Review by Choice Review
Tired of what they see as overly mechanistic approaches to the study of protest activity, scholars have increasingly turned to the metaphors of "frames" and "framing" as a way of emphasizing the emotional forces that permeate the more or less organized episodes of collective action that are commonly termed "social movements." Frames have been described as "interpretive schema." Much like picture frames, they provide a way of emphasizing and circumscribing an agenda and as such, constitute the public face or faces of a movement. For the contributors to this volume, frames provide the connection between "the movement" (or movement organization or campaign) and its public--they mobilize people to act. Like an advertiser's sound bite, they project a kind of gestalt or view that aims at resonating with its audience. This new collection seeks to bring together a set of definitive descriptions of the framing perspective and its theoretical implications, with a series of case studies that embody its principles. With useful material on framing and the mobilization process, nonmovement actors, political opportunity structures, and debates within the framing perspective, this collection provides a well-thought-out compendium of work in the area. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above. N. B. Rosenthal SUNY at Stony Brook
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
