In the US, the big soccer boom is always supposedly around the corner. The most recent example: right now, in the lead-up to next year's World Cup. But that waiting until the beautiful game is the "number 1 sport in the U.S." clouds our view of the game’s history in this country. Today, it's that history, in its own right, that we focus on. Brian Bunk focusses on it, especially, in his new book Beyond the Field: How Soccer Built Community in the United States. Brian is a Historian at the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, and has already written THE history of the early game in the US, From Football to Soccer. This is a sequel, a collection of local stories. And there are lot of stories around immigrant identity in there. So I’m reminded of what Oscar Handlin, the dean of American Immigration History, said a few decades ago: “Once I thought to write a history of the immigrants in America. Then I discovered that the immigrants were American history.” Well for today, we could say: Brian Bunk wrote a book about the history of soccer and community in the US. And we find out: soccer and community ARE American history.

HELPFUL LINKS FOR THIS EPISODE:

Brian's online exhibit "Beyond the Field," with historic photos that appear in the book

Brian Bunk on Bluesky

Brian's articles for the Society of American Soccer History

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Artwork for The Assistant Professor of Football is by Saige Lind

Instrumental music for this podcast, including the introduction track, is by the artist Ketsa and used under a Creative Commons license through Free Music Archive: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Ketsa/