Cowboy Eschatology: Make Eschatology Democratic Again

This presentation examines two uses of the cowboy archetype in American politics, focusing on its eschatological dimensions and its impact on democracy. During the Reagan era, conservative evangelicals, as detailed by Kristin Du Mez (2020), reimagined the cowboy as a symbol of rugged individualism, promoting a neoliberal vision of democracy. This cowboy eschatology, however, bypasses what I take to be the core democratic components of contestation, contingency and interdependence (Paxton, 2019). Drawing on Catherine Keller’s articulation of eschatology as an ongoing creation (2018), this presentation contrasts the conservative figure of the cowboy with a more historical understanding of the American cowboy as a paradigmatically queer figure. Riding the range, this figure represents a continual eschatological redrawing of frontiers in a way that is open to democratic contestation, contingency and interdependency. Cowboy eschatology is thereby repurposed as a theological resource for democracy.