Abigail A. Kohn
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195150513
- eISBN:
- 9780199944095
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195150513.003.0015
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture, Sport and Leisure
This chapter discusses the role of cowboy lawmen in gun culture in the U.S. It explains that Americans have long romanticized the American West and the frontier as places that forged some of the most ...
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This chapter discusses the role of cowboy lawmen in gun culture in the U.S. It explains that Americans have long romanticized the American West and the frontier as places that forged some of the most legendary heroes of American history. These heroes were the gun-toting cowboy lawmen. This chapter suggests that cowboy action shooting dramatizes the central theme of American mythic history: that American identity was reborn and remade through violent conflict, and it contributes to the ritual enactment to this legendary time in American history.Less
This chapter discusses the role of cowboy lawmen in gun culture in the U.S. It explains that Americans have long romanticized the American West and the frontier as places that forged some of the most legendary heroes of American history. These heroes were the gun-toting cowboy lawmen. This chapter suggests that cowboy action shooting dramatizes the central theme of American mythic history: that American identity was reborn and remade through violent conflict, and it contributes to the ritual enactment to this legendary time in American history.
Martin Ceadel
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199571161
- eISBN:
- 9780191721762
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199571161.003.0010
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Theory, International Relations and Politics
This chapter notes the efforts of his family to keep his memory alive, sums up the main revelations of the biography, and shows how many of Angell's strengths and weaknesses were path dependent–that ...
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This chapter notes the efforts of his family to keep his memory alive, sums up the main revelations of the biography, and shows how many of Angell's strengths and weaknesses were path dependent–that is, determined by his early experiences.Less
This chapter notes the efforts of his family to keep his memory alive, sums up the main revelations of the biography, and shows how many of Angell's strengths and weaknesses were path dependent–that is, determined by his early experiences.
Joe Truett
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520258396
- eISBN:
- 9780520944527
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520258396.001.0001
- Subject:
- Biology, Ecology
Part autobiography, part philosophical rumination, this conservation odyssey explores the deep affinities between humans and our original habitat: grasslands. The book traces the evolutionary, ...
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Part autobiography, part philosophical rumination, this conservation odyssey explores the deep affinities between humans and our original habitat: grasslands. The book traces the evolutionary, historical, and cultural forces that have reshaped North American rangelands over the past two centuries. It introduces an intriguing cast of characters—wildlife and grasslands biologists, archaeologists, ranchers, and petroleum geologists—to illuminate a wide range of related topics: our love affair with turf and how it manifests in lawns and sports, the ecological and economic dimensions of ranching, the glory of cowboy culture, grasslands and restoration ecology, and more. This book ultimately provides the background against which we can envision a new paradigm for restoring rangeland ecosystems—and a new paradigm for envisioning a more sustainable future.Less
Part autobiography, part philosophical rumination, this conservation odyssey explores the deep affinities between humans and our original habitat: grasslands. The book traces the evolutionary, historical, and cultural forces that have reshaped North American rangelands over the past two centuries. It introduces an intriguing cast of characters—wildlife and grasslands biologists, archaeologists, ranchers, and petroleum geologists—to illuminate a wide range of related topics: our love affair with turf and how it manifests in lawns and sports, the ecological and economic dimensions of ranching, the glory of cowboy culture, grasslands and restoration ecology, and more. This book ultimately provides the background against which we can envision a new paradigm for restoring rangeland ecosystems—and a new paradigm for envisioning a more sustainable future.
Gary Needham
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748633821
- eISBN:
- 9780748651252
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633821.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Upon its release in 2005, Brokeback Mountain became a major cultural event and a milestone in independent American filmmaking. Based on the short story by Annie Proulx and directed by Ang Lee, it ...
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Upon its release in 2005, Brokeback Mountain became a major cultural event and a milestone in independent American filmmaking. Based on the short story by Annie Proulx and directed by Ang Lee, it situated a love story between two closeted cowboys at the heart of American mythology, film spectatorship, and genre. Brokeback Mountain offered an independent and queer revision of the conventions and clichés of the Western and the melodrama through a studied exploration of homophobia and the closet. This book examines the film in relation to indie cinema, genre, spectatorship, editing and homosexuality. In doing so it brings film studies and queer theory into dialogue with one another and explains the importance of Brokeback Mountain as both a contemporary independent and queer film. The book provides an overview of Focus Features as a hybrid company operating across both the mainstream and independent cinema sectors, and proposes a new way of thinking about gay spectatorship that takes into account how editing and cruising relate to one another.Less
Upon its release in 2005, Brokeback Mountain became a major cultural event and a milestone in independent American filmmaking. Based on the short story by Annie Proulx and directed by Ang Lee, it situated a love story between two closeted cowboys at the heart of American mythology, film spectatorship, and genre. Brokeback Mountain offered an independent and queer revision of the conventions and clichés of the Western and the melodrama through a studied exploration of homophobia and the closet. This book examines the film in relation to indie cinema, genre, spectatorship, editing and homosexuality. In doing so it brings film studies and queer theory into dialogue with one another and explains the importance of Brokeback Mountain as both a contemporary independent and queer film. The book provides an overview of Focus Features as a hybrid company operating across both the mainstream and independent cinema sectors, and proposes a new way of thinking about gay spectatorship that takes into account how editing and cruising relate to one another.
Amanda Porterfield
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195131376
- eISBN:
- 9780199834570
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195131371.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
Disillusion with American culture became widespread during the Vietnam War as protesters condemned the immorality of the war and the military industrial establishment that supported it, and ...
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Disillusion with American culture became widespread during the Vietnam War as protesters condemned the immorality of the war and the military industrial establishment that supported it, and supporters of the war condemned the protesters. A sense of moral and spiritual disenchantment accompanied these culture wars, along with widespread criticism of American claims to being a nation chosen by God. In addition to describing the end of “victory culture,” and the dismantling of stereotypical distinctions between good cowboys and bad Indians, this chapter points to the important contributions made to American society by the civil rights movement. This discussion of civil rights focuses on the influence of the school of religious thought known as personalism on Martin Luther King Jr. and its linkages to long‐standing American trends of religious individualism.Less
Disillusion with American culture became widespread during the Vietnam War as protesters condemned the immorality of the war and the military industrial establishment that supported it, and supporters of the war condemned the protesters. A sense of moral and spiritual disenchantment accompanied these culture wars, along with widespread criticism of American claims to being a nation chosen by God. In addition to describing the end of “victory culture,” and the dismantling of stereotypical distinctions between good cowboys and bad Indians, this chapter points to the important contributions made to American society by the civil rights movement. This discussion of civil rights focuses on the influence of the school of religious thought known as personalism on Martin Luther King Jr. and its linkages to long‐standing American trends of religious individualism.
Zoltan J. Acs
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691148625
- eISBN:
- 9781400846818
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691148625.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Public Policy
This chapter examines entrepreneurship and innovation as fundamental elements of American-style capitalism. It first provides a historical background on how America got to an era of cowboy capitalism ...
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This chapter examines entrepreneurship and innovation as fundamental elements of American-style capitalism. It first provides a historical background on how America got to an era of cowboy capitalism before discussing how the American economy evolved after the settlement of the western frontier. The major changes moved in the direction of large industrial processes and an attitude that, among firms, bigger is better; this period is known as the managerial economy, which lasted through the 1970s. The chapter also considers why the information technology revolution happened in America and concludes with an assessment of whether the past three decades really is a new era of cowboy capitalism—a shift from the managerial economy that dominated for most of the twentieth century to a renewed entrepreneurial economy.Less
This chapter examines entrepreneurship and innovation as fundamental elements of American-style capitalism. It first provides a historical background on how America got to an era of cowboy capitalism before discussing how the American economy evolved after the settlement of the western frontier. The major changes moved in the direction of large industrial processes and an attitude that, among firms, bigger is better; this period is known as the managerial economy, which lasted through the 1970s. The chapter also considers why the information technology revolution happened in America and concludes with an assessment of whether the past three decades really is a new era of cowboy capitalism—a shift from the managerial economy that dominated for most of the twentieth century to a renewed entrepreneurial economy.
Anthony Harkins
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195189506
- eISBN:
- 9780199788835
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195189506.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
This chapter examines the role of “hillbilly” in commercially recorded rural white music, by the early 1930s commonly (although often disparagingly) labeled “hillbilly music”. The hillbilly image in ...
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This chapter examines the role of “hillbilly” in commercially recorded rural white music, by the early 1930s commonly (although often disparagingly) labeled “hillbilly music”. The hillbilly image in country music was both a fabrication of music industry producers and promoters, and an outgrowth of farcical performances by folk musicians. The hillbilly label and image was accepted by most musicians of the 1920s and early 1930s because it partially evoked a nostalgic sense of a mythic mountaineer. By the late 1930s, however, the growing power of a derisive hillbilly stereotype led musicians and the burgeoning country music industry increasingly to embrace the more unambiguously positive cowboy image and the less stigmatized term “country”. Nonetheless, as “hillbilly” and string-band music became interwoven in the popular imagination, its meaning shifted from one denoting only threat and violence to one that primarily signified low humor and carefree frivolity.Less
This chapter examines the role of “hillbilly” in commercially recorded rural white music, by the early 1930s commonly (although often disparagingly) labeled “hillbilly music”. The hillbilly image in country music was both a fabrication of music industry producers and promoters, and an outgrowth of farcical performances by folk musicians. The hillbilly label and image was accepted by most musicians of the 1920s and early 1930s because it partially evoked a nostalgic sense of a mythic mountaineer. By the late 1930s, however, the growing power of a derisive hillbilly stereotype led musicians and the burgeoning country music industry increasingly to embrace the more unambiguously positive cowboy image and the less stigmatized term “country”. Nonetheless, as “hillbilly” and string-band music became interwoven in the popular imagination, its meaning shifted from one denoting only threat and violence to one that primarily signified low humor and carefree frivolity.
Abigail A. Kohn
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195150513
- eISBN:
- 9780199944095
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195150513.003.0012
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture, Sport and Leisure
This chapter describes the sport of cowboy action shooting, the gun sport that most explicitly dramatizes the narrative of American Frontier history. It explains that this sport is conducted in a ...
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This chapter describes the sport of cowboy action shooting, the gun sport that most explicitly dramatizes the narrative of American Frontier history. It explains that this sport is conducted in a venue that ostensibly gave birth to images of traditional American gender roles and forms of Frontier-oriented entertainment. It argues that cowboy action shooting presents a vision of the American Frontier in which white, middle-class good guys can create small, self-contained communities based on shared values and lifestyles. It describes cowboy shoots governed by the Single Action Shooting Society (SASS).Less
This chapter describes the sport of cowboy action shooting, the gun sport that most explicitly dramatizes the narrative of American Frontier history. It explains that this sport is conducted in a venue that ostensibly gave birth to images of traditional American gender roles and forms of Frontier-oriented entertainment. It argues that cowboy action shooting presents a vision of the American Frontier in which white, middle-class good guys can create small, self-contained communities based on shared values and lifestyles. It describes cowboy shoots governed by the Single Action Shooting Society (SASS).
Hiram Perez
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479818655
- eISBN:
- 9781479846757
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479818655.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Gay and Lesbian Studies
A Taste for Brown Bodies asks what difference race makes in the emergence of gay modernity. The book examines how the romanticization of the “brown body” continues to shape modern gay sensibilities, ...
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A Taste for Brown Bodies asks what difference race makes in the emergence of gay modernity. The book examines how the romanticization of the “brown body” continues to shape modern gay sensibilities, tracing that brown body to the nostalgic imagination of gay cosmopolitanism. In so doing, the book looks in particular to the queer masculinities of three figures: the sailor, the soldier, and the cowboy, themselves proletariat cosmopolitans of sorts. All three of these figures have functioned, officially and unofficially, as cosmopolitan extensions of the US nation-state and as agents for the expansion of its borders and neocolonial zones of influence. The book considers not only how US imperialist expansion was realized but also how it was visualized for and through gay men. US empire not only makes possible certain articulations of gay modernity but also instrumentalizes them. The book argues that certain practices and subjectivities understood historically as forms of homosexuality are regulated and normalized in their service to US empire. By means of an analysis of literature, film, and photographs from the 19th to the 21st centuries—including Herman Melville’s Billy Budd, Annie Proulx’s “Brokeback Mountain,” and photos of abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison—the book proposes that modern gay male identity, often traced to late Victorian constructions of “invert” and “homosexual,” occupies not the periphery of the nation but rather a cosmopolitan position, instrumental to projects of war, colonialism, and neoliberalism.Less
A Taste for Brown Bodies asks what difference race makes in the emergence of gay modernity. The book examines how the romanticization of the “brown body” continues to shape modern gay sensibilities, tracing that brown body to the nostalgic imagination of gay cosmopolitanism. In so doing, the book looks in particular to the queer masculinities of three figures: the sailor, the soldier, and the cowboy, themselves proletariat cosmopolitans of sorts. All three of these figures have functioned, officially and unofficially, as cosmopolitan extensions of the US nation-state and as agents for the expansion of its borders and neocolonial zones of influence. The book considers not only how US imperialist expansion was realized but also how it was visualized for and through gay men. US empire not only makes possible certain articulations of gay modernity but also instrumentalizes them. The book argues that certain practices and subjectivities understood historically as forms of homosexuality are regulated and normalized in their service to US empire. By means of an analysis of literature, film, and photographs from the 19th to the 21st centuries—including Herman Melville’s Billy Budd, Annie Proulx’s “Brokeback Mountain,” and photos of abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison—the book proposes that modern gay male identity, often traced to late Victorian constructions of “invert” and “homosexual,” occupies not the periphery of the nation but rather a cosmopolitan position, instrumental to projects of war, colonialism, and neoliberalism.
Karla A. Erickson
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604732061
- eISBN:
- 9781604733464
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604732061.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Occupations, Professions, and Work
At a Tex-Mex restaurant in a Minneapolis suburb, customers send Christmas and Hanukkah cards to the restaurant, bring in home-baked treats for the staff, and attend the annual employee party. One ...
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At a Tex-Mex restaurant in a Minneapolis suburb, customers send Christmas and Hanukkah cards to the restaurant, bring in home-baked treats for the staff, and attend the annual employee party. One customer even posts in the entryway a sign commemorating the life of his dog. Diners and servers alike use the Hungry Cowboy as a place to gather, celebrate, relax, and even mourn. Moments such as these fascinate the author of this book, who worked for the restaurant. Weaving together narratives from servers, customers, and managers, the book explores a type of service work that is deeply embedded in personal relationships and community. Feelings, play, and emotions are inseparable from the market transactions within the restaurant. Based on extensive interviews and two years of working as a waitress, the book provides insights into the ways that people make contact in our society and how they build on the fleeting connections in the service exchange to form more intimate relationships.Less
At a Tex-Mex restaurant in a Minneapolis suburb, customers send Christmas and Hanukkah cards to the restaurant, bring in home-baked treats for the staff, and attend the annual employee party. One customer even posts in the entryway a sign commemorating the life of his dog. Diners and servers alike use the Hungry Cowboy as a place to gather, celebrate, relax, and even mourn. Moments such as these fascinate the author of this book, who worked for the restaurant. Weaving together narratives from servers, customers, and managers, the book explores a type of service work that is deeply embedded in personal relationships and community. Feelings, play, and emotions are inseparable from the market transactions within the restaurant. Based on extensive interviews and two years of working as a waitress, the book provides insights into the ways that people make contact in our society and how they build on the fleeting connections in the service exchange to form more intimate relationships.
Hiram Pérez
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479818655
- eISBN:
- 9781479846757
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479818655.003.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Gay and Lesbian Studies
Rather than imagining the late Victorian invention of homosexuality as a moment of singular and absolute abjection, the introduction posits the homosexual as a modern agent of neocolonial expansion ...
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Rather than imagining the late Victorian invention of homosexuality as a moment of singular and absolute abjection, the introduction posits the homosexual as a modern agent of neocolonial expansion (the geographies of which are redefined by new visual and information technologies), instrumental both to modern nation-building and transnational flows of capital. A range of mobilities, transformed or generated by industrialization (i.e. class privilege, whiteness, transportation technology, mass media, tourism) and eventually post-industrial society (i.e. communications and information technologies), provide conditions for a cosmopolitan gay male subject. The introduction traces the foundations of gay modernity to gay cosmopolitanism, including the queer, proletarian cosmopolitanism of sailors, soldiers, and cowboys, interrogating how these three figures were deployed to sustain and expand U.S. empire. It is crucial to recover these unexpected routes of queer cosmopolitanism in order to appreciate the links between gay modernity and imperialism.Less
Rather than imagining the late Victorian invention of homosexuality as a moment of singular and absolute abjection, the introduction posits the homosexual as a modern agent of neocolonial expansion (the geographies of which are redefined by new visual and information technologies), instrumental both to modern nation-building and transnational flows of capital. A range of mobilities, transformed or generated by industrialization (i.e. class privilege, whiteness, transportation technology, mass media, tourism) and eventually post-industrial society (i.e. communications and information technologies), provide conditions for a cosmopolitan gay male subject. The introduction traces the foundations of gay modernity to gay cosmopolitanism, including the queer, proletarian cosmopolitanism of sailors, soldiers, and cowboys, interrogating how these three figures were deployed to sustain and expand U.S. empire. It is crucial to recover these unexpected routes of queer cosmopolitanism in order to appreciate the links between gay modernity and imperialism.
Hiram Pérez
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479818655
- eISBN:
- 9781479846757
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479818655.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Gay and Lesbian Studies
Reviewing what became a common critical response to Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain (2005) as "not a gay movie," this chapter contests the prevailing reading of Ennis Del Mar as repressed homosexual, ...
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Reviewing what became a common critical response to Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain (2005) as "not a gay movie," this chapter contests the prevailing reading of Ennis Del Mar as repressed homosexual, inviting his difference to help open both "gay" and "queer" to new narratives. Ennis's queerness is concentrated unexpectedly in a cowboy ethic; because nationally that ethic is memorialized as heroically masculine, its queerness has dissipated from legend. This chapter restores the queer in cowboy, insisting that we situate Ennis close to home (Wyoming, ranch labor, rural) in order to appreciate his difference. Hence, the chapter challenges a metanarrative for modern gay identity largely founded on migration to metropolitan locales and on gay cosmopolitanism. In contrast to most readings, the chapter uses both Annie Proulx’s story and Lee’s adaptation to critique gay assimilationism and contemporary neoliberal (“homonormative”) gay and lesbian politics.Less
Reviewing what became a common critical response to Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain (2005) as "not a gay movie," this chapter contests the prevailing reading of Ennis Del Mar as repressed homosexual, inviting his difference to help open both "gay" and "queer" to new narratives. Ennis's queerness is concentrated unexpectedly in a cowboy ethic; because nationally that ethic is memorialized as heroically masculine, its queerness has dissipated from legend. This chapter restores the queer in cowboy, insisting that we situate Ennis close to home (Wyoming, ranch labor, rural) in order to appreciate his difference. Hence, the chapter challenges a metanarrative for modern gay identity largely founded on migration to metropolitan locales and on gay cosmopolitanism. In contrast to most readings, the chapter uses both Annie Proulx’s story and Lee’s adaptation to critique gay assimilationism and contemporary neoliberal (“homonormative”) gay and lesbian politics.
Jacqueline M. Moore
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814757390
- eISBN:
- 9780814759844
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814757390.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: early to 18th Century
Cowboys are an American legend, but despite ubiquity in history and popular culture, misperceptions abound. Technically, a cowboy worked with cattle, as a ranch hand, while his boss, the cattleman, ...
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Cowboys are an American legend, but despite ubiquity in history and popular culture, misperceptions abound. Technically, a cowboy worked with cattle, as a ranch hand, while his boss, the cattleman, owned the ranch. This book casts aside romantic and one-dimensional images of cowboys by analyzing the class, gender, and labor histories of ranching in Texas during the second half of the nineteenth century. As working-class men, cowboys showed their masculinity through their skills at work as well as public displays in town. But what cowboys thought was manly behavior did not always match those ideas of the business-minded cattlemen, who largely absorbed middle-class masculine ideals of restraint. Real men, by these standards, had self-mastery over their impulses and didn't fight, drink, gamble, or consort with “unsavory” women. The book explores how, in contrast to the mythic image, from the late 1870s on, as the Texas frontier became more settled and the open range disappeared, the real cowboys faced increasing demands from the people around them to rein in the very traits that Americans considered the most masculine.Less
Cowboys are an American legend, but despite ubiquity in history and popular culture, misperceptions abound. Technically, a cowboy worked with cattle, as a ranch hand, while his boss, the cattleman, owned the ranch. This book casts aside romantic and one-dimensional images of cowboys by analyzing the class, gender, and labor histories of ranching in Texas during the second half of the nineteenth century. As working-class men, cowboys showed their masculinity through their skills at work as well as public displays in town. But what cowboys thought was manly behavior did not always match those ideas of the business-minded cattlemen, who largely absorbed middle-class masculine ideals of restraint. Real men, by these standards, had self-mastery over their impulses and didn't fight, drink, gamble, or consort with “unsavory” women. The book explores how, in contrast to the mythic image, from the late 1870s on, as the Texas frontier became more settled and the open range disappeared, the real cowboys faced increasing demands from the people around them to rein in the very traits that Americans considered the most masculine.
Timothy E. Wise
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781496805805
- eISBN:
- 9781496805843
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781496805805.003.0007
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This chapter is concerned with the role yodeling played in mass media constructions of the fictional cowboy in the early twentieth century. With the emphasis on semiotics and musical connotation, it ...
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This chapter is concerned with the role yodeling played in mass media constructions of the fictional cowboy in the early twentieth century. With the emphasis on semiotics and musical connotation, it examines the relationship of yodeling to the attributes of the idealized cowboy in a mythic American West as presented on radio and in film. It relates elements of the cowboy construct, for example bravado and braggadocio, to the specific features of the yodeling heard in the recordings, such as speed and virtuosity. Also considered is the emergence of singing cowgirls, whose themes and styles contrast with those of their male counterparts. Using Wilf Carter as a paradigm for cowboy-style yodeling, the discussion extends to Elton Britt, Slim Whitman, Patsy Montana, harmony yodeling, the Girls of the Golden West, and the DeZurik Sisters, among others. The musical features characterizing cowboy yodeling styles are differentiated from those of hillbilly yodeling styles.Less
This chapter is concerned with the role yodeling played in mass media constructions of the fictional cowboy in the early twentieth century. With the emphasis on semiotics and musical connotation, it examines the relationship of yodeling to the attributes of the idealized cowboy in a mythic American West as presented on radio and in film. It relates elements of the cowboy construct, for example bravado and braggadocio, to the specific features of the yodeling heard in the recordings, such as speed and virtuosity. Also considered is the emergence of singing cowgirls, whose themes and styles contrast with those of their male counterparts. Using Wilf Carter as a paradigm for cowboy-style yodeling, the discussion extends to Elton Britt, Slim Whitman, Patsy Montana, harmony yodeling, the Girls of the Golden West, and the DeZurik Sisters, among others. The musical features characterizing cowboy yodeling styles are differentiated from those of hillbilly yodeling styles.
Eileen Boris
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520098701
- eISBN:
- 9780520943797
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520098701.003.0008
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
Heroic symbolisms and gender bias have always afflicted politics. This chapter describes the representation of two cultural and political archetypes that inhabits the American political landscape—the ...
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Heroic symbolisms and gender bias have always afflicted politics. This chapter describes the representation of two cultural and political archetypes that inhabits the American political landscape—the cowboy and the welfare queen, which are simultaneously gendered and racialized. The cowboy iconography is recognized for good or ill, displaying characteristics associated with a mythic American heroic figure that tames the wilderness and crusades against outlaws. The welfare queen, in contrast, was a label that detractors gave to poor women, undeservedly growing fat off of government largesse. These represented constructions are the symbols of nation and anti-nation. The chapter sketches the expedition of these icons throughout the political history of America from the tenure of Lyndon Baines Johnson. Such representations had signaled national longings and fears for more than a century. The 2008 presidential election both reflected these icons and upended them with the distinctively non-cowboy persona of Barack Obama.Less
Heroic symbolisms and gender bias have always afflicted politics. This chapter describes the representation of two cultural and political archetypes that inhabits the American political landscape—the cowboy and the welfare queen, which are simultaneously gendered and racialized. The cowboy iconography is recognized for good or ill, displaying characteristics associated with a mythic American heroic figure that tames the wilderness and crusades against outlaws. The welfare queen, in contrast, was a label that detractors gave to poor women, undeservedly growing fat off of government largesse. These represented constructions are the symbols of nation and anti-nation. The chapter sketches the expedition of these icons throughout the political history of America from the tenure of Lyndon Baines Johnson. Such representations had signaled national longings and fears for more than a century. The 2008 presidential election both reflected these icons and upended them with the distinctively non-cowboy persona of Barack Obama.
Clifford R. Murphy
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252038679
- eISBN:
- 9780252096617
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252038679.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
Merging scholarly insight with a professional guitarist's keen sense of the musical life, this book delves into the rich tradition of country and western music that is played and loved in the mill ...
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Merging scholarly insight with a professional guitarist's keen sense of the musical life, this book delves into the rich tradition of country and western music that is played and loved in the mill towns and cities of the American northeast. The book draws on a wealth of ethnographic material, interviews, and encounters with recorded and live music to reveal the central role of country and western in the social lives and musical activity of working-class New Englanders. As the book shows, an extraordinary multiculturalism informed by New England's kaleidoscope of ethnic groups created a distinctive country and western music style. But the music also gave—and gives—voice to working-class feeling. Yankee country and western emphasizes the western, reflecting the longing for the mythical cowboy's life of rugged but fulfilling individualism. Indeed, many New Englanders use country and western to comment on economic disenfranchisement and express their resentment of a mass media, government, and Nashville music establishment they believe neither reflects nor understands their life experiences.Less
Merging scholarly insight with a professional guitarist's keen sense of the musical life, this book delves into the rich tradition of country and western music that is played and loved in the mill towns and cities of the American northeast. The book draws on a wealth of ethnographic material, interviews, and encounters with recorded and live music to reveal the central role of country and western in the social lives and musical activity of working-class New Englanders. As the book shows, an extraordinary multiculturalism informed by New England's kaleidoscope of ethnic groups created a distinctive country and western music style. But the music also gave—and gives—voice to working-class feeling. Yankee country and western emphasizes the western, reflecting the longing for the mythical cowboy's life of rugged but fulfilling individualism. Indeed, many New Englanders use country and western to comment on economic disenfranchisement and express their resentment of a mass media, government, and Nashville music establishment they believe neither reflects nor understands their life experiences.
Marie W. Dallam
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- December 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780190856564
- eISBN:
- 9780190856595
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190856564.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This book examines the long history of cowboy Christians in the American West, including the cowboy church movement of the present day and closely related ministries in racetrack and rodeo settings. ...
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This book examines the long history of cowboy Christians in the American West, including the cowboy church movement of the present day and closely related ministries in racetrack and rodeo settings. Early chapters move from the postbellum period through the twentieth century, tracing religious life among cowboys on the range as well as projected in popular imagery and the media. The central chapters focus on the modern cowboy church and examine its structure, theology, and method of perpetuation, as well as exploring future challenges the institution may face, such as its relegation of women to subordinate participant roles. The final chapter considers present-day incarnations of rodeo and racetrack ministries as examples of the cowboy Christian proclivity for blending the secular and the sacred in leisure environments. Woven throughout the text is a discussion of the religious significance of the cowboy church movement, particularly relative to twenty-first century evangelical Protestantism. The author demonstrates that its antecedents and influences include muscular Christianity, the Jesus movement, and new paradigm church methodology. With interdisciplinary research that blends history and sociology, the text draws on interviews with leaders from cowboy churches, traveling rodeo ministries, and chaplains who serve horse racing and bull riding environments, as well as incorporating the author’s own experiences as a participant observer.Less
This book examines the long history of cowboy Christians in the American West, including the cowboy church movement of the present day and closely related ministries in racetrack and rodeo settings. Early chapters move from the postbellum period through the twentieth century, tracing religious life among cowboys on the range as well as projected in popular imagery and the media. The central chapters focus on the modern cowboy church and examine its structure, theology, and method of perpetuation, as well as exploring future challenges the institution may face, such as its relegation of women to subordinate participant roles. The final chapter considers present-day incarnations of rodeo and racetrack ministries as examples of the cowboy Christian proclivity for blending the secular and the sacred in leisure environments. Woven throughout the text is a discussion of the religious significance of the cowboy church movement, particularly relative to twenty-first century evangelical Protestantism. The author demonstrates that its antecedents and influences include muscular Christianity, the Jesus movement, and new paradigm church methodology. With interdisciplinary research that blends history and sociology, the text draws on interviews with leaders from cowboy churches, traveling rodeo ministries, and chaplains who serve horse racing and bull riding environments, as well as incorporating the author’s own experiences as a participant observer.
John Ryan Fischer
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781469625126
- eISBN:
- 9781469625140
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469625126.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, Environmental History
This chapter analyzes developments in native cattle cultures at the height of the hide and tallow trade. Early management of the feral herds depended on European and American bullock hunters. Around ...
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This chapter analyzes developments in native cattle cultures at the height of the hide and tallow trade. Early management of the feral herds depended on European and American bullock hunters. Around 1832, Hawaiian elites hired vaqueros from California to employ and teach a ranch style of herd management to better control and harvest goods from cattle on the island. California vaqueros and the newly trained Hawaiian paniolo labored with cattle within the European-controlled trade networks of the eastern Pacific. Meanwhile, California Indians outside this system still exploited the predominance of cattle on California’s rangelands through banditry.Less
This chapter analyzes developments in native cattle cultures at the height of the hide and tallow trade. Early management of the feral herds depended on European and American bullock hunters. Around 1832, Hawaiian elites hired vaqueros from California to employ and teach a ranch style of herd management to better control and harvest goods from cattle on the island. California vaqueros and the newly trained Hawaiian paniolo labored with cattle within the European-controlled trade networks of the eastern Pacific. Meanwhile, California Indians outside this system still exploited the predominance of cattle on California’s rangelands through banditry.
John Milward
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- January 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780252043918
- eISBN:
- 9780252052811
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5622/illinois/9780252043918.003.0013
- Subject:
- Music, Popular
This chapter discusses how the inspiration for Willie Nelson's career reinvention came from a song he had sung as a Fort Worth deejay in the 1950s and to his kids at bedtime, “Tale of the Red Headed ...
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This chapter discusses how the inspiration for Willie Nelson's career reinvention came from a song he had sung as a Fort Worth deejay in the 1950s and to his kids at bedtime, “Tale of the Red Headed Stranger.” Nelson fleshed out the story of the enigmatic cowboy and his black steed with original songs (“Time of the Preacher”) and covers of Eddy Arnold's “I Couldn't Believe It Was True” and “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.” Red Headed Stranger (1975) became both a cultural signifier and a commercial smash, with “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” Nelson's first number-1 country hit. The country music maverick had hit the big time with an Americana concept album that felt familiar to anyone who had grown up watching cowboys at the movies and on television. It was the mainstream success of Red Headed Stranger that ensured a long and profitable run on the concert circuit; along the way, Nelson would release a steady stream of albums that ranged from the artistically inspired to the amiably workmanlike.Less
This chapter discusses how the inspiration for Willie Nelson's career reinvention came from a song he had sung as a Fort Worth deejay in the 1950s and to his kids at bedtime, “Tale of the Red Headed Stranger.” Nelson fleshed out the story of the enigmatic cowboy and his black steed with original songs (“Time of the Preacher”) and covers of Eddy Arnold's “I Couldn't Believe It Was True” and “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.” Red Headed Stranger (1975) became both a cultural signifier and a commercial smash, with “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” Nelson's first number-1 country hit. The country music maverick had hit the big time with an Americana concept album that felt familiar to anyone who had grown up watching cowboys at the movies and on television. It was the mainstream success of Red Headed Stranger that ensured a long and profitable run on the concert circuit; along the way, Nelson would release a steady stream of albums that ranged from the artistically inspired to the amiably workmanlike.
Beth Levy
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520267763
- eISBN:
- 9780520952027
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520267763.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
This is an exploration of how the American West, both as physical space and inspiration, animated American music. Examining the work of such composers as Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Virgil Thomson, ...
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This is an exploration of how the American West, both as physical space and inspiration, animated American music. Examining the work of such composers as Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Virgil Thomson, Charles Wakefield Cadman, and Arthur Farwell, it addresses questions of regionalism, race, and representation, as well as changing relationships to the natural world, to highlight the intersections between classical music and the diverse worlds of Indians, pioneers, and cowboys. The author draws from an array of genres to show how different brands of western Americana were absorbed into American culture by way of sheet music, radio, lecture recitals, the concert hall, and film. The book is a comprehensive illumination of what the West meant and still means to composers living and writing long after the close of the frontier.Less
This is an exploration of how the American West, both as physical space and inspiration, animated American music. Examining the work of such composers as Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Virgil Thomson, Charles Wakefield Cadman, and Arthur Farwell, it addresses questions of regionalism, race, and representation, as well as changing relationships to the natural world, to highlight the intersections between classical music and the diverse worlds of Indians, pioneers, and cowboys. The author draws from an array of genres to show how different brands of western Americana were absorbed into American culture by way of sheet music, radio, lecture recitals, the concert hall, and film. The book is a comprehensive illumination of what the West meant and still means to composers living and writing long after the close of the frontier.
