The Kennedy Assassination

"Representing American Events" is edited by series Editors Helena Grice and Tim Woods. This series of textbooks focuses on key events in American history from the perspective of several different disciplines, offering the student a range of disciplinary perspectives on one particular historical event. Books in the series are unique in focusing on one particular event from a range of viewpoints. "The Kennedy Assassination" is written by Peter Knight. It is November 22nd 1963, Dealey Plaza. As a seminal event in late twentieth-century American history, the Kennedy assassination has permeated the American and world consciousness in a wide variety of ways. It has long fascinated American writers, filmmakers and artists, and this book offers an authoritative critical introduction to the way the event has been constructed in a range of discourses. It looks at a variety of historical, political and cultural attempts to understand Kennedy's death.Representations include: journalism from the time; historical accounts and memoirs; official investigations, government reports and sociological inquiries; the huge number of conspiracy-minded interpretations; novels, plays and other works of literature; and the Zapruder footage, photography, avant-garde art, and Hollywood films. Considering the continuities and contradictions in how the event has been represented, the author focuses on how it has been seen through the lens of ideas about conspiracy, celebrity and violence. He also explores how the arguments about exactly what happened on 22 November 1963 have come to serve as a substitute way of debating the significance of Kennedy's legacy and the meaning of the 1960s more generally. The key features are: presents information about the event itself, the cultural context of the period, and the consequences of the event; considers the ways in which the event has been represented in subsequent years in a variety of discourses; and, includes an annotated bibliography and 10 B&W illustrations.