Jennifer Carlson
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About Jennifer
Carlson's work examines the politics of guns in American life, including those who survive gun violence’s harrowing aftermath, police who enforce the country’s complex gun laws, gun sellers and retailers who are on the front lines of surges in gun purchasing, and the people who choose to own and carry guns. She is currently working on a book manuscript entitled Loaded Conversations: How We End the Gun Debate aimed at elevating public discourse about this divisive issue. Carlson is a 2022 MacArthur Fellow.
Contributions
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Publications
Eplores an understudied aspect of gun violence–how survivors navigate its financial aftermath. Examines crowdfunding campaigns to understand how race and gender shape how gun violence survivors seek out financial support and how gun violence becomes framed as a social problem in the process.
Examines how gun sellers at the frontlines of the 2020 surge in gun purchasing navigated the multilayered crisis of 2020, including a global pandemic, anti-racist uprisings, and democratic instability.
Draws on interviews with police and observations at gun licensing boards to unravel the relationship between gun politics, policing and race. Argues the politics of guns cannot be understood—or changed—without considering how the racial politics of crime affect attitudes surrounding guns.
Analyzes the intersection of race and gun violence by looking at anticipatory trauma. Explores how people, particularly parents, manage the anticipation of gun violence and its trauma, focusing on "the race talk" and the "gun violence talk".
Examines the politics of guns as reshaping citizenship from the bottom up, focusing on gun carriers in Metro Detroit. Shows how guns become meaningful to Americans, often in complex and counterintuitive ways.