Gunslinging justice

What does John Wayne have to do with the shooting of Trayvon Martin? How are The Last of the Mohicans and Clint Eastwood connected to the 2008 Supreme Court case that defined current interpretations of the 2nd Amendment? Justin Joyce's insightful study, Gunslinging justice: The American culture of gun violence in Westerns and the law, brilliantly explains the roots of America's glorification of violent white masculinity, Old West assumptions about the ideal citizen and his gun, as well as the historical development of so-called "stand your ground" laws. Moving effortlessly from classic literature to Hollywood Westerns, from property rights to race and the Constitution, Joyce explains the ways in which American jurisprudence shaped, and was shaped by, frontier mythologizing of Anglo masculine gun violence as a noble act-whether of self-defense, justice, or revenge.'
Sara L. Spurgeon, Professor of American Literature, Texas Tech University