Nascar, Sturgis, And The New Economy Of Spectacle

In this provocative and original monograph, Krier and Swart argue that NASCAR and the carnivalesque displays at Sturgis's mass motorcycle rallies reveal how spectator events of this scale have come to function as intensive sites of profit making in contemporary capitalism. The authors lucidly trace the historical development of these economic spectacles and analyse the structural components that sustain them.

Daniel Krier (Ph.D. Kansas) is associate professor of Sociology at Iowa State University. His writings on critical theory and political economy include Speculative Capitalism: Stock Market Power and Corporate Change (W.H. Freeman & Co., 2005) and the co-edited volume Capitalism’s Future: Alienation, Emancipation and Critique (Brill 2016).William J. Swart (PhD Kansas) is professor of Sociology and Director of the Civitas Honors Program at Augustana University. His articles on critical theory, social movements and identities have appeared in The Sociological Quarterly, Current Perspectives in Social Theory, and Critical Sociology.