Gun Rights Activists and the US Culture War: Embodied Fantasies of the Ethical Warrior in Contemporary Gun Culture

Gun Rights Activists and the US Culture War is a political anthropology book which explores how firearms can become associated with processes of identity formation, as well as acting as symbols of national belonging and embodied safety. In the years following Donald Trump’s election an increasingly polarised population is taking up arms against each other more often than ever before. Based on 12 months of participant observation at gun ranges, activist meetings, handgun courses, and political events, as well as interviews with gun rights activists in San Diego County, this book argues that US conservative identity is saturated with concerns about ethics, gender, and who can wield violence legitimately. The book focuses on two gun rights organisations; the first a conservative, predominantly white and male political action committee; the second a pro-LGBTQ+ firearms training group run by trans women. This book demonstrates how gun ownership gives Americans the perceived means to enact their political will through the threat of, or actual, organized violence, and that this perceived capacity explains why guns remain objects that continue to inspire such devotion and debate. Gun Rights Activists and the US Culture War will be of interest to scholars and students in anthropology, gender studies, ethnic studies, sociology, and politics, as well as a general audience of narrative non-fiction readers.