A Man and His 1967 Impala: Supernatural, U.S. Car Culture, and the Masculinity of Dean Winchester

Abstract

In Men in the Middle: Searching for Masculinity in the 1950s, James Gilbert observes that “Historians have found concern and even the evidence of a ‘male panic’—intense uncertainties about masculine identity—in almost every era of American history” (2). These U.S. masculinity crises manifest themselves at times of rapid social and political change. This was true of the 1950s when the residual ideologies of the rugged individualist were challenged by the new standard of the time—the team player. The 1990s and the start of the twenty-first century have been an equally turbulent times because of events such as the Gulf War, the continuing war on terror, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the government bailout of Wall Street, the recession, the Oklahoma City bombing, and perhaps the most significant event of the new millennium, the terrorist attacks of September11, 2001. All of these social, political, and economic upheavals have created a great deal of anxiety in twenty-first century America and given rise to another crisis of masculinity.