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This study illustrates how mainstream journalists employed racial stereotypes to depict controversial Black American boxer Sonny Liston in the early 1960s. The historical-critical narrative employs Raymond Williams's theory of hegemony to account for the vacillating media portrayals of the boxer over time, particularly before and after Muhammad Ali emerged as a social problem for White America. This perspective highlights both the practices and the social fissures that defined sports and media promotions during that era.
In the early 1960 s few racial images were more troubling to White America than the baleful glare of Black American boxer Charles "Sonny" Liston. The negative reaction reflected two interrelated factors: Liston was a troublesome figure who embodied a troublesome mediaconstructed stereotype. The massive, brooding Liston was well-known for his lengthy criminal record and conspicuous ties to organized crime. Accordingly, mainstream journalists portrayed the boxer in terms of a long-standing racial stereotype: a "bad buck" (Bogle, 2001, p. 9). Liston's intimidating persona, his criminality, and his notorious sexual appetites (Tosches, 2000, pp. 134-136) personified the stereotype's attributes: Blackness, physical size, sexual aggressiveness, and violence. Complicating matters, Liston legitimately laid claim to the coveted title of World's Heavyweight Champion, a boxing crown that had been a site for constructing discourses of Whiteness, masculinity, and civilization since the late 19th century (Bederman, 1995; Gorn, 1986; Isenberg, 1988). This was not the first time the cherished boxing title fell into the hands of a controversial Black American. Five decades earlier, White America figuratively tied itself in knots when controversial Black American Jack Johnson won the title (Gilmore, 1975). However, since vanquishing Johnson in 1915, White interests controlled the situation by keeping the title in the hands of either White boxers or a lineage of vetted "good Negro" boxers, dating to Joe Louis in the 1930s (Mead, 1985). In the early 1960s, given the delicacy of the Civil Rights movement, the "Liston problem" was serious enough that it generated extensive news coverage, and it even commanded the attention of US president John F. Kennedy ("Patterson Tells," 1962).
Yet as troublesome as Liston seemed, beginning in 1965 the same White news media transformed him into a heroic figure that White America could embrace. The catalyst for this transformation: Muhammad Ali and his ties...