Muscle Boys: Gay Gym Culture

by Erick Alvarez

Overview

What was once a lifestyle for a small number of gay men in big cities has become a way of life for many, and the gay gym is now a culture on its own. Muscle Boys: Gay Gym Culture explores the evolution and current structure of this gay subculture that surfaced in San Francisco, West Hollywood, and New York during the 1970s.

Covering ancient Greek gymnasium culture, modern bodybuilding practices, and homoerotic muscle-bound media, Muscles Boys examines the origins of the male athletic ideal. A sociological investigation on masculinity, fitness, HIV, steroids, and sex in the locker room, Muscle Boys dissects the gay gym experience, and celebrates gay body culture and its role in modern gay life.

Author Erick Alvarez offers a candid study of the gay gym from his perspective as a physical trainer in the San Francisco Bay area, and from his interviews and online surveys of nearly 6,000 gay men. Muscle Boys: Gay Gym Culture is an enlightening read for anyone interested in gay body culture, and a valuable resource for academics working in GLBT studies, human sexuality, psychology, or athletics.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781135275600
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	05/26/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	332
File size:	8 MB

About the Author

Erick Alvarez is a freelance writer and independent scholar. He has a Bachelor's degree in Kinesiology and Exercise Science from San Francisco State University, and has been a personal trainer in the San Francisco gym scene for over a decade.

Table of Contents

List of Figures. Acknowledgments. 1. Gay Gym Culture. 2. Greek Gym Culture and the Greek Ideal. 3. The Fall and Rise of the Gym Built Body. 4. Muscle Media. 5. The Gay Gym. 6. Muscle Boys. 7. The Poz Jock. 8. The Gay Athlete. 9. The Circuit Boy. 10. The Muscle Bear. 11. The Older Male. 12. The Locker Room. Notes. Index.

What People are Saying About This

Jack Fritscher

AN INFORMED HISTORY AND BREEZY ANALYSIS OF GAY MEN'S THIRSTY INTEREST IN BODY IMAGE. . . . Athlete Alvarez is a trainer who leaves his muscular signature on this entertaining book that covers early physique magazines, steroids, and pro athletes like Dave Kopay and Tom Waddell, inventor of the Gay Games. As a longtime gym-insider, Alvrez writes about what he knows. He captures the mystery and history of gay gym culture, of self-fashioning notions of masculine identity, and how gay muscle flexed gay power and uncloseted our Platonic Ideals into straight mainstream advertising. (Jack Fritscher, PhD, Author of "Gay Sports" in Gay San Francisco: Eyewitness Drummer - Sex, Art, and the Salon around Drummer Magazine)

Tom Cardamone

ACCESSIBLE PROSE AND EXPERIENCED INSIGHT . . . . Provides the reader with a timely idea: the importance of the gym in allowing gay men a place where they can find each other and, most significantly, themselves. This VERY READABLE book politely kicks sand in the faces of those who impugn the gym as anything other than a unique, healthy, surprisingly diverse communal culture worthy of study, comment and maybe even membership. . . . This INSIGHTFUL history gives voice to the countless gay men who found the strength to assert themselves and in doing so redefined masculinity. (Tom Cardamone, Author of The Werewolves Of Central Park)