"In her excellent new book, Amy Bass uses the famous 'black power' podium salute by sprinters John Carlos and Tommie Smith as the centerpiece of her expansive examination of the black athlete in America." -Boston Globe

"Amy Bass's powerful and nuanced account of the Olympic Project for Human Rights gives us the story behind this picture-a story that will change our conception of the history of sport and racial politics." -Robin D. G. Kelley

"Beautifully written, as well as appropriately complex and wide-ranging. As much as sports might appear to be a straight-ahead business, where the 'best' might be rightly rewarded, Bass deftly reveals the difficulties of maintaining a sense of self, collective consciousness, and political urgency." -Philadelphia City Paper

"Amy Bass sorts through the events and perceptions linked to some of the biggest names and moments in sports history and assesses their meaning beyond the playing field." -Bob Costas

Amy Bass is assistant professor of history at the College of New Rochelle and is a member of the NBC research team covering the Olympic Games including Atlanta 1996, Sydney 2000, Salt Lake 2002, and Athens 2004.

On the eve of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 March on Washington, W. E. B. Du Bois died in exile in Ghana at the age of 95, more than a half century after cofounding the NAACP. Five years after his death, residents of Great Barrington, the small Massachusetts town where Du Bois was born in 1868, proposed recognizing his legacy through the creation of a memorial park on the site of his childhood home. Supported by the local newspaper and prominent national figures including Harry Belafonte and Sydney Poitier, the effort to honor Du Bois set off an acrimonious debate that bitterly divided the town. Led by the local chapter of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, opponents compared Du Bois to Hitler, vilifying him as an anti-American traitor for his communist sympathies, his critique of American race relations, and his pan-Africanist worldview.

In "Those About Him Remained Silent," Amy Bass provides the first detailed account of the battle over Du Bois and his legacy, as well as a history of Du Bois's early life in Massachusetts. Bass locates the roots of the hostility to memorialize Du Bois in a cold war worldview that reduced complicated politics to a vehement hatred of both communism and, more broadly, anti-Americanism. The town's reaction was intensified, she argues, by the racism encoded within cold war patriotism.
Showing the potency of prevailing, often hidden, biases, "Those About Him Remained Silent" is an unexpected history of how racism, patriotism, and global politics played out in a New England community divided on how--or even if--to honor the memory of its greatest citizen.

Rooting for the Home Team examines how various American communities create and maintain a sense of collective identity through sports. Looking at large cities such as Chicago, Baltimore, and Los Angeles as well as small rural towns, suburbs, and college towns, the contributors consider the idea that rooting for local athletes and home teams often symbolizes a community's preferred understanding of itself, and that doing so is an expression of connectedness, public pride and pleasure, and personal identity. Some of the wide-ranging essays point out that financial interests also play a significant role in encouraging fan bases, and modern media have made every seasonal sport into yearlong obsessions. Celebrities show up for big games, politicians throw out first pitches, and taxpayers pay plenty for new stadiums and arenas. The essays in Rooting for the Home Team cover a range of professional and amateur athletics, including teams in basketball, football, baseball, and even the phenomenon of no-glove softball. Contributors are Amy Bass, Susan Cahn, Mark Dyreson, Michael Ezra, Elliott J. Gorn, Christopher Lamberti, Allison Lauterbach, Catherine M. Lewis, Shelley Lucas, Daniel A. Nathan, Michael Oriard, Carlo Rotella, Jaime Schultz, Mike Tanier, David K. Wiggins, and David W. Zang.