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Campus Carry and Active-Shooter-Event Emotion Management

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 November 2020

JUHA VUORI*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Management and Business, Tampere University. Email: [email protected].

Abstract

This forum entry approaches the issue of Campus Carry from the viewpoint of emotion management with regard to active-shooter events. Self-defense has become the most prominent reason for owning and carrying a firearm in the Unites States in the same period that mass shootings have continued to increase. At the same time, active-shooter drills and rehearsals have become a generational experience for students. The essay examines social imaginaries by comparing concealed-carry imaginaries against those discernible in active-shooter-event instructional videos produced by the City of Houston, the Department of Homeland Security, and a number of universities. This places the Campus Carry issue in the larger context of a general securitized imaginary where, irrespective of the actual prevalence of violent crime, the campus is considered a place like any other, in the sense that violent things can happen to everyone, at any time, obliging individuals to defend themselves with firearms because the authorities are not there to immediately protect them.

Type
Forum: Perceiving Security and Insecurity: The Campus Carry Law in Texas
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press and British Association for American Studies 2020

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56 Davis, Stages of Emergency.

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61 Department of Homeland Security.

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63 City of Houston.

64 Department of Homeland Security.

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66 See, e.g., Florida State University, Central Michigan University, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, Georgia Southern University, the University of Denver, and Central Washington University. Florida State University Police Department, “Run. Hide. Fight.® at Florida State University,” 2018, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyuSws1c2Jw; Central Michigan University, “Run. Hide. Fight: Surviving an Active Shooter Situation,” 2018, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=kti33RJ1ub8; Northwestern University, “Northwestern Safety Training: ‘Run, Hide, Fight’,” 2018, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=kti33RJ1ub8; Ohio State University – Administration & Planning, “Surviving an Active Aggressor,” 2018, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zfiQAk927s; Georgia Southern University, “Georgia Southern University Run, Hide, Fight Active Shooter Training,” 2019, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSRP9ZsGqiA; University of Denver, “Run, Hide, Fight 2019,” 2019, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbVaLmDuUNg; Central Washington University, “CWU Run. Hide. Fight,” 2019, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=kti33RJ1ub8. All videos accessed 12 Oct. 2019.

67 National Center for Educational Statistics, “Indicators of School Crime and Safety,” 22.

68 Department of Homeland Security, “Active Shooter Emergency.”

69 Ibid.

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71 Department of Homeland Security, “Options for Consideration.”