A Genealogy of Male Bodybuilding

This book looks at the development of dominant, organized, male bodybuilding culture from its early period (1880s) up until the present, tracing its transformations and offering an updated account for its current "extreme" direction. Unpacking this development both in terms of bodybuilding's own trajectory and the wider sociocultural processes it has been part of, the work uses a unique combination of historical and empirical data and, focusing on organized displays of the built body as a platform for investigating the diverse body aesthetics, models of embodied practice, aesthetics of representation and formal spectacles that have marked the history of bodybuilding.