2017 was a terrific year for my research on American gun culture. I didn’t accomplish everything I had hoped, but I did more than I could reasonably expect. Although I didn’t quite reach my goal of doubling this blog’s readership in 2017, I came pretty close. I have already written about my personal favorites and …
Last fall I was invited to contribute a short essay to the newsletter of the Medical Sociology section of the American Sociological Association. The editors asked me to write anything I wanted to about guns that would be helpful to medical sociologists studying the issue. While some sociologists call for a shift in the national …
I am very happy to report that my second academic article on gun culture was published today in the journal Sociology Compass (my first was on religion and gun ownership). Thanks to a generous grant from Wake Forest University’s ZSR Library and the Office of Research & Sponsored Programs, “The Sociology of U.S. Gun Culture” …
I love whisk(e)y. My love knows almost no boundaries. American, Canadian, Indian, Irish, Japanese, Scotch, Texas. Barley, corn, rye, wheat. Neat, rocks, mixed. To fuel my love I have been reading Reid Mitenbuler’s recent book, Bourbon Empire: The Past and Future of America’s Whiskey. Early on, Mitenbuler introduces the first alcohol distiller among the British …
I recently completed the Massad Ayoob Group’s MAG-40 course, “Armed Citizens’ Rules of Engagement,” co-sponsored by Derby Guns of Scottsdale (shout out to Kate and Jim Kreuger!). This is the course Ayoob used to teach under the auspices of the Lethal Force Institute in New Hampshire. (A review of the LFI course written in 1999 …
For the first 42 years of life, I had never even handled a real gun, much less shot one. My experience was limited to shooting BB guns as a teenagers. We would usually shoot at cans, but one day I took aim at a bird that was too far away to hit, pulled the trigger, …
I got into gun culture, personally and professionally, not long before Sandy Hook. Hence, not long before Wayne LaPierre’s post-Sandy Hook sound bite, “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun” (all italics in the original text). Ignoring the appropriately criticized “only,” I have often … Continue reading
Although the entire premise of this blog and my research on Gun Culture 2.0 more generally is that self-defense and concealed carry have been become the core of American gun culture, I do recognize that self-defense and concealed carry have always been a part of American gun culture. Even in the late 18th and early … Continue reading
I had the opportunity recently to review historian Clayton Cramer’s new book, Lock, stock, and barrel: The origins of American gun culture (Praeger, 2018), for CHOICE, a monthly publication of the Association of College & Research Libraries designed to help librarians decide which books to add to their collections. My overall evaluation is that this … Continue reading
Although I have been on a bit of a writing hiatus this summer, owing to my racket stringing side hustle and moving to a new house, I have continued my travels through American gun culture. On a sojourn to Texas in August, I spoke to the director of training at a large gun range. At … Continue reading
Sociologists are “my people,” but when sociologists talk about guns and gun culture, I often feel a profound disconnect from my own experience with and understanding of the same. At a special session on religion and guns/gun culture today at the annual meeting of the Association for the Sociology of Religion in Philadelphia, one of … Continue reading
Quote from opening statement by Jonathan Metzl, organizer of a session on “Gun’s and Violence in Trump’s America” at annual meeting of the American Sociological Association in Philadelphia. Sometimes social scientists studying guns (accidentally?) say what they really think. Continue reading
I had not heard the story of the Florida man (or is it another case of #FloridaMan?) who died in Queens recently after being punched in the head. At least not until his alleged assailant was identified as an assistant basketball coach at my school, Wake Forest University. Somehow in response to drunken Florida Man … Continue reading
