At some point the American West became Disneyfied and I presume it began with Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. I'm looking specifically for books about Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, and generally about similar phenomena in that time period: commercialization, showmanship, Disneyfication.
I ask this question because I think there is something poignantly sad about Sitting Bull selling out by joining the Wild West Show. As if that was a sort of end to the raw America and the beginning of something less authentic. I wonder if that phenomenon has been recognized and written about by historians, either specifically in the context of the Wild West Show or other subjects, or more generally about the nation as a whole. My whole conception is half-baked and therefore probably inaccurate, do you know of any history books that will illuminate, validate, clarify, explain, or refine my vague notion?
This book, "Native Performers in Wild West Shows", kind of counters your feeling (the common suspicion I'd think) that Native Americans were exploited etc. (maybe that's not exactly what you meant to say, but it counters the idea that their taking part in it is sad or poignant). It focuses on the Native performers, as the title would suggest, and it really tries to show their side of the whole Wild West Shows-story from Buffalo Bill up to present-day Disney shows.
On the other hand, this book, named simply "Wild West Shows" by Paul Reddin, examines the rise and fall of Wild West Shows and the image they created of the Wild West: "Wild West shows [like the Miller Brothers] presented highly selective and subjective representations of the West and its people." I think it fits your request perfectly, but it only covers the subject until the 1930s.
"Showmen considered key cultural issues, such as progress, violence, the value of wilderness, depictions of Plains people as heroic, and gender and race issues. Put simply, to sell tickets the shows had to entertain and edify in ways acceptable to most Americans."