Rezballers and Skate Elders

Joyful Futures in Indian Country

David Kamper

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Hardback

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English

University of Nebraska Press
01 June 2025

Social & cultural history; Indigenous peoples; Social & cultural anthropology; Basketball; Rollerblading, skateboarding, etc

Ethnographer and American Indian studies scholar David Kamper examines how Indigenous youth and adults are making basketball and skateboarding meaningful to their communities by sustaining the transmission of intergenerational knowledge and combatting intergenerational trauma. Kamper looks at how the events and tournaments built around rezball are similar to powwows in how they bring people together across localized communities and generations and he coins the phrase “skate elders” for those who use the social nature of skateboarding to build community and mentorships.

Through a broad picture of North America, Kamper demonstrates how Native peoples have long indigenized cultural practices and material culture to assert Native sovereignty, creating joy and hope in the process. In Rezballers and Skate Elders Kamper considers how Native expressions of basketball and skateboarding show continuities with the historical transformation of practices that originated outside Indian Country to make them meaningful in Native life.

By: David Kamper
Imprint: University of Nebraska Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
ISBN: 9781496213167
ISBN 10: 1496213165
Pages: 277
Publication Date: 01 June 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Further / Higher Education
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

David Kamper is a professor of American Indian studies, associate director and cofounder of the Center for Skateboarding, Action Sports, and Social Change, and cofounder of Surf/Skate Studies Collaborative at San Diego State University. He is the author of The Work of Sovereignty: Tribal Labor Relations and Self-Determination at the Navajo Nation and coeditor of Waves of Belonging: Indigeneity, Race, and Gender in the Surfing Lineup.

Reviews for Rezballers and Skate Elders: Joyful Futures in Indian Country

“David Kamper has provided a provocative and insightful reimagining of the role and function of sport in contemporary Native life. His sensitive portrayal of basketball and skateboarding invites the reader into a vibrant world of youth cultures, community engagement, Indigenous survivance, and reinvention of what it means to be Indigenous in the twenty-first century.”-Jeffrey P. Shepherd, author of We Are an Indian Nation: A History of the Hualapai People “Rezballers and Skate Elders is a contribution to its field, offering an upbeat portrayal of American Indian youth culture that goes beyond yet another story about historical traumas and tragedies. This is a fascinating and thought-provoking work.”-Ashkan Soltani Stone, coauthor of Rez Metal: Inside the Navajo Nation Heavy Metal Scene