Concealed Carry on Campus as an Expression of Racialized Vulnerability – Todd C. Couch
Abstract
Over the last twenty years, colleges and universities in the United States have begun to place campus safety as one of its highest priorities. Displeased with current best practices in campus security, a minority of students advocate for allowing concealed firearms on campus. Substantive research on why this population desires to arm themselves is scarce. Addressing this gap in the literature, this study examines 30 interviews with chapter presidents of a national student gun rights organization. Engaging in what is referred to as “racialized vulnerability,” participants highly associate racial differences with feelings of vulnerability and the need to carry a firearm. Men of color are viewed with great suspicion, while immigrants are perceived as a hostile invading force. Extending Feagin’s theory of systemic racism to gun politics, this paper argues anti-other, and nativist ideologies underly the organized advocacy for concealed carry on campus and are responsible, at least in part, for the homogenous membership of this movement.
Published October 20, 2020
