth and provides new ways of assessing how young people create their identities. Emily Chivers Yochim is Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication Arts, Allegheny College. Cover design by Brian V. Smith
Since then his literary production of more than fifty books in four main genres - novels, short stories, poetry, and critical essays - has consistently and insightfully explored a wide range of religious issues. The essays collected here evaluate the religious dimension of Updike's prodigious literary vision, looking broadly at Updike's understanding of religion in ordinary human experience, in the context of historic Christianity, and in contemporary American culture."--BOOK JACKET.
A mix of Tony Hawk and Brian Welch comes together in skateboarding legend Christian Hosoi, who reveals everything about his rise, fall, and redemption, in this amazing tell-all—from being named the greatest skater of all time to bottoming out on drugs to finally finding redemption through God. Fans of Slater Kelly’s Pipe Dreams and Brian Welch’s Save Me From Myself, and followers of Tony Alva, Jay Adams, and Steve Caballero, will be captivated by this extraordinary, star-studded story, a gripping read that ranges from the heart of the 1980s skateboarding scene to the inside of a prison, from Hollywood parties to intense prayer sessions. Hosoi: My Life as a Skateboarder Junkie Inmate Pastor takes readers to the heart of one little-known world after another—and he portrays them in all their gore and glory for all the world to see.
