270 - Special Session. Guns: Sociological Approaches to an American Problem

Session Submission Type: Invited Session

Abstract

With more guns circulating in private hands than any other industrialized country, guns are a critical feature of American life. The purpose of this session is to bring together some leading scholars to examine various ways that guns shape the American experience, and by extension, the different ways that people experience guns. Each of the presenters examines a different aspect of how guns shape American life -- from their place in familial relations, to how class and race inform gun politics, to the circulation of guns in the underground economy, to the experiences of shooting victims. This broad framing seeks to capture the significant ways that legal and illegal guns as well as legitimate and illegitimate gun use permeates American life and to see a range of sociological approaches to the topic.

Sub Unit

• Special Sessions

Session Organizer

• Harel Shapira, University of Texas-Austin

Presider

• Harel Shapira, University of Texas-Austin

Individual Presentations

• Strange Bedfellows, Usual Suspects: How Race, Class and Gender Shape American Gun Politics - Jennifer Carlson, University of Toronto

• Near Death: Surviving Traumatic Gun Violence - Jooyoung Kim Lee, University of Toronto

• Guns, Men, and Intimacy - Michael A. Messner, University of Southern California

• The Underground Market for Guns - Sudhir A. Venkatesh, Columbia University

Discussant

• Harel Shapira, University of Texas-Austin