Based on three years of ethnographic research with Bruce Springsteen fans, and informed by the author's own experiences as a fan, Tramps Like Us is an interdisciplinary study of the ways in which ordinary people form special, sustained attachments to Bruce Springsteen and his music and how those attachments function in people's daily lives to create meaning, shape identity, and create community. An insider's narrative about Springsteen fans -- who they are, what they do, and why they do it -- it is also about the phenomenon of fandom in general. The text moves back and forth between fans' stories and ideas and the author's own anecdotes, commentary, and analysis. Cavicchi argues that music fandom is a useful and meaningful behaviour that enables people to shape identity, create community, and make sense of the world.

Based on three years of ethnographic research with Bruce Springsteen fans, and informed by the author's own experiences as a fan, Tramps Like Us is an interdisciplinary study of the ways in which ordinary people form special, sustained attachments to Bruce Springsteen and his music and how those attachments function in people's daily lives to create meaning, shape identity, and create community. An insider's narrative about Springsteen fans -- who they are, what they do, and why they do it -- it is also about the phenomenon of fandom in general. The text moves back and forth between fans' stories and ideas and the author's own anecdotes, commentary, and analysis. Cavicchi argues that music fandom is a useful and meaningful behaviour that enables people to shape identity, create community, and make sense of the world.

Moving beyond the biographical and journalistic approaches of most writing on Bruce Springsteen, Born in the U.S.A. was the first major work of cultural criticism to situate Springsteen's work in the broader sweep of American history--the heir of Walt Whitman and Woody Guthrie, Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King. Springsteen is an influential chronicler of our society, says Jim Cullen, a "good conservative" who preserves the traditional values of hard work, inclusive families, and genuine concern for the less fortunate. In the new edition to this landmark work, Cullen also discusses new currents in Springsteen's music since 9/11, notably his 2002 album The Rising. This Wesleyan edition includes a new foreword, introduction, and afterword. Must reading for any serious fan--or anyone who has ever been curious about what all the fuss has been about.

My Music is a first-hand exploration of the diverse roles music plays in people's lives. "What is music about for you?" asked members of the Music in Daily Life Project of some 150 people, and the responses they received -- from the profound to the mundane, from the deeply-felt to the flippant -- reflect highly individualistic relationships to and with music. Susan Crafts, Daniel Cavicchi, and Project Director Charles Keil have collected and edited nearly forty of those interviews to document the diverse ways in which people enjoy, experience, and use music.
CONTRIBUTORS: Charles Keil, George Lipsitz.