Mark Poster. Critical Theory of the Family. Pp. xx, 233. New York: Seabury Press, 1978. $14.95

• Published date: 01 January 1979
• Author: John E. Owen
• Date: 01 January 1979
• DOI: 10.1177/000271627944100142
• Subject Matter: Articles

221

new

favor

with

Vietnam

induced

fascism)

are

defused

intellectually.

I

have

only

one

quibble

with

this

book.

It’s

almost

a

tour

de

force

to

talk

in

such

detail

about

sports

in

America

while

barely

mentioning

media.

Neither

radio

nor

television

makes

the

index

al-

though

Mr.

Monday

Night

Football

does

by

virtue

of

his

place

in

Guttmann’s

opening

line

in

the

football

chapter:

&dquo;Is

there

an

American

sportswriter

or

broad-

caster,

some

mute,

inglorious

Howard

Cosell

or

George

Plimpton,

who

has

failed

to

comment

upon

the

football

boom

of

the

1960s?&dquo;

(p.

117).

No,

surely.

But

there

is

at

least

one

reader

ready

to

brandish

Occam’s

Razor:

In-

stead

of

fertility

rituals

hyped

up

by

the

need

to

discharge

aggression

in

rou-

tinized

societies,

television

is

not

a

necessary

but

certainly

a

sufficient

condition

to

explain

football’s

eclipse

of

baseball.

Football

watches

better,

is

more

amenable

to

commercial

inser-

tions,

and

it’s

over

more

or

less

on

time.

(Think

of

how

extra

inning

ball

games

muck

up

the

advertising

schedules

of

the

Johnny

Carson

Show.)

Besides,

sum-

mer

is

ebb

time

viewing.

Even

Gutt-

mann’s

ingenious

use

of

Sports

Illus-

trated

covers

is

TV-tainted

evidence.

For

it

is

a

truism

in

magazine

promo-

tion

and

newsstand

sales

circles

that

the

cover

of

almost

every

general

audience

magazine

below

the

middlebrow

level

has

become

telecentric.

Empirical

evi-

dence

in

the

form

of

returned,

unsold

magazines

has

led

most

mass

magazines

into

a

lemming-like

line

up

of

TV-

related

covers.

The

logic

Guttmann

uses

in

explain-

ing

the

diffusion

of

&dquo;national&dquo;

sports

like

rugby

and

baseball

to

foreign

cul-

tures

is

sufficiently

explained

as

a

geo-

political

spinoff

(Japan

and

Cuba

ad-

mired

America

at

the

turn

of

the

cen-

tury-so

they

imported

baseball)

rather

than

through

national

character

sym-

metries.

I

would

explain

baseball’s

hegemony

as

the

national

pastime

be-

tween

1920

and

1960

as

a

result

of

the

media

boom

of

the

1920’s.

Tabloid

journalism

and

radio

played

hard

ball

in

competing

for

the

newly

enfranchised

(culturally

speaking)

blue

and

dirty

white

colors.

Babe

Ruth

is

as

much

a

media

invention

as

the

Tin

Lizzie.

The

point

is

that

just

as

Detroit

has

an

inter-

locking

half-Nelson

on

the

nation’s

economy

and

culture,

so

the

Madison

Avenue/Radio

City

axis

(and

its

Freddie

Silverman

lengthening

fields

of

force)

sets

the

frame

of

attention

for

the

mass,

non-Thoreau

public-which

is

to

say

all

of

us

at

least

some

of

the

time.

It’s

exhilarating

and

sometimes

con-

vincing

to

trace

baseball

and

football

back

to

mythic

roots,

but

the

bottom

line

so

to

speak

is

the

attendance

at

next

week’s

game,

the

circulation

of

this

month’s

magazine,

and

the

complex

symbiosis

that

we

now

see

develops

in

all

modernized

societies,

where

the

media

are,

quite

simply,

the

metabolism.

&dquo;Freedom

to&dquo;

change

these

conditions

quickly

or

radically

is,

in

my

opinion,

&dquo;freedom

from&dquo;

reality.

But

these

are

nit

picks

engendered

by

a

splendid

essay.

It

is

immensely

satisfying

to

know

that

so

perversive,

yet

paradoxically

so

neglected

a

topic,

as

sports

now

has

a

solid

foundation

for

further

research

and

speculation.

A

prime

theme

I’d

propose

to

Guttmann’s

followers:

What

is

there

about

the

ecology

of

imagination

in

America

that

sports

talk

can

be

as

pervasive

as

the

weather

while

sports

analysis

is

as

rare

as

snow

in

July.

Perhaps

a

foundation

ought

to

give

Newsweek’s

Pete

Axthelm

a

sabbatical

to

look

into

the

issue.

(But

even

he,

having

done

so

brilliantly

as

a

sports

writer,

appears

to

be

aspiring

to

general

punditry

rather

than

to

staying

a

mere

prattler

about

punting.)

PATRICK

D.

HAZARD

Beaver

College

Glenside

Pennsylvania

MARK

POSTER.

Critical

Theory

of

the

Family.

Pp.

xx,

233.

New

York:

Seabury

Press,

1978.

$14.95.

This

book

offers

a

critical

analysis

of

current

theories

of

the

family,

sup-

plemented

by

the

author’s

own

eclectic

synthesis

of

interpretation.

It

is

Poster’s

thesis

that

family

structure

must

be

re-

defined

away

from

issues

of

family

size