Bike Lust: Harleys, Women, and American Society: Harleys, Women and American Society

Bike Lust: Harleys, Women, and American Society - Kindle edition by Barbara Joans. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets .
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The Key To Running Inspired. This book is a no-nonsense, methodical breakdown of the basics of running and the mental and physical training that will help to keep someone running. From Publishers Weekly It's hard to be in love when your friends don't quite approve. Copyright Cahners Business Information, Inc. University of Wisconsin Press; 1st edition September 17, Language: Related Video Shorts 0 Upload your video. Try the Kindle edition and experience these great reading features: Share your thoughts with other customers.

Write a customer review. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Very honest and to the point.. Covers all possible points of involvement with females and Harley Davidson motorcycles. One person found this helpful. This book, published in , is a kind of anthropological look at Harley riders, both men and women her main concern, as the subtitle shows, is with women , and the variety of viewpoints and value judgments within the Harley culture. A lot of the book is reporting on conversations Joans had with Harley riders men and women and passengers women , but she doesn't exclude writing about her own views or experiences.

She has found or created a collection of categories through which she classifies everyone in the Harley culture, and this may help some readers, or may seem misguided. The people she spoke with, of course, had their own sense of identity and of how they viewed others associated in one way or another with Harley-Davidson. As is typical in any culture or sub-culture there are those who want everyone to be the same, meaning exactly like themselves, all others being viewed as inauthentic to some degree.

They judge others by a personal checklist of attitudes, experiences, and skills which they associate with the authentic biker and which they themselves have acquired over the course of their riding life, disdaining those riders who do not seem to aspire with the same vigor or not to aspire at all to those same attitudes, experiences, and skills. The pinnacle of authenticity, for some riders, is the outlaw biker. For others, it is a few degrees less volatile. Everyone seems to agree that independence, integrity, devotion, and passion are key characteristics of a true biker.

Without these, one isn't even a motorcycle enthusiast. The difference between those who see their motorcycle as transportation like a car or truck and those who see it as recreation like a boat or snowmobile is, I think, relevant. Joans focuses her attention she may have not thought the distinction was important; I do on people who routinely participate in group runs and events including group camping during a run, the "biker bar", and social rallies and whose self-identity is based as much upon that ongoing fact of their riding life as upon their relation to a particular H-D bike.

It is this collective behavior and how individuals define and describe themselves within it that Joans, as an anthropologist, has reported upon in her book.


  • BIKE LUST: Harleys, Women & American Society.
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This book is about identity and the various Harley sub-cultures. It has little to say about metric cruisers, sport-tourers, or any other type of motorcycling. It is not a textbook.


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It is for riders or wanna-be riders. It is for fun, for personal enjoyment.

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And I did enjoy the book. It helped me learn that I should not waste money on a Harley when I replace my metric cruiser. Apparently I belong with the sport touring folks who wear high-visibility protective gear and top-of-the-line full face helmets by choice, not law. I enjoyed the book, although the author's opinion of helmet comfort is misinformed and probably based on ill-fitting headgear. I know I don't want to be part of the culture she describes, but I recommend the book.

Bike Lust: Harleys, Women, and American Society: Barbara Joans: leondumoulin.nl: Books

I disagree with her on many points, but I recommend this book. It's really a treat to read. BIKE LUST is a unique, forceful and informative ethnography in which Barbara Joans takes the reader inside the minds and hearts of an emergent, important and incompletely understood American subculture. She tells much of this story in the language and with the forcefulness of a cultural insider.

Female Harley-Davidson Riders at Daytona Bike Week

I know of no account of Harley culture like it. The examples are clear and cleanly and drawn, not only in the manner of a professional anthropologist but also as a storyteller with a sharp ear for language. Joans comes to the task with particularly apt credentials, and the originality of her technique illuminates the character of the group she represents. An accomplished anthropologist with an established reputation in the field, Joans has not written simply an anthropologist's monograph, but by adopting the voice of her study population, she brings the reader inside the community; she makes the events and the people come alive.

This combining professional precision with subcultural patoise, enhances the portrayal. You find yourself seeing through biker's eyes, hearing and absorbing biker terminology and world view, and feeling the clamminess of water-soaked clothing after a stormy night's ride. Because of Joans' highly accessible style, often invisible prose, and the intrinsic interest of the material, the work will have broad appeal.

See a Problem?

A significant part of Joans' contribution to this literature is her use of both masculine and feminine perspectives in equally engaging ways. For this reason it might be argued that Joans' work is the first effectively ethnographic study of this subculture. As a woman, I agree that someone ought to write a book about this subject, but Joans hasn't done it justice.

She admits speaking with only one "Biker Chick" author's caps and nevertheless produces a whole slew of generalizations--based on what?

Editorial Reviews

Observation without interview doesn't make anthropology. Many premises are established shakily and then contradicted only pages later. Apparently she "interviewed" a bunch of her friends, threw together some poorly supported conclusions and wound up with this book. Bike Lust shatters myths and introduces us to a new generation of 'gender traitor' bikers, many of whom are wives, mothers, lesbians, feminists, and anti-feminists.

This is an inspired meditation. Barbara Joans, an anthropologist, has found her tribe and she loves them. She rides a Harley-Davidson Low Rider.


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For an excerpt from Bike Lust, visit this page of our website. Click here for excerpt. If you want to examine a book for possible course use, please see our Course Books page. September pp. If you have trouble accessing any page in this web site, contact our Web manager. Bike Lust Harleys, Women, and American Society Barbara Joans Part roaring adventure, part intimate ethnography, a portrait of women in the biker world Bike Lust roars straight into the world of women bikers and offers us a ride.