Content area
Full Text
(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)
This book truly answers to its title. On the one hand it draws the reader into the vivid world of lucha libre, the Mexican version of professional wrestling - its history, its rules, its performances and its performers. The reader is not only placed ringside but also taken into the arduous training processes and learns what it takes to become and remain a luchador or luchadora. On the other hand, lucha libre is analysed as a signifying practice and a social phenomenon, a 'master symbol of urban Mexican cultural authenticity' containing 'elements that could be read as a parody of the postrevolutionary political system' (p. 220). Through her multifaceted explorations of lucha libre Levi addresses central aspects of Mexican national (and gendered) identities and politics, thus revealing the world of which lucha libre is a part and to which it also meaningfully speaks. Levi provides a historical reconstruction of lucha libre in Mexico City, tying its specific development into significant events and processes, both locally and internationally. Her argument is that lucha libre 'makes sense because it is a performance genre that draws on and reproduces a series of contradictions that are broadly intelligible in the context of the shared historical and cultural background of its Mexican fans' (p. xiii). Thus she emphasises the particular Mexican nature of lucha libre.
The ethnography, based on 15 months of fieldwork, is rich. It is also multi-sited, ranging from wrestling events, interviews and classes in wrestling to systematic perusal of written documents and examination of mass media and avant garde artists' appropriation of lucha libre. Levi makes good use of local events (such as...