About this item
A witty history of the state that's always in the news, for everything from alligator attacks to zany crimes.There's an old clip of Bugs Bunny sawing the entire state of Florida off the continent -- and every single time a news story springs up about some shenanigans in Florida, someone on the internet posts it in response. Why are we so ready to wave goodbye to the Sunshine State? In A Florida State of Mind: An Unnatural History of Our Weirdest State, James D. Wright makes the case that there are plenty of reasons to be scandalized by the land and its sometimes-kooky, sometimes-terrifying denizens, but there's also plenty of room for hilarity.Florida didn't just become weird; it's built that way. Uncharted swampland doesn't easily give way to sprawling suburbia.
About the Author
James D. Wright is an author, educator, and the former Provost's Distinguished Research Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Central Florida. In 2013, he was named a UCF Pegasus Professor, the University's highest faculty honor. Until his retirement in 2018, Wright also served as the Director of the UCF Institute for Social and Behavioral Sciences, served for 36 years as the editor-in-chief of the journal Social Science Research, and served as the editor-in-chief of the International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2nd edition, published in 26 volumes by Elsevier in 2015. He has authored or coauthored 29 books and more than 300 articles, chapters, essays, reviews and polemics. He lives in St. Pete Beach with his wife Chris and their collection of dogs and cats.
