In just a few decades, sport has undergone a radical gender transformation. However, Cheryl Cooky and Michael A. Messner suggest that the progress toward gender equity in sports is far from complete. The continuing barriers to full and equal participation for young people, the far lower pay for most elite-level women athletes, and the continuing dearth of fair and equal media coverage all underline how much still has yet to change before we see gender equality in sports.  

The chapters in No Slam Dunk show that is this not simply a story of an “unfinished revolution.” Rather, they contend, it is simplistic optimism to assume that we are currently nearing the conclusion of a story of linear progress that ends with a certain future of equality and justice.  This book provides important theoretical and empirical insights into the contemporary world of sports to help explain the unevenness of social change and how, despite significant progress, gender equality in sports has been “No Slam Dunk.”  
 

CHERYL COOKY is an associate professor of American Studies in the School of Interdisciplinary Studies at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. 

MICHAEL A. MESSNER is a professor of sociology and gender studies at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He is the author or editor of many books including Child’s Play: Sport in Kids’ Worlds (Rutgers University Press).
 

"Sport is an essential window for understanding what unites and divides us. It shapes our world. No Slam Dunk is essential: a decoder ring for understanding issues of gender and sexuality with the Rosetta Stone that is the games we play."

"No Slam Dunk is an invaluable, highly accessible resource and a fantastic addition to the sport and gender literature. Cooky and Messner provide a volume that is both entertaining and engaging."

"'I don't think it's coincidental that the dunk becomes emblematic of men's basketball—and supposedly what makes men's basketball exciting—right at the moment the women's game is ascendent,' says Michael Messner, a professor of sociology and gender studies at USC and co-author of the upcoming book No Slam Dunk: Gender, Sport and the Unevenness of Social Change"

"No Slam Dunk: Gender, Sport and the Unevenness of Social Change by Cheryl Cooky and Michael A. Messner (Rutgers University Press; 314 pages; $99.95 hardcover, $39.95 paperback). Combines empirical and theoretical perspectives in a study of challenges that remain for gender equity in sports."

"Recommended." 

"A highly readable, engaging, and useful collection of crisply written chapters. Each chapter concludes with a series of thoughtful questions that could be used to stimulate reflection and debate within the classroom or lecture theater. As such, given the accessible writing and insightful commentaries, this text could be usefully employed as a course reader on sport and gender."

"This is a must-read book for anyone interested in understanding gender and sport today....No Slam Dunk synthesizes a robust literature and brings multiple qualitative methods, from content analysis to ethnography, interviews, and subjects’ accounts, to bear on timely topics."

"No Slam Dunk is an invaluable, highly accessible resource and a fantastic addition to the sport and gender literature. Cooky and Messner provide a volume that is both entertaining and engaging."

"'I don't think it's coincidental that the dunk becomes emblematic of men's basketball—and supposedly what makes men's basketball exciting—right at the moment the women's game is ascendent,' says Michael Messner, a professor of sociology and gender studies at USC and co-author of the upcoming book No Slam Dunk: Gender, Sport and the Unevenness of Social Change"

"Recommended." 

"No Slam Dunk: Gender, Sport and the Unevenness of Social Change by Cheryl Cooky and Michael A. Messner (Rutgers University Press; 314 pages; $99.95 hardcover, $39.95 paperback). Combines empirical and theoretical perspectives in a study of challenges that remain for gender equity in sports."

"This is a must-read book for anyone interested in understanding gender and sport today....No Slam Dunk synthesizes a robust literature and brings multiple qualitative methods, from content analysis to ethnography, interviews, and subjects’ accounts, to bear on timely topics."

"A highly readable, engaging, and useful collection of crisply written chapters. Each chapter concludes with a series of thoughtful questions that could be used to stimulate reflection and debate within the classroom or lecture theater. As such, given the accessible writing and insightful commentaries, this text could be usefully employed as a course reader on sport and gender."

"Sport is an essential window for understanding what unites and divides us. It shapes our world. No Slam Dunk is essential: a decoder ring for understanding issues of gender and sexuality with the Rosetta Stone that is the games we play."