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Forty Million Dollar Slaves: The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of the Black Athlete | 
 enlarge | Author: William C. Rhoden
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy New: $7.76
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Avg. Customer Rating:  27 reviews
Sales Rank: 193399
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0307353141
Dewey Decimal Number: 796.08996073
EAN: 9780307353146
ASIN: 0307353141
Publication Date: July 24, 2007
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Product Description
From Jackie Robinson to Muhammad Ali and Arthur Ashe, African American athletes have been at the center of modern culture, their on-the-field heroics admired and stratospheric earnings envied. But for all their money, fame, and achievement, says New York Times columnist William C. Rhoden, black athletes still find themselves on the periphery of true power in the multibillion-dollar industry their talent built.
Provocative and controversial, Rhoden’s $40 Million Slaves weaves a compelling narrative of black athletes in the United States, from the plantation to their beginnings in nineteenth-century boxing rings and at the first Kentucky Derby to the history-making accomplishments of notable figures such as Jesse Owens, Althea Gibson, and Willie Mays. Rhoden makes the cogent argument that black athletes’ “evolution” has merely been a journey from literal plantations—where sports were introduced as diversions to quell revolutionary stirrings—to today’s figurative ones, in the form of collegiate and professional sports programs. Weaving in his own experiences growing up on Chicago’s South Side, playing college football for an all-black university, and his decades as a sportswriter, Rhoden contends that black athletes’ exercise of true power is as limited today as when masters forced their slaves to race and fight. The primary difference is, today’s shackles are often of their own making.
Every advance made by black athletes, Rhoden explains, has been met with a knee-jerk backlash—one example being Major League Baseball’s integration of the sport, which stripped the black-controlled Negro League of its talent and left it to founder. He details the “conveyor belt” that brings kids from inner cities and small towns to big-time programs, where they’re cut off from their roots and exploited by team owners, sports agents, and the media. He also sets his sights on athletes like Michael Jordan, who he says have abdicated their responsibility to the community with an apathy that borders on treason.
Sweeping and meticulously detailed, $40 Million Slaves is an eye-opening exploration of a metaphor we only thought we knew.
From the Hardcover edition.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 22 more reviews...
 INTENSE SPORTS AND HISTORY ! May 21, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
As a sportsfan, this is a must read! The author's writing style was fantastic. The way the title of the book was introduced to the reader was outstanding, like watching a car accident unfold. Exposing racism in the beginging stages of sports is a hard pill to swallow but very necessary, truth hurts! It's amazing to know that men envied by the masses for their lucrative salaries and lifestyles are virtually powerless in the strategic scope of sports. If you enjoy history, sports, and stories of triumph and struggle you will love this book.
 Overwrought and overwritten April 24, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Many other reviewers have noted that William Rhoden's basic premise is thought-provoking and well-argued. I agree. But Rhoden makes his point with a ton of repetition and a great deal of exaggeration -- thus weakening a well-researched and deeply-felt book.
From my perspective, Rhoden's most interesting point is about the integration of major college and professional sports in the 1950s-1960s. While integration is portrayed as an almost purely beneficial act, Rhoden shows that integration in this case meant absorption of the entire black sports infrastructure -- which created some negative consequences.
However, while I agree with this line of argument, Rhoden takes it too far. He basically says that integration had no positive effects for the black community, which is preposterous. And he cites statistics that don't seem to support his contention. For example, he writes that blacks filled 10% of NCAA sports administrative positions at major colleges in the 1990s. But blacks are 13% of the population, so what's the problem? The number doesn't seem far offline to me.
Thus, Rhoden's constant refrain about the "racist sports-industrial complex" (his phrase) is a little hard to believe. Pretty much everyone at the time thought integration was a good idea. And it's far from clear that not having a great football team at Morgan State University (where Rhoden played) today is the reason that inner-city Baltimore is a hellhole. I think there are bigger factors.
So, read the book and learn from William Rhoden. But you can read the first half of each chapter and skip the second half, which is usually a rehash (often with the exact same phrases and sentences).
What a saga! January 2, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
What a terrific book! Rhoden does his homework and writes a detailed, provocotive history of sports in America and African Americans' unique role in shaping that history. It's important for today's athletes and fans to remember the black sports heroes that "history" forgot: Isaac Murphy, the most celebrated horse racing jockey in the late 1800s, a time when Blacks dominated the sport; Rube Foster, founder of the Negro National League and a sports/black entrepreneur with a vigor unrivaled in the 20th century; Curt Flood, the first to challenge baseball's Reserve Clause and start the push for player control and free agency. It is equally important to take note of how Blacks were systematically pushed out of professional sports around the turn of the century, then had their own thriving institutions (HBCUs, Negro Leagues) appropriated and plundered by the dominant white industries when integration came about.
Though this history is painful, it may help to be conscious of it when attempting to reform modern day systems and institutions. Rhoden lays all the facts on the table for you. He only falls short when making recommendations for the future. His suggestion is that black athletes today should organize effectively and unite in the "struggle," a vague term that connotes the fight for control and power, not just wealth. Some questions not addressed in this book, but which a careful reader will no doubt seek answers to are: What off-the-field goals drive and motivate the professional athlete? How prevalent is the desire in the athlete to become a team owner or social change agent? If not athletes, who will be drawn to the ranks of the "new ownership" Rhoden advocates for? How does the history of post-slavery black labor mirror the sports industry? What is the nature of black business and entrepreneurship over time - does it too parallel the black experience in the sports industry? In the wake of Robert Johnson's sale of BET to Viacom, what is the nature of black "corporate responsibility" to some social mission in addition to the bottom line? Is a White-ally style of corporate responsibility able to achieve some of the reforms that the book advocates for? How does public education tie into the "conveyor belt" that mine's black talent from the inner city? What are education and other public and private institutions' roles in helping to reach the "promised land" that Rhoden refers to frequently but never quite defines? How can sports catalyze change for the African American community and other disenfranchised groups?
Check this book, and come up with some questions of your own. It's worth your time. Then, bug Rhoden and get him to write the sequel!
A serious eye opener January 2, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book was one of the most informative books about Blacks in sports. It illustrates how many of these black athletes went from the slave plantation to the sport arenas. The only difference of a black male and a black professional athlete is their status: money, wealth, etc. Many of the Black Athletes came from poor backgrounds and they are living in up.
Many of them forgot who fought for them to be where there are: Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, Medgar Evers. Many of these Athletes are rich, they feel immune to their former communities because they made it on their god given gifts.
Michael Jordan has been dubbed the greatest basketball player who ever lived, Yet, he was used by Wizards owner Abe Pollin and then fired when he hung up his sneakers for the third time. It goes to show you, no matter what you did the past, they will let you know, who you are and we will put youy in your place.
educational October 10, 2007
This is an excellent book that gives very insiteful information on known and unknown practices in professional sports.
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