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Introduction 1 On 15 December 2013, only two and a half years after the Republic of South Sudan had become an independent state, the long-simmering tensions between President Salva Kiir and his former vice-president, Riek Machar, erupted into armed clashes in the capital, Juba. War soon broke out. This article seeks to document and analyse violence affecting the provision of healthcare by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and its intended
1 War Introduction This I feel. A curse. Mother said it more than once, ‘You could be killed over there, Oliver,’ as if I were incompetent, not man enough to take care of myself; I hated her motherlove arrogance. Did I listen? Did it make sense? Mothers are cowards. Curses passed down the vaginal passageways deep to man. True as true can be. I told her that I didn’t really want to go back to Yale, I was an adventurer, just like her and went to Vietnam instead. But I wonder what she’ll say when she finds out about this. My limbs stiffening, waiting in this groin
parliamentarian and economics professor had turned gunrunner and war correspondent, Kettle would have cause to retract his claim (indeed, as we shall see, he also played a significant role in resuming the duel), but in his introductory commentary he could write with confidence that ‘the crowd, the common herd, the multitude’, which the philosopher famously railed against, ‘has dismissed Nietzsche’s ideas in order
T HE Cold War ended dramatically on 26 December 1991 when the collapsed Soviet Union dissolved itself. Ironically, in late 1991 British forces were just returning from the war to help liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation, where they had fought with their airpower and heavy metal very much in Cold War style. It was as if anti-Soviet battle routines had been transposed out of NATO and tested by the allies in the open territory around Basra. Britain created a full division for the operation and
To discuss the perception and comprehension of war and ‘the military’ within the aims of the current volume, the Christianisation of warfare is an important factor. As a small contribution within this larger frame, I have chosen a very specific theme that nevertheless seems to be typically medieval: the religious (or religiously motivated) war in Carolingian times as it was perceived by contemporary chroniclers of the ninth century (whose convictions need not, of course, be identical with those who waged these wars). My general question
Introduction What is the logic governing journalistic practices in armed conflict contexts? 1 There are obvious physical constraints that make it difficult for sociologists and anthropologists to directly observe reporters working in war zones or areas of armed conflict. And while it is no substitute for direct observation, I would like to share my own experience of the multiple constraints that journalists face in crisis zones and of the
This book explores a particular 1918–20 ‘moment’ in the British Empire’s history, between the First World War’s armistices of 1918, and the peace treaties of 1919 and 1920. That moment, we argue, was a challenging and transformative time for the Empire. While British authorities successfully answered some of the post-war tests they faced, such as demobilisation, repatriation and fighting the widespread effects of the Spanish flu, the racial, social, political and economic hallmarks of their imperialism set the scene for a wide range of expressions of loyalties and disloyalties, and anticolonial movements. The book documents and conceptualises this 1918–20 ‘moment’ and its characteristics as a crucial three-year period of transformation for and within the Empire, examining these years for the significant shifts in the imperial relationship that occurred, and as laying the foundation for later change in the imperial system.
Twentieth century cinema involving monster conflict featured solitary monsters in combat (Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, for example). The writing of Anne Rice and the RPG Vampire: The Masquerade by White Wolf Games introduced the idea of Gothic communities and civilisations in conflict. It was not until after the terror attacks of 11 September that the idea of a clash of civilisations between supernatural societies fully emerged into the mainstream of popular culture. This essay explores the construction of a clash of civilisations between supernatural communities as a form of using the Gothic as a metaphor for contemporary terrorism in film and television series such as Underworld, Twilight, True Blood and The Vampire Diaries. Inevitably, it is the lycanthropes that are the disempowered and disenfranchised society and are alternately exploited by and rebel against the dominant vampire civilisation grown decadent and on the verge of collapse. Post-9/11 Gothic posits a world in which vampire society is the new normal, and werewolves represent a hidden danger within. Lycanthropes must be controlled, profiled and/or fought and defeated. Through close readings of the cinematic and televisual texts, I explore the vampire/werewolf clash as metaphor and metonym for the war on terror.
Total war tends to create a situation that falls back on established social and cultural discourses and institutional arrangements at the same time that it provides the opportunity for a shifting and renegotiation of these arrangements. This book explores how the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (FANY) drew upon, and/or subverted cultural mythologies to make sense of their wartime service. It focuses on this renegotiation of gender and examines seven key themes implicit in this process. The first theme concerns the ways women's military organizations utilized traditional notions of genteel femininity and its accompanying nurturance, cheerfulness and devotion in their promise of service, yet went beyond the parameters of such cultural mythologies. The second focuses on the gendering of military heroism. The third theme addresses the context of female military service in terms of the preparation women received, the opportunities they were given and the risks they took, and focuses on their coping behaviours. Theme four focuses specifically on women's transgression into the masculine terrain of driving and mechanics and shares the ways they developed skills and competencies previously off-limits for women. Such transgressions almost invariably led to women having to negotiate masculine authority and develop skills in autonomy, independence and assertiveness - the focus of theme five. The last two themes discussed in the book address the integration and consolidation of women's organizations as the war progressed and their service became indispensable.