Strip Cultures: Finding America in Las VegasThe Project on Vegas (Stacy M. Jameson, Karen Klugman, Jane Kuenz, and Susan Willis). Duke University Press, 2015.

Abstract

Strip Cultures: Finding America in Las Vegas Project on Vegas (Stacy M. Jameson, Karen Klugman, Jane Kuenz, and Susan Willis). Duke University Press, 2015.Strip Cultures: Finding America in Las Vegas is an interesting combination of personal experiences, research, on-the-spot photography, and serious scholarship all rolled into one. authors call themselves The Project on a group of four academics from various universities and various disciplines who describe their personal experiences and encounters with real people in Las Vegas, both tourists and inhabitants, while deconstructing American culture and consumerism through interviews, conversations, and observations, mixed in with scholarship and research on popular culture and American capitalism. Interspersed throughout are over one hundred photographs of people, buildings, Strip locations, and photo montages which capture the essence and atmosphere that is Las Vegas. authors spent over a decade visiting Las Vegas intermittently, both prior and after the economic recession of 2008, chronicling the constant flow, rise, and decline of the city, its visitors, and its citizens.The book is divided into thirteen sections, through which the authors provide a type of travelogue experience to the reader of their Las Vegas encounters. In the introduction, taking the Deuce or double-decker bus that goes up and down the Las Vegas Strip, the authors listen in on conversations of first-timers to the city and how these first impressions, both visual and cultural, are so important to those who visit the Strip. first chapter captures the intensity and experience of Las Vegas reality, whatever that is and means, framing the conversation around Elvis, sex and pornography, and first impressions of the various Las Vegas Strip hotels. Chapter Two explores the casino and gambling side of Vegas, with pictures of people sitting at the various slot machines in the casinos with various expressions of boredom, disgust, and interest. Chapter Three explores the sin in Sin City or rather the Surveillance Information Network (SIN) that chronicles everything and everyone in Las Vegas on a continual basis. There isn't a cubbyhole that doesn't have a camera pointing at it, watching visitors as well as the habits of the employees and professional gamblers at all times. This chapter is an eye-opening expose of government and corporate intelligence and surveillance methods in the wake of 9/11. …