Illinois Authors

Looking at America from the floor of a gun show, Gun Show Nation answers the question posed by Michael Moore's hit documentary film Bowling for Columbine: why are Americans so obsessed with guns? And what can be done about it? Gun Show Nation goes beyond the issues of handgun bans and child-safety locks to delve into what the author sees as the heart of the matter-that owning a gun has come to be seen as a fundamental right in our democracy. In a colorful tour of the nation's gun shows from Peoria to Reno, author Joan Burbick instantly takes note that mixed with the gun displays are political pamphlets, Second Amendment treatises, and patriotic literature, and that the men in front of the gun racks are as eager to talk about politics as they are to sell their wares. What Burbick discovers is that America is not merely armed to the teeth - America has a gun culture. From interviews at shooting ranges, the NRA's annual convention, and behind closed doors with gun rights strategists, Burbick offers the most thorough account yet of the beliefs that millions of ordinary Americans hold about guns. Gun ownership, Burbick argues, is now seen as a patriotic act, and is closely allied with the most conservative ideals in American politics. Burbick's fascinating conclusions bear directly on gun debates, yet point to much more difficult and fundamental solutions. Sure to be the subject of intense discussion, Gun Show Nation is a landmark of historical and cultural reporting.--Jacket.

"The creation of an American national culture in the nineteenth century coincided with a common belief that the emerging nation was diseased and in need of healing. Reading nineteenth-century narratives of health by a wide variety of authors, Burbick exposes the fears and conflicts underlying the creation of an American national culture. In studying these narratives of the body, this pioneering and comprehensive work concludes that a fundamental uneasiness about democracy may result in a collective, willful effort to control the body trope as a means of composing social order." -- Publisher website.

Public Affairs, New York : ©2002.

Public Affairs, New York : ©2002.

Uses stories and interviews to provide a glimpse into the history and lives of past and present "sweethearts of the rodeo."

University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia : ©1987.