Boxing in its contemporary form is a sport in which men and increasingly among professionals, women of closely matched weights fight with their fists in padded leather gloves. No bare description can account for the impact of boxing on American culture, or an appeal which persists despite, or perhaps because of, occasional ring deaths, and in the face of medical evidence that persistent blows to the head, even from gloved fists, can cause forms of brain damage. (The American Medical Association has frequently called for the sport to be banned.) Ever since African American boxer Jack Johnson’s championship reign (1908–15), boxing has been a crucible for issues of race and masculinity. Johnson’s first championship victory over Tommy Burns in Australia, provoked race riots in many American cities and gave rise to the racially charged search in the press and elsewhere for a “Great White Hope” (one of many boxing expressions that have entered common usage, including “double cross,” “knockout,” “up against the ropes” and “the real McCoy”).

Boxers have traditionally come from economically oppressed minority communities, especially African American, Italian American or Irish American. Like other professional sports, boxing has been seen as a way to escape poverty but success is rare, and boxers have frequently been financially exploited. Despite the successes of such great champions as Henry Armstrong, Sugar Ray Robinson and Joe Louis (whose knockout of the German Max Schmeling in 1938 was seen as a rebuff to Adolf Hitler’s claim of Aryan racial superiority), black boxers’ opportunities at the highest levels were restricted to the extent that white boxers could avoid them, until after the Second World War. Successful black boxers had to be very careful about their public image (Louis was instructed not to be photographed alongside white women). In the 1950s, however, this began to change with the combination of somewhat improved opportunities for black men following from their wartime service and, by the late 1950s, the advent of televised boxing and increased demand for talented fighters. African Americans have dominated the public face of the sport ever since, especially in the most visible heavyweight division, where the last undisputed white champion was Rocky Marciano, who retired in 1955. Many boxers in the lighter weight classes have been from Latin America and Asia, especially as boxing’s market has expanded via global communications networks.

Since the 1960s, the three central figures in the public awareness of boxing have been the heavyweight champions Muhammad Ali and Mike Tyson, and the promoter Don King. Handsome, flamboyant and loquacious, Ali’s public opposition to the Vietnam War and his claims to be “the prettiest” and “the Greatest,” echoing the political slogan “Black is Beautiful,” made him into a hero for many and eventually one of the most famous men alive. Boxing was seen to fall into a lull after Ali’s retirement in the early 1980s. By then the division of championships by separate sanctioning bodies meant that there were often multiple champions in each weight division, and without charismatic figures like Ali many fans lost interest.

Tyson’s very different appeal sparked something of a popular revival. For Tyson, boxing was an escape from a much-publicized juvenile delinquent youth on the streets of Brooklyn, New York, and he became a protégé of the trainer Cus D’Amato. Viewed against Ali’s speed and agility Tyson was an explosive puncher who rose to prominence with a series of spectacular early round knockouts, and unified the title (won the title under each of the separate sanctioning organizations) in 1988. As champion, Tyson’s malevolent, “gangster” rap image and his very public personal life were accompanied by rumors of continued delinquency and charges of sexual harassment. His marriage to actor Robin Givens collapsed, and, in a stunning upset, he was defeated by unheralded Buster Douglas in 1990. In 1992 Tyson was convicted in Indiana of the rape of a Miss Black America pageant contestant. His supporters claimed for him the same status as a legal martyr to racism that Ali and before him Jack Johnson had attained. Paroled after three years, Tyson fought a series of inconsequential bouts that brought him a meaningless championship. However, he was unexpectedly and thoroughly beaten by Evander Holyfield in 1996 and again in 1997 when he was disqualified for twice biting Holyfield’s ears.

The promoter Don King, his trademark upright hairstyle and motto, “Only in America,” ubiquitous at major bouts, spans the championship reigns of Ali and Tyson. A former Cleveland numbers runner, once convicted of manslaughter, King secured the first $10 million purse for Ali’s bout with George Foreman in Zaire in 1974, and the bloated prize-money in tens of millions of dollars, for Tyson’s comeback mismatches on pay-perview television. Although he has avoided legal entanglements, his simultaneous promotional deals with opposing boxers have been associated with the perceived corruption of boxing.