[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.A historic epic emerged, one that celebrated the conquering of the West as a triumph of civilization over savagery, of whites over Indians, and of civilization over nature.12 The cowboywas the perfect hero for this particular vision, as his image was tightly linkedwith moral courage and lonely individualism, a hero who was destined to repeatedly save a society to which he would never quite belong.Although themythic stories embodied in movie westerns don t enjoy the tremendouspopularity that they did in the 1950s and 1960s, the cowboy himself remainsa powerful icon in American popular culture.One primary reason for the continued fascination with the mythic cowboy is that he never fully integrated himself with society, despite the inherently social tendency to serve that society and work with his peers.The cowboy thus embodied an interesting ability to mediate the tension betweenstark individualism and adherence to community, both in spirit and in ac-tuality.13 The cowboy s six-shooter came to embody his individualistic brandof justice, enabling him to shoot straighter and faster than others, encouraging the sense that even when he took the law into his own hands, he did sowith an unerring sense of virtue and righteousness.These values ostensiblyjustified his vigilante actions.14 Classic movie westerns reiterated this lessonat every turn: when the hero of High Noon, Sheriff Will Kane, returns totown to face his enemies, he does so not because his community asks him tobut because his pride and sense of duty demand it.15 Everybody knows thata bloody showdown between good and evil is the only ending to the storywhen the bad men come to town.Western Myths and Myths of the WestCowboys on the mythic Frontier, which was both a geographic place and anideological construct, have had tremendous impact on the development ofthe American national character and the imaginations and identities of the86 the meani ngs of guns citizenry.Two of the most famous contributors to both the Frontier and tocowboys (in myth and image) in the past two centuries were Frederick Jackson Turner, a historian and professor, and William Buffalo Bill Cody, apremiere entertainer of the Wild West.16 This unlikely duo presented twovery different images of the American Frontier during the late nineteenthcentury.Turner s image of the Frontier, which has been referred to as his Frontier thesis, presented a rather bucolic image of the taming of theAmerican Frontier.His heroes were farmers, always gendered as male, forging their way through the American wilderness, which took on a decidedlyEden-like cast, while American Indians watched quietly from the sidelines.Turner s argument helped foster the idea that a man was not born American.Rather, he became American through his action and his vigor, which proclaimed his new identity more loudly than any document or speech couldpossibly do.Europeans could become American by performing their Americanness, by this active and transformative process.17William Buffalo Bill Cody also recognized the importance of action andperformance as authentically American, action and performance in alltheir uses and meanings.Frontier history, as presented in Buffalo Bill Cody sWild West and Congress of Rough Riders, a historical reenactment androdeo show featuring authentic sharpshooters and cowboys, was aboutcombating wild animals and savage, menacing Indians.18 Buffalo Bill s Westteemed with people and ferocious wildlife, and his Frontier heroes were thehunters and cowboys, frontiersmen and scouts who combated their natural enemies and defeated them in literal and moral victories.The showturned the westering movement into a morality play: white frontiersmenrepresented the forces of good and civilization and Indians and a few errantWhite road agents symbolized evil and barbarism. 19 Once Cody s show hadrun its course, it was quickly replaced by the traveling rodeo, an equally dazzling opportunity for Americans to see examples of modern men who reflected western toughness, raw courage, and natural strength, living proofthat the pioneer spirit of the West remained intact. 20These two different images of the American Frontier in the nineteenthcentury, Turner s Frontier thesis and Cody s Wild West show, had wide appeal for Americans.Both explained the forging of an American identity inways that Americans understood and were already romanticizing.It wasan identity created out of the conquering of the American Frontier.Thiswas the time when particular constructions of masculinity, including physical strength, a willingness to confront and commit violence, and a stoicco wbo y l a wmen 87 resolve to push through and civilize the world, were highly valued commodities.While these characteristics were certainly employed in the service of theliteral conquest and settlement of the West, they took on their own mythicqualities as they were employed to convey the magnitude of the accomplishment of claiming the West.This was a West that demanded the authentic masculinity that middle-class Americans treasured, a far cry froman increasingly urban and industrialized East.This authentic masculinity found a distinctive home in the mythic West and came to signify an authentic American character in significant ways.In the early twentieth century, the West was understood as the great repository for the individualismand freedom already woven into the American ethos.Journalists and othercultural producers learned quickly that myths sold more easily than realitybecause myths informed Americans how to be Americans with far moreflair and color than any other kind of narratives possibly could.21 Thesemythic visions of the West also came during a time when Americans wereconcerned that the real West was closing, that the boundaries were nowvisible on what was first conceptualized as a boundless economic and phenomenological opportunity for growth and progress.How could progress,literal and metaphoric, be demonstrated with the closing of the Frontier?The answer is that Americans create new frontiers, in a variety of different ways.The Frontier, in myth and image, continues to serve as a powerfulmetaphor for American progress and entrepreneurial spirit, and as a symbol in the service of American industry and business.22 In the early and mid1990s, the nascent information technology industry referred to itself and wasreferred to as the next American Frontier. The Frontier is also kept alivethrough television and film; the American West still looms large in popularculture as the landscape for epic American drama.And finally, Americansritually reenact how the West was won on a local and community level,creating Frontiers for play and self-expression, using the Frontier as the idiom to express their own pride in their heritage.23Modern-Day Cowboy LawmenShooters harked constantly to images and ideals that are now linked inexorably to American s western past.For the men and women who love thesport of cowboy action shooting in particular, guns are emblematic of a hostof principles and values that speak largely to the American Creed.88 the meani ngs of guns Self-RelianceCowboy shooters, like modern-day citizen soldiers, talk about how gunsprovide a means by which they can become more self-reliant.This self-reliance is intimately connected with their notion of being more individualistic.A shooter is capable of relying on himself, being his own person.Jonathan, a white administrator who worked at a large university, explained:Why do I like guns? To me it s just like because I can shoot really well withthem, I just have this affinity for them [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl matkasanepid.xlx.pl
.A historic epic emerged, one that celebrated the conquering of the West as a triumph of civilization over savagery, of whites over Indians, and of civilization over nature.12 The cowboywas the perfect hero for this particular vision, as his image was tightly linkedwith moral courage and lonely individualism, a hero who was destined to repeatedly save a society to which he would never quite belong.Although themythic stories embodied in movie westerns don t enjoy the tremendouspopularity that they did in the 1950s and 1960s, the cowboy himself remainsa powerful icon in American popular culture.One primary reason for the continued fascination with the mythic cowboy is that he never fully integrated himself with society, despite the inherently social tendency to serve that society and work with his peers.The cowboy thus embodied an interesting ability to mediate the tension betweenstark individualism and adherence to community, both in spirit and in ac-tuality.13 The cowboy s six-shooter came to embody his individualistic brandof justice, enabling him to shoot straighter and faster than others, encouraging the sense that even when he took the law into his own hands, he did sowith an unerring sense of virtue and righteousness.These values ostensiblyjustified his vigilante actions.14 Classic movie westerns reiterated this lessonat every turn: when the hero of High Noon, Sheriff Will Kane, returns totown to face his enemies, he does so not because his community asks him tobut because his pride and sense of duty demand it.15 Everybody knows thata bloody showdown between good and evil is the only ending to the storywhen the bad men come to town.Western Myths and Myths of the WestCowboys on the mythic Frontier, which was both a geographic place and anideological construct, have had tremendous impact on the development ofthe American national character and the imaginations and identities of the86 the meani ngs of guns citizenry.Two of the most famous contributors to both the Frontier and tocowboys (in myth and image) in the past two centuries were Frederick Jackson Turner, a historian and professor, and William Buffalo Bill Cody, apremiere entertainer of the Wild West.16 This unlikely duo presented twovery different images of the American Frontier during the late nineteenthcentury.Turner s image of the Frontier, which has been referred to as his Frontier thesis, presented a rather bucolic image of the taming of theAmerican Frontier.His heroes were farmers, always gendered as male, forging their way through the American wilderness, which took on a decidedlyEden-like cast, while American Indians watched quietly from the sidelines.Turner s argument helped foster the idea that a man was not born American.Rather, he became American through his action and his vigor, which proclaimed his new identity more loudly than any document or speech couldpossibly do.Europeans could become American by performing their Americanness, by this active and transformative process.17William Buffalo Bill Cody also recognized the importance of action andperformance as authentically American, action and performance in alltheir uses and meanings.Frontier history, as presented in Buffalo Bill Cody sWild West and Congress of Rough Riders, a historical reenactment androdeo show featuring authentic sharpshooters and cowboys, was aboutcombating wild animals and savage, menacing Indians.18 Buffalo Bill s Westteemed with people and ferocious wildlife, and his Frontier heroes were thehunters and cowboys, frontiersmen and scouts who combated their natural enemies and defeated them in literal and moral victories.The showturned the westering movement into a morality play: white frontiersmenrepresented the forces of good and civilization and Indians and a few errantWhite road agents symbolized evil and barbarism. 19 Once Cody s show hadrun its course, it was quickly replaced by the traveling rodeo, an equally dazzling opportunity for Americans to see examples of modern men who reflected western toughness, raw courage, and natural strength, living proofthat the pioneer spirit of the West remained intact. 20These two different images of the American Frontier in the nineteenthcentury, Turner s Frontier thesis and Cody s Wild West show, had wide appeal for Americans.Both explained the forging of an American identity inways that Americans understood and were already romanticizing.It wasan identity created out of the conquering of the American Frontier.Thiswas the time when particular constructions of masculinity, including physical strength, a willingness to confront and commit violence, and a stoicco wbo y l a wmen 87 resolve to push through and civilize the world, were highly valued commodities.While these characteristics were certainly employed in the service of theliteral conquest and settlement of the West, they took on their own mythicqualities as they were employed to convey the magnitude of the accomplishment of claiming the West.This was a West that demanded the authentic masculinity that middle-class Americans treasured, a far cry froman increasingly urban and industrialized East.This authentic masculinity found a distinctive home in the mythic West and came to signify an authentic American character in significant ways.In the early twentieth century, the West was understood as the great repository for the individualismand freedom already woven into the American ethos.Journalists and othercultural producers learned quickly that myths sold more easily than realitybecause myths informed Americans how to be Americans with far moreflair and color than any other kind of narratives possibly could.21 Thesemythic visions of the West also came during a time when Americans wereconcerned that the real West was closing, that the boundaries were nowvisible on what was first conceptualized as a boundless economic and phenomenological opportunity for growth and progress.How could progress,literal and metaphoric, be demonstrated with the closing of the Frontier?The answer is that Americans create new frontiers, in a variety of different ways.The Frontier, in myth and image, continues to serve as a powerfulmetaphor for American progress and entrepreneurial spirit, and as a symbol in the service of American industry and business.22 In the early and mid1990s, the nascent information technology industry referred to itself and wasreferred to as the next American Frontier. The Frontier is also kept alivethrough television and film; the American West still looms large in popularculture as the landscape for epic American drama.And finally, Americansritually reenact how the West was won on a local and community level,creating Frontiers for play and self-expression, using the Frontier as the idiom to express their own pride in their heritage.23Modern-Day Cowboy LawmenShooters harked constantly to images and ideals that are now linked inexorably to American s western past.For the men and women who love thesport of cowboy action shooting in particular, guns are emblematic of a hostof principles and values that speak largely to the American Creed.88 the meani ngs of guns Self-RelianceCowboy shooters, like modern-day citizen soldiers, talk about how gunsprovide a means by which they can become more self-reliant.This self-reliance is intimately connected with their notion of being more individualistic.A shooter is capable of relying on himself, being his own person.Jonathan, a white administrator who worked at a large university, explained:Why do I like guns? To me it s just like because I can shoot really well withthem, I just have this affinity for them [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]