Military Anthropology

Military Anthropology PDF Author: Montgomery McFate
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190934727
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 503

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Book Description
In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy goals. From the strategic bombing of Vietnam to the accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan, it has blundered around with little consideration of local cultural beliefs and for the long-term effects on the host nation's society. Cultural anthropology--the so-called "handmaiden of colonialism"--has historically served as an intellectual bridge between Western powers and local nationals. What light can it shed on the intersection of the US military and foreign societies today? This book tells the story of anthropologists who worked directly for the military, such as Ursula Graham Bower, the only woman to hold a British combat command during WWII. Each faced challenges including the negative outcomes of exporting Western political models and errors of perception. Ranging from the British colonial era in Africa to the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Military Anthropology illustrates the conceptual, cultural and practical barriers encountered by military organisations operating in societies vastly different from their own.

Military Anthropology

Military Anthropology PDF Author: Montgomery McFate
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190934727
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 503

Get Book Here

Book Description
In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy goals. From the strategic bombing of Vietnam to the accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan, it has blundered around with little consideration of local cultural beliefs and for the long-term effects on the host nation's society. Cultural anthropology--the so-called "handmaiden of colonialism"--has historically served as an intellectual bridge between Western powers and local nationals. What light can it shed on the intersection of the US military and foreign societies today? This book tells the story of anthropologists who worked directly for the military, such as Ursula Graham Bower, the only woman to hold a British combat command during WWII. Each faced challenges including the negative outcomes of exporting Western political models and errors of perception. Ranging from the British colonial era in Africa to the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Military Anthropology illustrates the conceptual, cultural and practical barriers encountered by military organisations operating in societies vastly different from their own.

Civil–Military Entanglements

Civil–Military Entanglements PDF Author: Birgitte Refslund Sørensen
Publisher: Berghahn Books
ISBN: 1789201969
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
Military-civilian encounters are multiple and diverse in our times. Contributors to this volume demonstrate how military and civilian domains are constituted through entanglements undermining the classic civil-military binary and manifest themselves in unexpected places and manners. Moreover, the essays trace out the ripples, reverberations and resonations of civil-military entanglements in areas not usually associated with such ties, but which are nevertheless real and significant for an understanding of the roles war, violence and the military play in shaping contemporary societies and the everyday life of its citizens.

Army Anthropology

Army Anthropology PDF Author: United States. Surgeon-General's Office
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Anthropometry
Languages : en
Pages : 652

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Book Description


Anthropology and the United States Military

Anthropology and the United States Military PDF Author: P. Frese
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1403982171
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 177

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Book Description
An edited collection of ethnographic research that seeks to provide visions of and for US military culture from a solid anthropological base. The volume explores several important but relatively unknown cultural variations in the defense community through a variety of lenses. A strong list of contributors highlight important issues such as: anthrax vaccines, the 'Golden Age' culture of the military, gender roles among army spouses, weight control and physical readiness, the military advisor, and the United States Naval Academy.

America's Digital Army

America's Digital Army PDF Author: Robertson Allen
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 0803285299
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 226

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Book Description
"An ethnographic study based on scholar Robertson Allen's years of behind-the-scenes ethnographic fieldwork within the work environments of the video game developers, military strategists, enlisted soldiers, and defense contractors who produced the official U.S. Army video game, "America's Army.""--

Anthropologists in Arms

Anthropologists in Arms PDF Author: George R. Lucas
Publisher: Rowman Altamira
ISBN: 0759119198
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
Anthropologists in Arms looks at the moral and ethical debates surrounding the recent development of 'military anthropology'—particularly the practice of embedding anthropologists with combat troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Lucas traces the troubled history of social scientists collaborating with national military, security, and intelligence organizations and shows how these complex and frequently misunderstood historical concerns contribute to the contemporary moral controversy. He gives special attention to the Human Terrain Systems project developed by the U.S. Army under the direction of General David Petraeus. Although this project has been criticized as unethical by academic anthropologists in the U.S. and the U.K., Lucas shows that the moral status of that program is much more ambiguous than these blanket criticisms would suggest. Anthropologists in Arms concludes with a call for a thorough review of HTS itself, and suggests alternative strategies for providing anthropological knowledge to military forces engaged in irregular warfare—knowledge that might, in turn, help military forces to ameliorate the suffering imposed on noncombatants, while respecting the privacy, security, and human rights of indigenous populations.

Anthropological Intelligence

Anthropological Intelligence PDF Author: David H. Price
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822342373
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 398

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Book Description
DIVCultural history of anthropologists' involvement with U.S. intelligence agencies--as spies and informants--during World War II./div

Soldiering Under Occupation

Soldiering Under Occupation PDF Author: Erella Grassiani
Publisher: Berghahn Books
ISBN: 0857459570
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
Often, violent behavior or harassment from a soldier is dismissed by the military as unacceptable acts by individuals termed, “rotten apples.” In this study, the author argues that this dismissal is unsatisfactory and that there is an urgent need to look at the (mis)behavior of soldiers from a structural point of view. When soldiers serve as an occupational force, they find themselves in a particular situation influenced by structural circumstances that heavily influence their behavior and moral decision-making. This study focuses on young Israeli men and their experiences as combat soldiers in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), particularly those who served in the “Occupied Palestinian Territories” (OPT) during the “Al Aqsa Intifada,” which broke out in 2000. In describing the soldiers’ circumstances, especially focusing on space, the study shows how processes of numbing on different levels influence the (moral) behavior of these soldiers.

Citizen, Student, Soldier

Citizen, Student, Soldier PDF Author: Gina M. Pérez
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 147980780X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Since the 1990s, Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) programs have experienced unprecedented expansion in American public schools. The program and its proliferation in poor, urban schools districts with large numbers of Latina/o and African American students is not without controversy. Public support is often based on the belief that the program provides much-needed discipline for "at risk" youth. Meanwhile, critics of JROTC argue that the program is a recruiting tool for the U.S. military and is yet another example of an increasingly punitive climate that disproportionately affect youth of color in American public schools. Citizen, Student, Soldier intervenes in these debates, providing critical ethnographic attention to understanding the motivations, aspirations, and experiences of students who participate in increasing numbers in JROTC programs. These students have complex reasons for their participation, reasons that challenge the reductive idea that they are either dangerous youths who need discipline or victims being exploited by a predatory program. Rather, their participation is informed by their marginal economic position in the local political economy, as well as their desire to be regarded as full citizens, both locally and nationally. Citizenship is one of the central concerns guiding the JROTC curriculum; this book explores ethnographically how students understand and enact different visions of citizenship and grounds these understandings in local and national political economic contexts. It also highlights the ideological, social and cultural conditions of Latina/o youth and their families who both participate in and are enmeshed in vigorous debates about citizenship, obligation, social opportunity, militarism and, ultimately, the American Dream.

Making War at Fort Hood

Making War at Fort Hood PDF Author: Kenneth T. MacLeish
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 069116570X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Book Description
An intimate look at war through the lives of soldiers and their families at Fort Hood Making War at Fort Hood offers an illuminating look at war through the daily lives of the people whose job it is to produce it. Kenneth MacLeish conducted a year of intensive fieldwork among soldiers and their families at and around the US Army's Fort Hood in central Texas. He shows how war's reach extends far beyond the battlefield into military communities where violence is as routine, boring, and normal as it is shocking and traumatic. Fort Hood is one of the largest military installations in the world, and many of the 55,000 personnel based there have served multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. MacLeish provides intimate portraits of Fort Hood's soldiers and those closest to them, drawing on numerous in-depth interviews and diverse ethnographic material. He explores the exceptional position that soldiers occupy in relation to violence--not only trained to fight and kill, but placed deliberately in harm's way and offered up to die. The death and destruction of war happen to soldiers on purpose. MacLeish interweaves gripping narrative with critical theory and anthropological analysis to vividly describe this unique condition of vulnerability. Along the way, he sheds new light on the dynamics of military family life, stereotypes of veterans, what it means for civilians to say "thank you" to soldiers, and other questions about the sometimes ordinary, sometimes agonizing labor of making war. Making War at Fort Hood is the first ethnography to examine the everyday lives of the soldiers, families, and communities who personally bear the burden of America's most recent wars.