View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by OpenSIUC Kaleidoscope: A Graduate Journal of Qualitative Communication Research Volume 10 Article 7 2011 Brock Lesnar is Going Down: A Performative Critique of a So-called Ultimate Fighter Joe Hassert Southern Illinois University Carbondale,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/kaleidoscope Recommended Citation Hassert, Joe (2011) "Brock Lesnar is Going Down: A Performative Critique of a So-called Ultimate Fighter," Kaleidoscope: A Graduate Journal of Qualitative Communication Research: Vol. 10 , Article 7. Available at: http://opensiuc.lib.siu.edu/kaleidoscope/vol10/iss1/7 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by OpenSIUC. It has been accepted for inclusion in Kaleidoscope: A Graduate Journal of Qualitative Communication Research by an authorized administrator of OpenSIUC. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Brock Lesnar is Going Down: A Performative Critique of a So-called Ultimate Fighter Joe Hassert Southern Illinois University Carbondale
[email protected] In this paper, I take a no-holds-barred approach to cultural criticism, using performative writing as my primary combat style with which to kick Ultimate Fighting Champion Brock Lesnar’s ass. Under the performative guise of a three-round fight, I offer a counter-hegemonic reading of Brock Lesnar’s move from professional wrestling to Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). I argue that Lesnar’s quest to become the Ultimate Fighting Champion parallels a crucial feature of hegemonic masculinity—the constant struggle to become a man—while demonstrating the process of formalization and informalization that continually shapes our understanding of what it is to be a man.