Professional Wrestling Studies Association
Studying the Past, Present, and Future of Professional Wrestling
prowrestlingstudies_21lb3c I’m still on a high, friends. If you are expecting this to be an overly critical, borderline cynical blog post as is the usual with Nylons, you may want to read elsewhere this week. In this post we’re going to celebrate the triumph that was the WWE Evolution pay-per-view. Let’s get right into it because … Read more Nylons and Midriffs: We Witnessed An Evolution (Evolution Review: October 31, 2018)
EDITOR’S NOTE: There is a spoiler here for NXT UK and is marked as such. This past Sunday night was WWE’s first ever all women’s pay-per-view called Evolution. While other promotions feature an all women roster (Shimmer and Shine most notably), this is the first time WWE has put all the focus on their women … Read more “Ladies All Across the World!”: An Evolution Review
Greetings and salutations good wrestling fans. I can’t believe this will be the last post before Evolution. It is mind-boggling how fast this year is going, and how quickly this “monumental” pay-per-view is approaching. I’m not sure WWE knows this either…hm. Let’s talk a bit about that, shall we? The Good Before I become too … Read more Nylons and Midriffs: What’s Happening in Women’s Wrestling (October 15, 2018)
Greetings good wrestling fans. I hope some autumn leaves have blessed your front lawns by this point! Fall is by far my favorite season of the year, and as far as wrestling goes, it brings us closer to 2019 and the illusion of new beginnings for WWE. With Evolution looming, how are they rounding out … Read more Nylons and Midriffs: What’s Happening in Women’s Wrestling (October 1, 2018)
Greetings wrestling fans, and welcome to the post-Hell in a Cell edition of Nylons and Midriffs. The last few weeks have been interesting to say the least, in both exciting and mildly worrisome ways. As per usual, I will divide the discussion between the two weekly WWE shows and the most recent pay-per-view. The Good … Read more Nylons and Midriffs: What’s Happening in Women’s Wrestling (September 17, 2018)
by David Beard, Associate Professor of Rhetoric, University of Minnesota Duluth WizKids has announced that they have licensed WWE intellectual property for their tabletop games. WizKids, the leader in high-quality pre-painted miniatures and established board games, today announced a new multi-year licensing partnership with WWE, with plans to bring the organization’s iconic Superstars to the … Read more WWE and WizKids: An opportunity to rethink game theory
For those unaware, All In, which took place at the Sears Centre Arena just outside Chicago, IL on September 1, 2018, came about because of a tweet posted on May 16, 2017 by Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer. In the tweet, Meltzer denied that an independent wrestling promotion like Ring of Honor (ROH) could … Read more Review – All In
Many greetings to you, wrestling fans near and far. I hope those of you in the U.S. had an enjoyable Labor Day weekend. As I’m sure we’re all still trying to digest all of the savory barbecue and appetizers we ate this weekend, I won’t give you too much to swallow with this post. But … Read more Nylons and Midriffs: What’s Happening in Women’s Wrestling (September 4, 2018)
by David Beard, Associate Professor of Rhetoric, UM Duluth The history of women in wrestling was given a brief overview in Chris Kelly’s August 10th essay in The Washington Post “Lifestyle Section,” “The Women Wrestlers of WWE Have Created a Movement. Is it Built to Last?” But the history is partial, only reaching back as far … Read more Women’s Wrestling and the Erasure of History
by David Beard and John Heppen Fans of pro wrestling are typically divided into two groups, “marks” and “smarks.” The fiction is that a fan is either a smark or a mark. It’s a little like “Santa Claus” — either you believe or you don’t. We propose a third path. We propose that there are marks, … Read more Deconstructing the Distinction between Marks and Smarks