Professional Wrestling Studies Association
Studying the Past, Present, and Future of Professional Wrestling
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
by David Beard with John Heppen Wrestling is an athletic performing art where the winners of the matches are prearranged. Wrestlers require athletic skill and physical training: be very careful in telling a pro wrestler that what he or she does is “fake.” It would be like telling Sir Ian McKellan that what he does … Read more Differentiating Regional Professional Wrestling from National Pro Wrestling: Some Observations
by David Beard, Associate Professor of Rhetoric, University of Minnesota Duluth There was one women’s match at FortuneBaynia, a regional professional wrestling show held in Tower, Minnesota, July 29, 2018, about three hours north of Minneapolis. That match demonstrated some of the limitations of women’s professional wrestling when it settles down into the regional circuits. … Read more Reflections on Regional Professional Wrestling: Gender at FortuneBaynia
Vincent Kennedy McMahon has always aspired to take good ol’ “rasslin” and diffuse it into popular culture. Thinks of all the guest stars he has brought into the fold. He has always desired his product to be more than just a regional wrestling promotion and he always wanted to be bigger than just a wrestling … Read more A Softer, Wiser XFL?
Wrestle Kingdom 12 has come and gone, and New Japan Pro Wrestling picked up some new fans along the way. This was largely due to interest in the Alpha Vs Omega dream match between Chris Jericho (Alpha) and Kenny Omega (Omega, obviously). The build for this match was beautifully done with the rivalry starting on … Read more Alpha Vs Omega
South East Women Wrestlers (hereafter SEWW) are an artist collective in Athens, GA consisting of female and female-identified performers who seek to subvert patriarchy and the male gaze through spectacle and role play. Started in Summer 2017, SEWW has produced performance events — such as SumHERslam, Fall BRAwl, and HalloKWEENhavoc — as well an exhibit at the … Read more A League of One’s Own: South East Women Wrestlers
Comic elements have featured regularly in Western pro wrestling for many decades. While presented seriously in its early decades (1890s-1930s), pro wrestling began increasingly featuring comedic angles or performers, perhaps first widely popularized by Gorgeous George, whose campy, prissy persona transgressed gender boundaries and expectations, infuriating most male and intriguing many, though certainly not all, … Read more Theater of the Absurd: A Brief Hustle Retrospective
In this blog post, I explore the question: How much of the heel’s identity and success is dependent on the wrestler’s performance, and how much on the audience’s (re)actions? This question relates to the work I am doing on the co-constructon of kayfabe through the moment-to-moment interactions between wrestlers and fans. For this particular blog … Read more Interacting with AAW Heels
The following are two video presentations given at the Midwest Popular Culture / American Culture Conference in St. Louis, Missouri, from October of 2017. In this first presentation, Jack Karlis presents his thoughts on how the WWE has handled various scandals as it attempts to develop more of a corporate social responsibility ethos now that … Read more WWE Video Presentations
As part of the Works-In-Process aspect for the Professional Wrestling Studies Association (which you can read more about in Submissions and Contributions), I am submitting a piece I am writing on the co-construction of kayfabe between the wrestlers and their fans (which I have written about elsewhere on this blog, here and here), and how … Read more The Squared Circle and the Magic Circle