Nobility Lost is a cultural history of the Seven Years' War in French-claimed North America, focused on the meanings of wartime violence and the profound impact of the encounter between Canadian, ...Indian, and French cultures of war and diplomacy. This narrative highlights the relationship between events in France and events in America and frames them dialogically, as the actors themselves experienced them at the time. Christian Ayne Crouch examines how codes of martial valor were enacted and challenged by metropolitan and colonial leaders to consider how those acts affected French-Indian relations, the culture of French military elites, ideas of male valor, and the trajectory of French colonial enterprises afterwards, in the second half of the eighteenth century. At Versailles, the conflict pertaining to the means used to prosecute war in New France would result in political and cultural crises over what constituted legitimate violence in defense of the empire. These arguments helped frame the basis for the formal French cession of its North American claims to the British in the Treaty of Paris of 1763.
While the French regular army, the troupes de terre (a late-arriving contingent to the conflict), framed warfare within highly ritualized contexts and performances of royal and personal honor that had evolved in Europe, the troupes de la marine (colonial forces with economic stakes in New France) fought to maintain colonial land and trade. A demographic disadvantage forced marines and Canadian colonial officials to accommodate Indian practices of gift giving and feasting in preparation for battle, adopt irregular methods of violence, and often work in cooperation with allied indigenous peoples, such as Abenakis, Hurons, and Nipissings.
Drawing on Native and European perspectives, Crouch shows the period of the Seven Years' War to be one of decisive transformation for all American communities. Ultimately the augmented strife between metropolitan and colonial elites over the aims and means of warfare, Crouch argues, raised questions about the meaning and cost of empire not just in North America but in the French Atlantic and, later, resonated in France's approach to empire-building around the globe. The French government examined the cause of the colonial debacle in New France at a corruption trial in Paris (known as l'affaire du Canada), and assigned blame. Only colonial officers were tried, and even those who were acquitted found themselves shut out of participation in new imperial projects in the Caribbean and in the Pacific. By tracing the subsequent global circumnavigation of Louis Antoine de Bougainville, a decorated veteran of the French regulars, 1766-1769, Crouch shows how the lessons of New France were assimilated and new colonial enterprises were constructed based on a heightened jealousy of French honor and a corresponding fear of its loss in engagement with Native enemies and allies.
With the rise of drones and computer-controlled weapons, the line between war and video games continues to blur. In this book, the authors trace how the realities of war are deeply inflected by their ...representation in popular entertainment. War games and other media, in turn, feature an increasing number of weapons, tactics, and threat scenarios from the War on Terror.While past analyses have emphasized top-down circulation of pro-military ideologies through government public relations efforts and a cooperative media industry, The Military-Entertainment Complex argues for a nonlinear relationship, defined largely by market and institutional pressures. Tim Lenoir and Luke Caldwell explore the history of the early days of the video game industry, when personnel and expertise flowed from military contractors to game companies; to a middle period when the military drew on the booming game industry to train troops; to a present in which media corporations and the military influence one another cyclically to predict the future of warfare.In addition to obvious military-entertainment titles like America's Army, Lenoir and Caldwell investigate the rise of best-selling franchise games such as Call of Duty, Battlefield, Medal of Honor, and Ghost Recon. The narratives and aesthetics of these video games permeate other media, including films and television programs. This commodification and marketing of the future of combat has shaped the public's imagination of war in the post-9/11 era and naturalized the U.S. Pentagon's vision of a new way of war.
Why does peace fail? More precisely, why do some countries that show every sign of having successfully emerged from civil war fall once again into armed conflict? What explains why peace "sticks" ...after some wars but not others? In this illuminating study, Charles T. Call examines the factors behind fifteen cases of civil war recurrence in Africa, Asia, the Caucasus, and Latin America. He argues that widely touted explanations of civil war-such as poverty, conflict over natural resources, and weak states-are far less important than political exclusion. Call's study shows that inclusion of former opponents in postwar governance plays a decisive role in sustained peace.Why Peace Failsultimately suggests that the international community should resist the temptation to prematurely withdraw resources and peacekeepers after a transition from war. Instead, international actors must remain fully engaged with postwar elected governments, ensuring that they make room for former enemies.
Other People's Wars explores key US efforts involving
direct observation missions and post-conflict investigations
throughout its history. Sterling shows how initiatives to learn
from other nations' ...wars can yield significant benefits,
emphasisizing comprehensive qualitative learning to foster better
military preparedness and adaptability.
Case studies explore how to improve military adaptation
and preparedness in peacetime by investigating foreign
wars
Preparing for the next war at an unknown date against an
undetermined opponent is a difficult undertaking with extremely
high stakes. Even the most detailed exercises and wargames do not
truly simulate combat and the fog of war. Thus, outside of their
own combat, militaries have studied foreign wars as a valuable
source of battlefield information. The effectiveness of this
learning process, however, has rarely been evaluated across
different periods and contexts.
Through a series of in-depth case studies of the US Army, Navy,
and Air Force, Brent L. Sterling creates a better understanding of
the dynamics of learning from "other people's wars," determining
what types of knowledge can be gained from foreign wars,
identifying common pitfalls, and proposing solutions to maximize
the benefits for doctrine, organization, training, and
equipment.
Other People's Wars explores major US efforts involving
direct observation missions and post-conflict investigations at key
junctures for the US armed forces: the Crimean War (1854-56),
Russo-Japanese War (1904-5), Spanish Civil War (1936-39), and Yom
Kippur War (1973), which preceded the US Civil War, First and
Second World Wars, and major army and air force reforms of the
1970s, respectively. The case studies identify learning pitfalls
but also show that initiatives to learn from other nations' wars
can yield significant benefits if the right conditions are met.
Sterling puts forth a process that emphasizes comprehensive
qualitative learning to foster better military preparedness and
adaptability.
In Inglorious, Illegal
Bastards , Aaron Herald Skabelund examines
how the Self-Defense Force (SDF)-the post-World War II Japanese
military-and specifically the Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF),
...struggled for legitimacy in a society at best indifferent to them
and often hostile to their very existence.
From the early iterations of the GSDF as the Police Reserve
Force and the National Safety Force, through its establishment as
the largest and most visible branch of the armed forces, the GSDF
deployed an array of public outreach and public service
initiatives, including off-base and on-base events, civil
engineering projects, and natural disaster relief operations.
Internally, the GSDF focused on indoctrination of its personnel to
fashion a reconfigured patriotism and esprit de corps. These
efforts to gain legitimacy achieved some success and influenced the
public over time, but they did not just change society. They also
transformed the force itself, as it assumed new priorities and
traditions and contributed to the making of a Cold War defense
identity, which came to be shared by wider society in Japan. As
Inglorious, Illegal Bastards demonstrates, this identity
endures today, several decades after the end of the Cold War.
This social and cultural history of Civil War medicine and science sheds important light on the question of why and how anti-Black racism survived the destruction of slavery. During the war, white ...Northerners promoted ideas about Black inferiority under the guise of medical and scientific authority. In particular, the Sanitary Commission and Army medical personnel conducted wartime research aimed at proving Black medical and biological inferiority. They not only subjected Black soldiers and refugees from slavery to substandard health care but also scrutinized them as objects of study. This mistreatment of Black soldiers and civilians extended after life to include dissection, dismemberment, and disposal of the Black war dead in unmarked or mass graves and medical waste pits. Simultaneously, white medical and scientific investigators enhanced their professional standing by establishing their authority on the science of racial difference and hierarchy. Drawing on archives of the U.S. Sanitary Commission, recollections of Civil War soldiers and medical workers, and testimonies from Black Americans, Leslie A. Schwalm exposes the racist ideas and practices that shaped wartime medicine and science. Painstakingly researched and accessibly written, this book helps readers understand the persistence of anti-Black racism and health disparities during and after the war.
How to Look Good in A War examines the methods used to depict, defend and justify the use of state violence. Many books have shown how 'truth is the first casualty of war' but this is the first to ...analyse exactly how pro-war narratives are constructed and normalised. Brian Rappert details the 'upside-down' world of war in which revelation conceals, knowledge fosters uncertainty, and transparency obscures. He looks at government spin during recent wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya where officials manoeuvre between circulating and withholding information. Examining how organised violence is justified, How to Look Good in A War draws on experiences from recent controversy to consider how ignorance about the operation of war is produced and how concerned individuals and groups can intervene to make a difference.
Will be of interest to those working on conflict and peace studies,
economic development, cultural studies, and women in the modern world. A key new
publication. -- Chandra R. de Silva, Old Dominion
...University ... offers a superb overview of how a civil war,
driven by ethnicity, can engender a new culture and a new political economy...
Highly recommended. -- Choice Economy, Culture, and
Civil War in Sri Lanka provides a lucid and up-to-date interpretation of Sri Lankan
society and its 20-year civil conflict. An interdisciplinary examination of the
relationship between the economy, broadly defined, and the reproduction of violent
conflict, this volume argues that the war is grounded not just in the goals and
intentions of the opposing sides, but also in the everyday orientations,
experiences, and material practices of all Sri Lankan people. The contributors
explore changing political and policy contexts; the effect of long-term conflict on
employment opportunities and life choices for rural and urban youth; life histories,
memory, and narratives of violence; the economics of enlisting and
individual decisions about involvement in the war; and nationalism and the moral
debate triggered by women's employment in the international garment manufacturing
industry. Contributors are Francesca Bremner, Michele Ruth
Gamburd, Newton Gunasinghe, Siri T. Hettige, Caitrin Lynch, John M. Richardson, Jr.,
Amita Shastri, Deborah Winslow, and Michael D. Woost.
This open access book explores the history of asylums and their civilian patients during the First World War, focusing on the effects of wartime austerity and deprivation on the provision of care. ...While a substantial body of literature on 'shell shock' exists, this study uncovers the mental wellbeing of civilians during the war. It provides the first comprehensive account of wartime asylums in London, challenging the commonly held view that changes in psychiatric care for civilians post-war were linked mainly to soldiers' experiences and treatment. Drawing extensively on archival and published sources, this book examines the impact of medical, scientific, political, cultural and social change on civilian asylums. It compares four asylums in London, each distinct in terms of their priorities and the diversity of their patients. Revealing the histories of the 100,000 civilian patients who were institutionalised during the First World War, this book offers new insights into decision-making and prioritisation of healthcare in times of austerity, and the myriad factors which inform this.
Throughout the history of the Crusades, liturgical prayer, masses, and alms were all marshaled in the fight against Muslim armies. In Invisible Weapons, M. Cecilia Gaposchkin focuses on the ways in ...which Latin Christians communicated their ideas and aspirations for crusade to God through liturgy, how public worship was deployed, and how prayers and masses absorbed the ideals and priorities of crusading. Placing religious texts and practices within the larger narrative of crusading, Gaposchkin offers a new understanding of a crucial facet in the culture of holy war.
