Peaks and Valleys

In this article, the author examines the gendered emotional culture of high-risk takers. Drawing on five and one-half years of ethnographic fieldwork with a volunteer search and rescue group, the author details the intense emotions rescuers experienced before, during, and after the most dangerous and upsetting rescues. Lyng's concept of “edgework” (voluntary risk taking) is used to analyze how male and female rescuers experienced, understood, and acted on their feelings. The data reveal several gendered patterns that characterized this emotional culture. The article concludes with a discussion of gender, edgework, and emotional culture, focusing on the theoretical implications of their confluence.