Raymond J. Michalowski

Brings together fifteen essays to show that those in positions of political and economic power frequently operate in collaboration, and are often all too willing to sacrifice the well-being of the many for the private profit and political advantage of the few.

Run for the Wall is a highly readable ethnographic account of this remarkable American ritual. The authors, themselves motorcyclists as well as Run participants, demonstrate that the event is a form of secular pilgrimage. Here key concepts in American culture— “freedom,” and “brotherhood,” for example—are constructed and deployed in a variety of rituals and symbols to enable participants to come to terms with the consequences of the Vietnam war. While the focus is the journey itself, the book also explores other themes related to American culture and history, including the nature of community, the Vietnam war, and the creation of American secular ritual.