Every once in a while, we at C-VILLE feel the need to mock the accomplishments of the only people more eggheady than writers: academics. Fortunately, UVA offers no shortage of exhibits A through Z in the case of C-VILLE v. Nerds. This year, there were 92 masters and doctoral dissertations published by degree candidates, but in separating the impenetrable wheat from the inscrutable chaff, we stumbled across a few that seemed astoundingly esoteric. Newly designated sociology Ph.D. Michael J. Hightower’s 374-pager, “Inventing tradition: Cowboy sports in a postmodern age,” rose to the top.
 Will cowboys trade in Stetsons for black berets in the postmodern age? We’ll never know. |
Among other goals, Hightower’s abstract promises to compare and contrast the so-called “cowboy sports” (rodeo stuff, though the thought of basketball with lassoes is briefly compelling) with other extreme sports and explore their relation to “postmodern American culture.” We are a bit curious as to what makes cowboy sports postmodern—buncha cowboys sittin’ around, deconstructin’ paradigms with a quiet dignity—but that question must go unanswered, because this is one dissertation we ain’t reading.
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