Amy Bass is a professor of sport studies, where her interests focus on sport, culture, and politics, and chair of the division of social science and communication. She received a PhD with distinction in history with a comparative in cultural studies from Stony Brook University and did her undergraduate work at Bates College. Her first book, Not the Triumph but the Struggle: The 1968 Olympic Games and the Making of the Black Athlete, is considered a standard-bearer for those interested in studying sport from a cultural perspective. Her followup, In the Game, solidified that reputation. Her third book, Those About Him Remained Silent: the Battle over W.E.B. Du Bois, received Honorable Mention from the National Council on Public History.
Her most recent work, ONE GOAL: A Coach, A Team, and the Game That Brought a Divided Town Together, was named a best book of 2018 by the Boston Globe and Library Journal, and was featured on the Today Show, NPR’s “The Takeaway,” “Midday,” “Under the Radar,” and “Only a Game,” and in Sports Illustrated and ESPN’s The Undefeated, as well as other national media. It has been optioned by Netflix. In its starred review of the book, Kirkus called ONE GOAL “an edifying and adrenaline-charged tale,” while the Wall Street Journal declared it “the perfect parable for our time,” and the Globe & Mail dubbed it “magnificent and significant.”
Bass edits her own series, “Sporting,” for Temple University Press. In mainstream media, she has written for Slate, Salon, and The Christian Century, and is a frequent contributor for CNN, both in print and in studio, and worked across eight Olympic Games for NBC Sports, winning an Emmy Award for Live Event Turnaround at the London Olympic Games.
History, PhD, Stony Brook University
History, MA, Stony Brook University
History, BA, Bates College
Williams College Mystic Seaport Maritime American Studies Program
Book
AuthorONE GOAL: A Coach, a Team, and the Game That Brought a Divided Town Together
Book
AuthorNot the Triumph but the Struggle: The 1968 Olympic Games and the Making of the Black Athlete
Book
AuthorThose About Him Remained Silent: the Battle over W.E.B. DuBois
Book
AuthorIn the Game: Race, Sport, and Society in the 20th Century
Chapter
"Active Radicals: the Political Athlete in the Contemporary Moment"
Chapter
"We Believe: the Anatomy of Red Sox Nation"
Article
“How A High School Soccer Team United A Racially Divided Town”
Article
"More than a Feel Good Tale"
Article
"The State of the Field: Sport History and the 'Cultural Turn'"
Article• November 03, 2014
"Calling Nature A Cheat: the Case of Dutee Chand"
Article
"Objectivity Be Damned, or Why I Go to the Olympic Games: A Hands on Lesson in Performative Nationalism"
Article• July 02, 2019
US Women's Soccer Team to the World: We Got This
Article• August 12, 2019
"US Gold Medalists' Pan Am Protests are the Right Stand to Take
Article• February 16, 2014
"The Sochi Olympics Will Be Corrupt, Troubling....and Fabulous"
January 29, 2014
"Visualizing World Peace through the Olympic Truce"
Article• March 14, 2014
"How Magic Johnson's Diagnosis Changed HIV/AIDS in America"
Article• July 24, 2012
"'Slave Genes' Myth Must Die"
Article
"Teaching Sport and Politics"
Chapter
“Exploring the Wide World of Sports: Taking a Class to the (Virtual) Olympics”
Chapter
“We Don’t Suck at Soccer: The Cultural Imperialism of Sports”
Chapter
“Whose Broad Stripes and Bright Stars? Race, Nation, and Power at the Mexico City Olympics”
National Endowment for the Humanities Faculty Development Grant, 2016
Learning Associate, Bates College, 2014
Emmy Award, “Outstanding Live Event Turnaround: Games of the XXX Olympiad,” National Academy for Television Arts and Sciences, 2013
National Council on Public History, Honorable Mention, 2011
New York University Faculty Network Grant, 2005-2006
Fellow, Institute for Ethics in Public Life, Plattsburgh State University, 2003