Happy Birthday to world champion boxer Sugar Ray Robinson (b. Walker Smith Jr., May 3, 1921, in Detroit, MI), who won 174 of the 201 fights in his professional career and was known outside the ring for his style and colorful cars. Taken together, his professional achievements, stylish consumer identity, and extravagant lifestyle represented a unique and empowering personal identity. As historian Daniel A. Nathan writes, “As a performer, in and out of the ring, Robinson enacted a version of black masculinity that signified pride, self-worth, strength, and individualism, one that simultaneously embodied racial empowerment without representing a serious threat to the racial social order. In this sense, Robinson represented different things to different communities and audiences. Like Jack Johnson before him and Muhammad Ali afterward, Robinson did not mean one thing, he meant many things.” This multidimensionality is important to consider when thinking about historical figures who also became popular culture icons.
Citations: Daniel A. Nathan, “Sugar Ray Robinson, the Sweet Science, and the Politics of Meaning,” Journal of Sport History 26, no. 1 (Spring 1999): 165-166, 168, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43611722; Orlando Fernandez, “Ray Robinson and friends / World Telegram & Sun photo by O. Fernandez,” photograph (location unknown, 1965), https://lccn.loc.gov/2006683724.
Comments