Review
This timely and groundbreaking book is about basketball as lived religion in some of America's most dangerous neighborhoods. But more centrally it is about grief expressed and hope conjured as seen through the lens of a stellar young scholar who has been there and through the eyes of young black men who, though weighed down by the forces of death, somehow rise above the asphalt. -- Stephen Prothero, author of Why Liberals Win the Culture Wars (Even When They Lose Elections)
In this season where black male bodies are under attack, Black Gods of the Asphalt offers a profound narrative of survival, self-determination, and the urban swag of Boston's inner-city basketball courts as sites where religion is 'lived' and spiritual transformation occurs on a regular basis. Woodbine brilliantly posits that the 'ritual space of the asphalt' is where memory, hope, and healing converge to fight the systemic oppressive forces beyond the rim. This book is a slam dunk! -- Emmett G. Price III, editor of The Black Church and Hip Hop Culture: Toward Bridging the Generational Divide
The stories in Black Gods of the Asphalt are rich and powerful and are woven together skillfully and beautifully. Onaje X. 0. Woodbine switches between his roles as participant and observer, by turns narrating and analyzing with great dexterity. -- Rebecca Alpert, author of Religion and Sports
This narrative is more than academic prose; it is a deeply personal and poetic travel through the author's own story of racial struggle and the survival tactics of the players he befriends.... In this majestic study of basketball as ritual, religion, and culture, Woodbine plunges into the courts of Boston with an insider's savvy to catalogue the urban sport's pulsating (and potentially transcendent) dialogue. ― Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Woodbine's got game, on the court and on the page, and here he dunks emphatically. From the time we meet Shorty, a street-basketball legend, through a brief history of the game and its link (religion playing a large role) to young African American culture, we learn of basketball, and the many lives it memorializes, as we have in few other books. ― Booklist
In this painful, beautiful nonfiction debut, scholar Onaje X. O. Woodbine uses a seamless mix of memoir, ethnography, and poetry to chronicle Boston's street basketball players seeking physical and spiritual grace through hoops. ― Boston Magazine
In Black Gods of the Asphalt, the worlds of religion and hoops come together.... Woodbine shares how the courts can be a place of healing, of ritual, of community, and even transcendence. -- Christie Storm ― Arkansas Democrat Gazette
Black Gods of the Asphalt is likely to change your entire perspective of urban basketball. -- David Crumm ― Read The Spirit
For the young men in Woodbine's book, street basketball disconnects players from daily life in a way that gives them joy.... But, at the same time, inner city life literally enshrouds their game, and this tragedy is what Black Gods brings to life in vividly realized accounts of young men and the street ball tournaments they play. -- David Lipset ― Eephus
A powerful and deeply moving work, Black Gods of the Asphalt reveals a world of redemption and hope rarely glimpsed from the outside. -- Diana L. Hayes ― National Catholic Reporter
A thoughtful, passionate, and personal exploration. ― The Boston Globe (Best Books of 2016)
A uniquely engaging and rewarding read for sociologists. -- Douglas Hartmann ― Contemporary Sociology: A Journal of Reviews
About the Author
Onaje X. O. Woodbine is assistant professor of philosophy and religion at American University.
