Dr Nik Dickerson

Dr Nik Dickerson graduated with a BA in Sport Sociology from Ithaca College in 2005. He then went on to receive an MA in the Cultural Studies of Sport from the University of Maryland (2007), and a PhD in the Cultural Studies of Sport from the University of Iowa (2012). His PhD examined how race, gender, and national identity informed mediated representations of recreational drug use in sport, advertisement, and film. After graduating he served as a lecturer in American Studies at the University of Iowa for three years, and then spent seven years as a Senior Lecturer in Sport Sociology at the University of Lincoln (UK).

Nik’s research focuses on representations of Black masculinity and national identity within sport and popular culture. Specifically, his work interrogates how various forms of media (e.g., internet memes, adverts, film) construct dominant understandings of Black masculinity and national identity, while also exploring how members of the Black diaspora self-define and construct understandings of Black masculinity from a Black ontological perspective as a response to this dominant framing. He has specific expertise in representations of recreational drug use in sport, athlete activism, and the political underpinnings of constructions of national identity within sport through the lenses of race and gender.

• Dickerson, N., & Hodler, M. (2021) Real Men Stand for Our Nation: Constructions of an American nation and anti-Kaepernick memes. Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 45 (4), 329-357. DOI: 10.1177%2F0193723520950537
• Dickerson, N. (2018) Ricky and sticky icky: Marijuana, sport, and the legibility/illegibility of black masculinity. Sociology of Sport Journal, 35, 386-393. DOI: 10.1123/ssj.2017-0033
• Dickerson, N. (2016) Constructing the digitalized sporting body: Black and white masculinity in NBA/NHL Internet memes. Communication and Sport, 4, 303-330. DOI: 10.1177%2F2167479515584045