David Hayano is a cultural anthropologist by profession. He studies people and the societies that they form. David Hayano is also a poker player. During the 1970s he was a “regular” at the Gardena poker clubs in Los Angeles County. As he spent more time playing poker in public card rooms, he couldn’t help but consider the people he met as a society. After considerable interest in some preliminary reporting he had done about this poker society, Hayano got to work on a systematic exploration of that culture. The result is the book Poker Faces: The Life and Work of Professional Card Players.
Poker Faces is unlike any other poker book I’ve ever read. This is neither a guide on how to win at the tables, nor is it a collection of stories or examination of the colorful characters that inhabit the places where poker is played. This is a scholarly work, exploring the types of people who regularly inhabit California card rooms. While it does not require an advanced degree in the social sciences to understand this book, it is not light reading either. Poker Faces is aimed at a narrower audience than the average “How to Win Huge at Poker” treatise.
While the book is focused on “professional” poker players, it is difficult to objectively judge who fits this categorization and who doesn’t. This is a pitfall the author understands well, but the classification of professional in this book is largely one of self-selection, and perhaps “card room …