Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / Rowman & Littlefield International
Pages: 272
Trim: 6½ x 9½
978-1-78661-413-1 • Hardback • July 2020 • $135.00 • (£104.00)
978-1-78661-414-8 • eBook • July 2020 • $43.99 • (£34.00)
Robert Matej Bednar is associate professor of communication studies; chair, Strategic Planning + Budget Committee; and co-coordinator of the Situating Place Paideia Cluster, Southwestern University, Georgetown, Texas.
Preface and Acknowledgments1 Introduction: What Are Car Crash Shrines Doing on the Roadside?2 Trauma/Memory/Automobility3 Making Places for Performing Road Trauma4 Materializing Road Trauma5 Performing Road Trauma6 Interpellating a Knowing Motoring Public7 Conclusion: Melancholy RemainsBibliographyIndexAbout the Author/Photographer
Here, beautifully presented like gifts to the reader, roadside shrines mourn lives lost on the spot with stuffed animals, dolls, and footballs that mold and crumble, and are replaced and updated with “big girl” dolls as if the materials of mourning were leading their own lives forward. Scars of trauma perform for a public of strangers the melancholia of being in something unknown but pressing with others.— Kathleen Stewart, Professor of Anthropology, University of Texas
Robert Bednar has spent almost two decades mapping and photographing thousands of roadside car crash shrines, especially in the American Southwest. This cogent, well-theorized, and heartfelt account focuses on their traumatic affect, making a strong case for their disturbing significance as signs, and scars, of the nation’s troubling, and enduring, dependence on automobility.
— Erika Doss, Professor of American Studies, University of Notre Dame
Based on more than fifteen years of research, Robert Bednar’s book is a ground-breaking look at these seemingly silent sentinels. With particular attention to the role of photography, Bednar’s unique transciplinary approach lays the groundwork for a provocative analysis of the collective agency these memorials exert as manifestations of cultural trauma. Challenging us to recognize society’s responsibilities to such trauma, Bednar calls upon us all to bear witness.
— Holly Everett, Head of the Department of Folklore, Memorial University