Car Troubles: Critical Studies of Automobility and Auto-Mobility [Paperback]

Car Troubles central premise is that the car as the dominant mode of travel needs to be problematized. It examines a wide range of issues that are central to automobility by situating it within social, economic, and political contexts, and by combining social theory, specific case studies and policy-oriented analysis. With an international team of contributors the book provides a coherent and comprehensive analysis of the global phenomenon of automobility from the Anglo world to the cases in China and Chile and all the elements that relate to it.Car Troubles examines a wide range of issues that are central to automobility by situating it within social, economic, and political contexts, and by combining social theory, specific case studies and policy-oriented analysis. It examines obstacles to change and considers the possibility of alternatives that go beyond the car.Jim Conley is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at Trent University, Peterborough, Canada. Arlene Tigar McLaren is Professor Emerita in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada.'This collection of lively and engaging studies drives home to devastating effect and from different political, material, cultural and social directions, the fundamental contradiction of the car; that it destroys the very environment it makes accessible.' Tim Dant, University of Lancaster, UK 'Car Troubles shows brilliantly how far we have come since Wolfgang Sachs claimed that the problem with the automobile is that the automobile is not a problem . It gives rich, diverse insights into our problematisation of the car, and into the complex politics of dealing with the problems cars cause.' Matthew Paterson, University of Ottawa, CanadaIntroduction, Jim Conley, Arlene Tigar McLaren; Part 1 Cultures of Automobility; Chapter 1 T-Bucket Terrors to Respectable Rebels: Hot Rodders and Drag Racers in Vancouver BC, 19481965, Catharine Genovese; Chapter 2 Automobilel