Rodeo cowboys in the North American imagination

by Michael Allen

In this broadly researched and engagingly written study, historian Michael Allen examines the image of the rodeo cowboy and the role this image has played in popular culture over the past century. He sees rodeo as a significant American folk festival and the rodeo cowboy as the surviving avatar of a nearly vanished authentic figure - the "real cowboy," who embodies the skills and values of traditional western rural culture. Rodeo Cowboys in the North American Imagination explores the evolution of the myth of the rodeo man and its subsequent institutionalization and acculturation into the media of popular culture - movies and television, folklore and literature, country music, and the visual arts.