This experiment was inspired by reporter Michele Norris’ Race Card Project. Norris asked people to distill their thoughts on race down to 6 words as a way of initiating conversations about a difficult subject.
In “Let’s Talk Guns,” we want to do the same for another topic we often have a difficult time talking about. Thank you for your interest in contributing to having better conversations about guns.
This project is managed by David Yamane, a sociology professor at Wake Forest University. He is an internationally recognized scholarly authority on guns in America and a calming voice in our divisive national argument on the issue. An Asian American and lifelong liberal from the San Francisco Bay Area, Yamane became a first-time gun owner as a 42-year-old and began a 12-year journey into the complex world of firearms in America. Having one foot outside and one inside gun culture allows him to speak with compassion across our paralyzing differences.
His book, Gun Curious: A Liberal Professor’s Surprising Journey Inside America’s Gun Culture, was published in 2024.
A brief summary of his perspective on guns was published in The Conversation under the title, “Guns in America: A Liberal Gun-Owning Sociologist Offers 5 Observations to Understand America’s Culture of Firearms.” He also brought together the various strands of his work in a public address given in California in June 2025, “Guns in America: A Civil Conversation in Uncivil Times.”
Other recent publications include “Guns in America: A liberal gun-owning sociologist offers 5 observations to understand America’s culture of firearms,” “Gun Culture 2.0: Evolution and Contours of Defensive Gun Ownership in America,” and “Understanding and Misunderstanding American Gun Culture and Violence.”
Committed to informing public debate and enriching everyday conversations about guns, Professor Yamane shares his thoughts on his Light Over Heat Substack, and on BlueSky and X at @davidyamane. In 2022, he launched a YouTube channel, “Light Over Heat with Professor David Yamane,” on which he posts short videos and interviews about issues related to his scholarship.
LET'S TALK GUNS 