Harel Shapira is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin. Shapira is an ethnographer who uses long-term participant observation in order to study political life in contemporary America, with an emphasis on right wing politics. He is the author of Waiting for José: The Minutemen’s Pursuit of America (Princeton University Press), which explores the civilians who patrol the United States / Mexico border. He is currently writing a book on gun owners which explores how the notion of self-defense is deeply connected to group identity. Through fieldwork at gun schools, Shapira considers how people train their minds and bodies to use guns, and what such an education means for the future of American democracy. His previous research has been funded by the National Science Foundation as well as the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation.