For this special episode of The Pop Culture Lens, co-hosts Christopher J. Olson and I address a question they have been working on answer: why study professional wrestling?

Their answers delve into the many ways that professional wrestling has impacted societies and cultures around the world to understand just how important pro-wrestling is. From the WWE to indie federations, and from Shakespeare to opera, pro-wrestling has left its mark in history, on peoples, and on business practices.

In this episode, they discuss the formation of the Professional Wrestling Studies Association, whose website/blog can be found here: https://prowrestlingstudies.org.

They also offer a thank you to The Popular Culture Studies Journal for their support of this new field of scholarship. The journal’s website is http://mpcaaca.org/the-popular-culture-studies-journal.

As always, you are encouraged to become a part of this conversation by visiting any of the podcast’s social media sites. You can also talk with Christopher Olson on Twitter (@chrstphrolson) and at his academic blog seemsobvioustome.wordpress.com. And you can talk to me on Twitter (@mediaoracle).