Bear With Me: A Cultural History of Famous Bears in America

by Daniel Horowitz

Overview

From teddy bears and Winnie-the-Pooh to Smokey Bear, Yogi Bear, and Cocaine Bear, American popular culture has been fascinated with real and fictional bears for more than two centuries. Bears are ubiquitous, appearing in advertisements, as logos for sports teams, and as central characters in children’s books, cartoons, movies, and video games. In Bear With Me, Daniel Horowitz presents a vibrant history of the pedestrian and celebrity bears who have captured our imaginations and infiltrated our everyday lives. He shows that bears’ ability to represent and evoke both terror and comfort makes them well-suited for their omnipresence. Today, cultural depictions of bears largely encompass examples of human-bear relationships, reciprocity, and emotional engagement. Reminders that climate change threatens the lives of polar bears engender feelings of empathy, while news of bear attacks drives us to fascinated fear. Whether examining the subculture of gay bears or the deadly consequences of anthropomorphizing animals, Horowitz charts the complexities and depth of American culture’s unique and enduring relationship with bears.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781478061045
Publisher:	Duke University Press
Publication date:	07/18/2025
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	296
File size:	19 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Daniel Horowitz is Mary Huggins Gamble Professor of American Studies, Emeritus, at Smith College and the author of many books, most recently, American Dreams, American Nightmares: Culture and Crisis in Residential Real Estate from the Great Recession to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Table of Contents

Preface. Polar Bears, Franz Boas, and Me  ix
Introduction  1
1. Folkloric Bears and Actual Ones: Sacred and Profane from the Bible to Contemporary Celebrities  11
2. The Stories of Hugh Glass: The Case of a Disappearing and Reappearing Dangerous Bear  33
3. Out of Hibernation and Into Children’s Literature  47
4. Grizzly Adams: Bears He Tamed, Those He Displayed, and Those Responsible for His Death  75
5. Captive Bears and Their Captors as Workers  95
6. Teddy Bear: Another One Quickly Disappears and Frequently Reappears  129
7. Off the Poster and Out of the Zoo: Smokey Bear Goes Everywhere  149
8. Out of the Closet: Bears in the Gay World  167
9. Timothy Treadwell and Marian Engel: Bears, Humans, and Dangerous Eroticism  181
Coda. Precarity and Polar Bears  203
Acknowledgments  211
Notes  215
Select Bibliography  245
Index  261

Editorial Reviews

“Bear With Me is a fascinating and deeply meditative two-hundred-year cultural history of America’s popular obsession with bears. Analyzing an impressive range of folklore, live entertainments, literature, film, toys, cartoons, television, posters, social movements, and social media, the distinguished historian Daniel Horowitz forcefully places bears—representational and real—at the center of the American experience.”
-- Janet M. Davis, author of The Gospel of Kindness: Animal Welfare and the Making of Modern America

“In this eye-popping survey of bears in American culture from the colonial period to the present, Daniel Horowitz tackles an enormous subject with a passion and a curiosity that prove contagious. Bears entered American culture in droves and under many guises. Horowitz has the audacity to embrace this complexity rather than explain it away.”
-- Jon T. Coleman, author of Here Lies Hugh Glass: A Mountain Man, a Bear, and the Rise of the American Nation

"This is a detailed, entertaining, and informative breakdown of bears in popular culture. . . . Bear With Me is a revealing cultural history that puts bears in popular culture, including Yogi Bear and Paddington, into greater context."
-- Ryan Prado Foreword Review

"Permission granted to buy this book as a gag gift for a hirsute homosexual in your life, but Bear with Me is also well-worth delving into. ... This book’s inclusive recognition of gay culture alongside the likes of athletic fandom and children’s toys is much appreciated in today’s censorious academic environment."
-- Jim Gladstone Passport

“In this witty and thought-provoking examination of America’s relationship with bears, historian Horowitz zeroes in on the ways that humans have feared, loved, and exploited these charismatic creatures.... Wide-ranging and entertaining, this is a clever work of cultural history.”
-- Publishers Weekly

"A world bereft of an academic appraisal of celebrity bears would somehow seem deficient, so a growl of appreciation is due Daniel Horowitz, whose Bear With Me tells us tons about Teddy, Smokey, Pooh, Paddington and even the dreadful Berenstains."
-- Dave Shiflett Wall Street Journal

From the Publisher