Negotiating Work, Family, and Identity among Long-Haul Christian Truck Drivers

What Would Jesus Haul?

Negotiating Work, Family, and Identity among Long-Haul Christian Truck Drivers cover

Negotiating Work, Family, and Identity among Long-Haul Christian Truck Drivers

What Would Jesus Haul?

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Description

This book draws upon ethnographic and qualitative research in the United States to demonstrate the means through which long-haul truck drivers navigate work and family tensions in ways that resonate across categories of race, class, gender and religion. It examines how Christianity and constructions of masculinity are significant in the lives of long-haul drivers and how truckers work to construct narratives of their lives as ‘good, moral’ individuals in contrast to competing cultural narratives which suggest images of romantic, rule-free, renegade lives on the open road. Based upon ethnographic fieldwork, interviews, observations of long-haul truckers, and participation in a CDL school, this rich ethnography highlights how Christian trucking opportunities provide avenues through which balance is struck between work and family, masculinity and other identities. Embedded in larger social discourse about the meaning of masculinity and similar to evangelical perspectives such as those of the Promise Keepers, Christian truckers often draw upon older ideas about responsible, breadwinning fatherhood in their discourse about being good “fathers” while on the road. This discourse is in some conflict with the lived experiences of Christian truckers who simultaneously find themselves confronted by more contemporary cultural narratives of “the work-family balance” and expectations of what it means to be a good “worker” or a good “trucker.” The book offers new insight in the field of work and family studies and an extremely relevant voice in the broader contemporary discourse in the United States on the meaning of fatherhood and religion in the 21st century.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Who are Christian Truckers?
Chapter 2: Christian Truckers in Culture and Context
Chapter 3: Where are Christian Truckers?: On the Road in Bobtails and Mobile Ministries
Chapter 4: Virgin Berths: Sex, Gender and Relationships on the Road
Chapter 5: Working Men and God’s Work
Chapter 6: Masculinity in Motion: Carrying the Message On and Off the Road

Product details

Published Aug 12 2016
Format Hardback
Edition 1st
Extent 128
ISBN 9780739196625
Imprint Lexington Books
Dimensions 236 x 157 mm
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

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