Thai People Don’t Get Hate Mail
This chapter explores the decline of golf in America’s inner cities in the 1980s, subsequent efforts to increase minority participation, and the rise of Tiger Woods. Complicating the notion of Woods as a traditional, popular figure in sport desegregation, the narrative instead posits him as a reluctant civil rights hero, contextualizing his popularity and exploring why the media (and many golf fans) struggled to turn back the clock and fit Woods into the mold of historic black athletes. It was a process that future historians may consider a failure, not only because the traditional “civil rights era” was over but also because the young Woods himself asked not to be identified as “black” and instead told the world that he was “Cablinasian,” a term he coined to describe his multiracial heritage. The chapter features an analysis of Woods that draws on a comparison with other athletes, including lesser-known black golfers like Calvin Peete as well as superstars like basketball great Michael Jordan.