Armed Self-Defense in Recent America: Intersectional Perspectives

• Applicants: Professorin Dr. Barbara Lüthi; Professor Dr. Jürgen Martschukat; Professor Dr. Simon Wendt
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: from 2018 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 371984545

With this renewal proposal, we apply for an extension of our collaborative research project (Paketprojekt) on “Armed Self-Defense in Recent America: Intersectional Perspectives” . When submitting our original proposal in November 2016, a major impetus for our application was the shooting of Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida, in 2012, and a series of gun-related deaths of young and mostly male African Americans, often caused by male, white police officers and security guards. In addition to the racial and gendered configuration of these shootings, our research interest was sparked by the observation that shooters in these cases often sought to justify their violence by claiming to have acted in self-defense to preserve their physical integrity and even to save their lives, to defend their home and their property, or to protect the community. Since November 2016, the development of race relations in America, the Trump presidency, and the massive momentum of the Black Lives Matter movement in the wake of the murder of George Floyd have demonstrated that our research project on the history of armed self-defense in the United States is even more significant than originally anticipated. Our guiding question is as to who is endowed with the right to use violence as self-defense against whom and under which circumstances.The project encompasses three subprojects, scrutinizing crucial, yet hitherto neglected cases of armed self-defense by white, black, male, and female citizens in American everyday life, their perceptions and interpretations, as well as their legal and political ramifications. Each subproject is built on case studies with different main actors at their center: the first subproject focuses on black men as shooters; the second subproject concentrates on women of color; the final subproject scrutinizes a white male shooter. The cases are from the 1970s and 1980s, which are pivotal decades for a historical study of intersectional violence in recent America. Together, the three studies merge into a multi-perspective analysis, thus showing their greatest strength. In 2018 and 2019, we had had a perfect first project year, with workshops, text discussion meetings, and first successful research trips to the United States. In March 2020, the Covid-19 crisis put everything on hold, as borders and archives were closed. Most importantly, and extremely detrimental to our project plan, the key research trips for our project had to be cancelled. The members of the research group continued to work with the available material, refined and adjusted their approaches, preponed working steps from phase 3 as far as possible, but a second archival research trip and enough time to assess the material and weave it into the existing fragmentary research results will be indispensable for the successful completion of the subprojects. For that reason, we apply for a 12-months-extension of the funding period.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants