| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.1

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 92.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

More Than Just a Game: Sports in American Life since 1945. By Kathryn Jay. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004. xii, 287 pp. $27.95, ISBN 0-231-12534-8.)
In this brief volume Kathryn Jay, professor of history at Barnard College, has taken on the formidable task of writing a general history of one of the rapidly expanding popular institutions in American life. Given the limitations imposed by the length of this work, Dr. Jay has produced a useful and thoughtful volume.	1
Among the areas explored are the growth of intercollegiate athletics, the impact of the Cold War, the impact of television, and the watershed developments of the 1960s. The final two chapters examine a variety of issues from the past two decades.	2
Jay brings the strongest analysis to the impact of the Cold War on the Olympic Games and women's sport. Her explanations of the growth of middle-class sport and her analysis of racial attitudes and sport in the 1950s offer new perspectives on these areas.	3
In addition to the standard interpretations of the 1960s, an analysis of "conservative heroes" (p. 137) is innovative and significant. Jay offers a provocative analysis of the nexus of sport, race, and drugs, and she highlights the useful distinction between recreational and enhancement drugs.	. . .

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