My reflections on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial were provoked some time ago in a quite natural way, by a visit to the memorial itself. I happened upon it almost by accident, a fact that is due at least in part to the design of the Memorial itself . I found myself reduced to awed silence, and I resolved to attend the dedication ceremony on November 13, 1982. It was an extraordinary event, without question the most (...) moving public ceremony I have ever attended. But my own experience of the Memorial on that and other occasions is far from unique. It is almost commonplace among the many visitors to the VVM—now the most visited of all the memorials in Washington—a fact so striking as to have compelled journalists, art historians, and architects to write countless articles about the monument. And although philosophers traditionally have had little to say about architecture in general or about that of memorials in particular, there is much in the VVM and its iconography worthy of philosophical reflection. Self-knowledge includes, I hazard to say, knowledge of ourselves as members of the larger social and political context, and so includes knowledge of that context.Architecture need not memorialize or symbolize anything; or it may symbolize, but not in a memorializing way, let alone in a way that is tied to a nation’s history. The structures on the Washington Mall belong to a particular species of recollective architecture, a species whose symbolic and normative content is prominent. After all, war memorials by their very nature recall struggles to the death over values. Still further, the architecture by which a people memorializes itself is a species of pedagogy. It therefore seeks to instruct posterity about the past and, in so doing, necessarily reaches a decision about what is worth recovering. It would thus be a mistake to try to view such memorials merely “aesthetically,” in abstraction from all judgments about the noble and the base. To reflect philosophically on specific monuments, as I propose to do here, necessarily requires something more than a simply technical discussion of the theory of architecture or of the history of a given species of architecture. We must also understand the monument’s symbolism, social context, and the effects its architecture works on those who participate in it. That is, we must understand the political iconography which shapes and is shaped y the public structure in question. To do less than this—if I may state a complex argument in hopelessly few words—is to fall short of the demands of true objectivity, of an understanding of the whole which the object is. To understand the meaning of the VVM requires that we understand, among other things, what the memorial means to those who visit it. This is why my observations about the dedication of the VVM and about the Memorial’s continuing power over people play an important role in this essay. Charles L. Griswold, associate professor of philosophy at Howard University, is the author of Self-Knowledge in Plat’s “Phaedrus” and has published widely in the areas of Greek philosophy, German Idealism, hermeneutics, and political philosophy. He is an editor of the Independent Journal of Philosophy and a recipient of numerous awards and fellowships. Currently he is working on a project which centers on Adam Smith’s notion of the “self” and Smith’s relationship to Stoicism and to the American Founding. (shrink)

Monument or memorial? Defeat or withdrawal? The Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC pays tribute to more than 58,000 Americans who died fighting an unpopular war. Yet today the ‘Wall’, as it is known to most Americans, is the most visited site managed by the US National Park Service. Weekend visitors will happen upon an almost festive place as thousands of people pass by looking at the names – what do they think, imagine? This chapter discusses (...) not only the story and controversy behind the building of the ‘Wall’, but also how it reflects the collective memory of a society and its values, and how these are constructed. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A National Shrine to Scapegoating? The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Washington, D.C. Jon Pahl Valparaiso University In a recent survey I conducted of visitors to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C, 92 percent agreed that "the memorial is a sacred place, and should be treated as such."1 Clearly, this place, by some reports the most visited site in the U.S. capital, draws (...) devotion. But how does a pilgrimage to this memorial function?2 Does pilgrimage to "the wall" serve to "heal a nation," as its builders intended, or does pilgrimage to the memorial ironically legitimize structures of violence like those which led the United States into the Vietnamese conflict in the first place?3 My argument builds upon the work of René Girard to suggest that pilgrimage to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial can legitimize the violence of American culture by 'The survey was of 185 pilgrims attending ceremonies during Veterans Day, November 11, 1993 and 1994. Several recent works explore the interface between civil religion and violence, notably John E. Bodnar, Karal Ann Marling, and Edward T. Linenthal. On sacred places, the pioneering work of Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane, remains important but must be supplemented by Jonathan Z. Smith's Imagining Religion. 1 Victor and Edith Turner argue cogently that "if a tourist is half pilgrim, a pilgrim is half tourist" (20). Many visitors to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial understand themselves only as tourists, but their behavior appears to me to warrant treatment under the category of "pilgrimage." 3 I assume a "maximalist" definition of violence, which understands the word to refer not only to physical harm to individuals, but also to systemic, social structures of exclusion (such as racism), and ideological (or symbolic) justifications of violence (see Robert McAfee Brown; for a minimalist approach, see Gerald Runkle). 166Jon Pahi reinforcing scapegoating.4 At the same time, however, the established religious pluralism and voluntarism of American culture—evident in this pilgrimage process—diffuses violence. Furthermore, the democratic character of this pilgrimage empowers pilgrims to critique idolatrous worship of the nation, and to witness to authentic reverence for life. Mimesis on the mall A brief impressionistic portrait ofthe way visitors experience the Vietnam Veterans Memorial will demonstrate how the memorial draws pilgrims into a mimetic process—a key feature of Girard's theory. Many pilgrims stop at the memorial as part of a National Park Service 'Tourmobile' circuit of museums and memorials, or as part of another bus tour (school and senior citizens groups are especially common ). These busses disembark pilgrims at the base of the Lincoln Memorial, directly in front of the reflecting pool on the national mall, in sight of the Washington Monument and the Capitol. Pilgrims may, or may not, first climb the steps of the Lincoln Memorial (a powerful shrine with implications for understanding violence in its own right). Moving north, they eventually proceed along a sidewalk lined with Fig. 1 "Three Men Statue".,. several tents where veterans organizations sell T-shirts, medals, bumper-stickers, books, and other memorabilia. The first stop for many pilgrims is the "Three Men Statue" (Fig. 1) located in a grove just past the tents. 4 I summarize Girard's theory as follows: Beginning with mimetic desire, rivalry for an object escalates and threatens the social order. Religion—and notably sacrifice of the scapegoat—creates sufficient unanimity to restore a sense of social order, but does so through violence itself, masking through myth and ritual a vicious cycle of aggression we know as the history of human culture. A National Shrine to Scapegoating?167 This bronze statue (and the American flag which flies nearby) was not part ofthe original design for the memorial, and was dedicated in 1985, three years after the wall of names. It was the result of a compromise between founders of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund led by veteran Jan Scruggs and a group led by 1992 Presidential candidate H. Ross Perot which was dissatisfied with the wall and felt the need for a more 'heroic' representation of the survivors ofthe war.5 Most pilgrims understand little of the history behind the statue, or its intent to create a more heroic... (shrink)

Danto's discussion of site‐related and site‐specific art opens up perspectives on both his conception of the ethics and politics of public art and on his ultimately idealistic ontology of art. Danto's analysis of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial involves an important distinction between monuments and memorials that is highly relevant to current controversies, like those about Confederate statues. His differing responses to two site‐related public art works by Richard Serra exhibit a nuanced sensibility to the taste of the (...) public audience and the aesthetics of genius loci. Danto's enthusiastic account of several site‐specific works involving minimal interventions on the ground (some of which remained in the planning stage) disclose his inclination to reduce art to its idea, prescinding from its material presence. (shrink)

Conceived to commemorate the victims of South Korea’s participation in the Vietnam War, the statue of the Vietnam Pieta invites us to question who shapes the memory of this neglected facet of the conflict. The present article analyzes the various actors involved in this contentious process in and across both countries, starting with the South Korean activists behind the statue’s making and the movement for recognizing the crimes committed by their army. Examining these activists’ advocacy work since the (...) late 1990s, the article argues that they are triply situated in the fight over remembering South Korea’s intervention in Vietnam. Truth advocates first appear in a position of privilege and leadership vis-à-vis Vietnamese victims of South Korean military wrongdoings, which raises the issue of the material and political asymmetries at stake in the construction of memory. Simultaneously, the same advocates occupy a position of marginality vis-à-vis the dominant public discourse held on the war by Hanoi and Seoul, whose common interest lies in deepening their mutually beneficial but unequal economic partnership. Thirdly, the memory of the conflict pits truth activists against another group within their own civil society: veterans’ organizations aggressively denying all war crimes accusations. Ultimately, remembering the war is not the object of a bilateral dispute between the South Korean and Vietnamese states, but rather a site of domestic tensions within South Korea itself. (shrink)

This paper is about women nurse veterans from the Royal Australian Army Nursing Corps (RAANC) who served in Vietnam. I aim to develop an understanding about these nurses that might place their experiences into a wider context. My conclusions provide starting points for future studies on myth, remembering and oral history.

P. J. Rhodes: Preface Polly Low and Graham Oliver: Comparing Cultures of Commemoration in Ancient and Modern Societies Polly Low: The Monuments ot the War Dead in Classical Athens: Forms, Contexts, Meanings Alison Cooley: Commemorating the War Dead of the Roman World Angelos Chaniotis: The Ritualised Commemoration of War in the Hellenistic City: Memory, Identity, Emotion Avner Ben-Amos: Two Neo-Classical Monuments in Modern France: The Pantheon and Arc de Triomphe Graham Oliver: Naming the Dead, Writing the Individual: Classical Traditions and (...) Commemorative Practices in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries Stefan Goebel: Cultural Memory and the Great War: Medievalism and Classicism in British and German War Memorials Lawrence A. Tritle: Monument to Defeat: the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in American Culture and Society. (shrink)

Arthur Danto asserts that Maya Lin’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington really embodies the beauty of his meaning. For him, the Memorial’s “internal beauty” is felt and read because she is built as a text by the rhetoric of enthymeme, as a syllogism based on some tacit knowledges and highly probables communplaces. However, the relationship to the Kant’s pulchritudo adhaerens and philosophy of architecture is not an easy one : Danto rejects as unreadable the self-referent formalism (...) of Greenberg’s Modernism and the environmental non-monumentality of Richard Serra’s Minimalism, but the agency of the Memorial’s shared internal beauty is haunted by an unquestioned spectral logic. Actually, the image embodiment in this work can always exceed the rhetoric of reconnaissance supported by the syllogistic rhetoric and disturb the identity framework of the nord-american community. The beholders’ reflecting shape on the Memorial can become, finally, an unreadable and pathetic index, or be perceived as a figural imprint, ephemeral and troubling ; these disembodied pictures can achieve a medial incarnation – e.g. a Verkörperung – of the underworld. (shrink)

Arthur Danto asserts that Maya Lin’s Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington embodies the rhetoric paradigm of internal beauty’s meaning. However, the relationship to the Kant’s pulchritudo adhaerens is not an easy one: Danto’s recalls against the self-referent formalism of Greenberg’s Modernism and his tacit issues about the environmental non-monumentality of Richard Serra’s Minimalism, are, most importantly, haunted by the unquestioned spectral logic of the image embodiment. The beholders’ reflecting shape on the funeral Wall is, finally, both a (...) pathetic index and a medial incarnation–e.g. a Verkörperung–of the underworld. (shrink)

This paper replies to the account of forgiveness developed in Griswold’s Forgiveness: A Philosophical Exploration. It defends the idea that “unilateral” forgiveness is the paradigm case of the virtue of forgiveness, rejecting Griswold’s claims that forgiveness is essentially a “dyadic” virtue, and that reconciliation of the wronged party with the wrongdoer is a defining element of forgiveness. Forgiveness is fundamentally a matter of being reconciled to the persistence of human wrongdoing, as expressed in particular instances. Reconciliation may well be essential (...) to some attempts at “political apology” for wide-scale wrongdoing. But then, contrary to some of Griswold’s claims, forgiveness will be central to many national projects of bringing about civic reconciliation. The paper also distinguishes between the project of seeking moral reconciliation from the project of seeking and granting political recognition for those who have been denied civic status. Contrary to Griswold’s view, the Vietnam Veterans War Memorial is best understood as a project of seeking and granting recognition, not as an attempt to produce civic reconciliation in response to the Vietnam War. (shrink)

In the absence of shared beliefs and even common interests, it should not be surprising that so much of the well-intentioned art acquired for public spaces has failed—failed as art and as art for a civic site. The conventional wisdom of simply choosing “the best artist” and then turning him or her loose to create a work within time and budget guidelines lost much credibility with the drama of Richard Serra’s Tilted Arc commission: the process of selection, erection, litigation, rejection, (...) and removal of the sculpture from the Federal Building plaza in New York City. The new conventional wisdom? The jury, not the artist, was ultimately responsible. For Serra did precisely the kind of work for which he is respected worldwide but in a context and for a specific public whose requirements, in their view, were not met but even abrogated by what Serra had done so well: made a Serra.The issues raised by this particular controversy as well as by the very different response now accorded the once-controversial Vietnam Veterans Memorial by Maya Lin, together with firsthand frustration with the selection process for public commissions, were some of the specific reasons for organizing the day-long symposium held 16 September 1989 in First Chicago Center under the auspices of Sculpture Chicago, a biennial exhibition and educational series. John Hallmark Neff, director of the First National Bank of Chicago’s art program, is a former director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. He is the author of Anselm Kiefer: Brüch und Einung , and he is currently working on a book on Max Neuhaus and a catalogue essay for the forthcoming Agnes Denes retrospective exhibition. (shrink)

As far back as we know, there have been individuals incapacitated by memories that have filled them with sadness and remorse, fright and horror, or a sense of irreparable loss. Only recently, however, have people tormented with such recollections been diagnosed as suffering from "post-traumatic stress disorder." Here Allan Young traces this malady, particularly as it is suffered by Vietnam veterans, to its beginnings in the emergence of ideas about the unconscious mind and to earlier manifestations of traumatic (...) memory like shell shock or traumatic hysteria. In Young's view, PTSD is not a timeless or universal phenomenon newly discovered. Rather, it is a "harmony of illusions," a cultural product gradually put together by the practices, technologies, and narratives with which it is diagnosed, studied, and treated and by the various interests, institutions, and moral arguments mobilizing these efforts. This book is part history and part ethnography, and it includes a detailed account of everyday life in the treatment of Vietnam veterans with PTSD. To illustrate his points, Young presents a number of fascinating transcripts of the group therapy and diagnostic sessions that he observed firsthand over a period of two years. Through his comments and the transcripts themselves, the reader becomes familiar with the individual hospital personnel and clients and their struggle to make sense of life after a tragic war. One observes that everyone on the unit is heavily invested in the PTSD diagnosis: boundaries between therapist and patient are as unclear as were the distinctions between victim and victimizer in the jungles of Southeast Asia. (shrink)

Several authors have argued that traumatic experiences are processed and remembered in a qualitatively different way from neutral events. To investigate this issue, we interviewed 121 Croatian war veterans diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder about amnesia, intrusions , and the sensory qualities of their most horrific war memories. Additionally, they completed a self-report scale measuring dissociative experiences. In contrast to what one would expect on the basis of theories emphasizing the special status of traumatic memories, amnesia, and high frequency (...) intrusions were not particularly typical for our sample of traumatized individuals. Moreover, traumatic memories were not qualitatively different from neutral memories with respect to their stability and sensory qualities. The severity of PTSD symptoms was not significantly correlated with dissociative experiences. Our findings do not support the existence of special memory mechanisms that are unique to experiencing traumatic events. (shrink)

In this article we analyze the social memories of the Vietnam War afforded by tourism at the Cu Chi battlefield. Specifically, we explore the experiences of tourists at the site in order to address the under-theorized relationship between carnivalesque and dialogical discourses. Drawing on field interviews and ethnographic engagement with young adult Western tourists who took tours led by Vietnamese guides, we document how the tourists’ playful engagement with the past at Cu Chi facilitates the development of new dialogical (...) memories of the war. Our interviews reveal a strong concern with the suffering of both occupying forces and the Vietnamese communist forces, a finding that points to the need for scholars to better appreciate the multiplicity of ways that social performances function in shaping social memory. Ultimately, we challenge social performance theories whose explanations reduce shifts in social memory to audience interpretations of authenticity. (shrink)

In this collection of essays, Camillo “Mac” Bica, Ph.D., a former Marine Corps Officer, Vietnam Veteran, and philosopher, provides a cogent analysis of why a veteran may not want to be thanked for his “service” in war. Mac’s experiential and theoretical perspective is both gut wrenching and concise. “The Philosopher speaks from the mind,” Mac writes, “the warrior from where it hurts.” With simplicity, poignancy, and power, this book, together with future installments of the War Legacy Series, works to (...) dispel the mythology of nobility and heroism by providing a window into the reality of war and its devastating effects upon all who experience its horrors. (shrink)

(2001). Moving places: A comment on the traveling Vietnam Memorial. Philosophy & Geography: Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 219-224.

(2001). Moving places: A comment on the traveling Vietnam Memorial. Philosophy & Geography: Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 219-224.

La guerre du Vietnam a été le plus grand traumatisme vécu par les Américains au XXe siècle, une « tache » dans « leur siècle » que la société a progressivement estompée pour faire entrer le récit de cette guerre dans la logique de la « Destinée manifeste ». L'analyse des fictions cinématographiques et télé­visées produites aux États-Unis permet de suivre l'évolution de ce travail de mémoire : violence du traumatisme dans les années 1960 et surtout 1970, « révision (...) » dans les années 1980 pour en faire une « noble cause », devenue quasi folklorique dans les années 1990 et remise au goût du jour dans les années 2000 face au nouveau bourbier américain, l'Irak.The Vietnam War was a momentous trauma for 20th century Americans, a "stain}} on "the American century" that was gradually glossed over by society to bring events into line with the "Manifest Destiny". This analysis of film and TV fiction produced in the United States tracks the workings of memory from the violent trauma of the 1960s and especially the 1970s, through to the "revision" of the 1980s that turned the war into a "noble cause}}, then into !ittle more than anecdotal folklore in the 1990s, and finally, after 2000, back to centre stage as America once more sank into a quagmire, this time in Iraq. (shrink)

In 1974, John P. "Jack" Murtha became the first Vietnam combat veteran elected to Congress. In the nearly three decades since then, Congressman Murtha has been intimately involved with governmental decisions about America's national security and foreign policy, adding his unique perspective to international affairs while faithfully representing Pennsylvania's twelfth district. _From Vietnam to 9/11 _combines personal memoir with thoughtful analysis to provide a behind-the-scenes account of the formation and conduct of U.S. foreign policy in the last quarter-century. (...) At the same time, it tells the story of a man committed to service and community. (shrink)

In 1974, John P. "Jack" Murtha became the first Vietnam combat veteran elected to Congress. In the nearly three decades since then, Congressman Murtha has been intimately involved with governmental decisions about America's national security and foreign policy, adding his unique perspective to international affairs while faithfully representing Pennsylvania's twelfth district. _From Vietnam to 9/11 _combines personal memoir with thoughtful analysis to provide a behind-the-scenes account of the formation and conduct of U.S. foreign policy in the last quarter-century. (...) At the same time, it tells the story of a man committed to service and community. (shrink)

Americans are very grateful to veterans. Veterans are celebrated via speeches, statues, memorials, holidays, and affirmative action. They are lavishly praised in public gatherings and private conversations. Contrary to this widespread attitude, I argue that U.S. citizens should not be very grateful to veterans. In evaluating whether the significant gratitude toward veterans is justified, I begin by exploring the nature of gratitude. On my account, one person should be very grateful to a second person just in (...) case the second person reasonably attempted to provide a significant benefit to the first and was primarily motivated by concern for the first’s well-being. I then look at whether veterans typically satisfy these conditions and argue that they do not. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of CharacterGraham ZankerAchilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character, by Jonathan Shay; xxiii & 246 pp. New York: Atheneum, 1994, $20.00.This book, a study of posttraumatic stress disorder victims among U.S. Vietnam veterans which considers the Iliadic Achilles as a test-case, has a clear tripartite structure. First, the causes of PTSD are located (...) in a sense of betrayal by superior officers which results in a shrinkage of social and moral horizons to include only one’s closest friend who, if killed, triggers off guilt and frequently the berserk state. The parallel with Achilles’ relations with Agamemnon, Patroklos, and Hektor is strikingly close.Second, Shay discusses the importance of honoring the enemy, as he finds happens in the Iliad; remarks on “what Homer left out,” like deprivation; illustrates the limitations placed by luck upon the soldier’s virtue, engaging usefully with the work of Martha Nussbaum in the context of the Iliad and actual modern combat; and considers the Homeric gods as “REMFs” (Rear Echelon Mother-Fuckers), a droll notion by no means devoid of truth.The third section argues for the inadequacy of the U.S. definition of PTSD and offers suggestions for preventing the disorder, like proper grieving for the dead, and strategies for treating it, including the communalization of the trauma by narrative, which Shay sees in exemplary form in Attic tragedy.The four reservations I set forth here are meant on the whole to offer the perspective of a Homerist, and are discussed in detail in my The Heart of Achilles: Characterization and Personal Ethics in the Iliad. First, Shay recognizes the vital role of honor in Iliadic society, but does not point home quite clearly enough that honoring the enemy was built into the Iliadic warrior-ethic: the intensely individualistic sense of honor insisted that combatants knew one another by [End Page 376] name, for anonymity was uniformly detested. Thus, when Shay makes his convincing case for honoring the foe in modern combat as benefiting the mental health of combatants and veterans, his suggestion that the Iliad’s warriors were acting “properly” should, I feel, have been accompanied by a distinction between Iliadic and modern motives for honoring the enemy. Second, Shay could profitably have probed more deeply into Achilles’ reasons for refusing the supplication of the Achaians: Achilles now expresses doubt over honor as the driving factor in human effort, for he claims that the only ultimate honor is shared by warriors both great and small—death. Third, I suggest that Shay underplays the meeting of Priam and Achilles in Iliad 24 where, as I have argued, Achilles goes far beyond what is commended by the reciprocity-driven warrior honor code, achieving a magnanimity which modern philosophers like Bernard Williams would call altruism. Fourth, Shay denies that any true war story can carry a moral (p. 183). If Book 24 shows Achilles to any degree restating or refining the generosity admitted by the “code,” the Iliad, for one, assuredly carries a moral. The narrative is bleak, but the narrator leaves the audience uplifted by the thought that pity and kindness can meaningfully be extended even to an enemy, given that all humanity is subject to forces beyond its control, an idea explicitly stated in Achilles’ image of the Jars of Zeus.That said, and while this book is targeted primarily at medical professionals, literary scholars will be fascinated to find the Iliad used sometimes as an exemplar for modern war practice, for instance in Shay’s commendation of Diomedes’ moderation during combat, sometimes as strikingly paralleling the mental processes of the modern soldier, especially, of course, in the progress of Achilles. Putting the relationship of Achilles and Patroklos in the context of the experience of the Vietnam berserker, for example, adds a significant dimension to what has often been felt to be a mysteriously underdeveloped presentation of the friendship. Scholars will be grateful to see a respected psychiatrist reminding us that Homer’s original audiences, with their frequent experience of warfare in the service of their local lords, would have been particularly alert to any psychological improbabilities... (shrink)

Extensive media coverage of the nation’s response to its obligation to furnish health care for service members wounded in current overseas conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan has elevated public consciousness of the importance of the U.S. military and veteran’s health care systems to a level not seen since the end of the Vietnam War. The number of casualties of U.S. military engagements has varied in each specific conflict and is a direct result of both the type of battle and (...) the military’s ability to handle battlefield injuries. (shrink)

This essay compares decade-long commemorations between American and Japanese veterans of Pearl Harbor, and the ancient kabuki legend of “Treading the Tiger's Tail”, which also concerns enemies who come to appreciate their commonalities. The “danger zones” in the joint Pearl Harbor reunions had less to do with enemies still fighting an old war, than with each nation's internally unresolved tensions and with sensitivities across a broader, more complex constellation of postures toward war memory. Hawai'i played a significant role in (...) providing a more culturally porous milieu for the veterans to meet, away from the mainstream tensions in each of their respective nations. (shrink)

The author reviews the planned withdrawal of healthcare from the primary public hospital, Grady Memorial Hospital, of Atlanta, Georgia. Prior to passage of the Affordable Care Act of 2010, at least half of the patients had no public or private health insurance and their care was financially supported by State and County funding as well as supplementation from Emory University. New administration in the elected positions of the State and County and at the University reached agreement to decrease care. (...) The University President stated that the Hippocratic Oath was no longer valid for salaried physicians who must follow the direction of their business manager. The author, a tenured Professor, was forcibly transferred to the Veterans Hospital, which also was withholding standard medical care, including life-saving medications. Organizing multiple concerned organizations including members of the King Center, the Carter Center, the Open Door Community Center, Gay Rights, etc., (Grady Coalition) multiple public protests were successful in raising the necessary funds to continue adequate care at Grady and begin an investigation of the Veterans Affairs Hospital. (shrink)

Jacques Derrida has written much in recent years on the topic of mourning. This essay takes Derrida's insights into mourning in general and collective mourning in particular in order to ask about the relationship between mourning and politics. Taking a lead from a recent work of Derrida's on Jean-François Lyotard, the essay develops its argument through two examples, one from ancient Greece and one from twentiethcentury America: the role mourning plays in the constitution and maintenance of the state in Plato's (...) Laws and the controversy surrounding the consecration of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier of Vietnam in Arlington National Cemetery. This latter example provides the occasion for questioning the possibilities of mourning the unknown or the unidentifiable and for addressing some of the ways in which the United States has mourned or failed to mourn, remembered or failed to remember, in the wake of September 11. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Introduction:Remarks in Memory of David W. ChappellDonald K. SwearerOn December 8, 1996, David Chappell delivered the Bodhi Day lecture, titled "Bodhisattva in the Twenty-first Century," at the Hompa Hongwanji Temple in central Oahu. The lecture wasn't autobiographical—David was much too unassuming to have thought of himself in these terms—but those of us who loved David and who had the privilege of working with him over many years have no (...) such qualms. David's dedication, sincerity of spirit, generosity, and compassion were truly bodhisattva-like.In his lecture David contrasts the superficial, electronic Internet connectedness of our lives today with the common ground discovered at Awakening based on what David called "heart connection," an insight into the shared nature of all sentient beings that leads to empathy, compassion, and kindness. In contrast to enlightened heart connectedness, Internet interaction lacks the capacity of an intimacy with the varied phenomena of life at each moment. "The Internet," he observes, "allows us to ease our solitude by getting access to things that are compatible with our own interests. However, Buddhism considers that the achievement of enlightenment involves being able to be compatible and have empathy with things that may seem foreign or offensive or a threat to us by seeing them as connected and similar to ourselves. This involves not just new information, or a new perspective on things, but a new understanding of ourselves and our relationship to others at a level that touches what is beyond manipulation or even rational expression."I've quoted rather extensively from David's 1996 Bodhi Day talk because it reveals several dimensions of his bodhisattva-like nature: his sense of connectedness with those around him and a heart-to-heart intimacy with a wide network of friends, acquaintances, and even those at a greater personal distance. David's simpatico nature was manifested in many ways—from his body language to his dedication to peacemaking.On a visit to the United States during the Vietnam War, Thich Nhat Hanh was speaking to a large audience gathered in the auditorium of a large Midwestern church. Following the talk a middle-aged man jumped to his feet, shook his clenched [End Page 3] fist in anger, and shouted in a loud voice, "Well, Mr. Hanh, if you're so concerned about your fellow Vietnamese dying in the rice paddies, why are you here?! Why aren't you there with them?!" Thây stood silently for what seemed like minutes and then replied in calm, quiet tones, "I'm here because some of the roots of the war are here in the United States. When one waters a plant, it's insufficient to water the leaves. One has to water the roots." He then turned and walked slowly through the side door of the auditorium. Jim Forest, Thây's Catholic Peace Fellowship friend who was in the audience, sensed something was wrong and quickly followed him outside. There he found his friend bent over, hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. Slowly Thây stood erect and, breathing normally, explained that in order not to respond in anger but with understanding and compassion he had entered into deep breathing; however, the state he had achieved had been too deep and left him short of breath. Jim Forest later observed in a memoir that for the first time in his life he realized the profound connection between breathing and one's actions.David's inner nature was expressed in an act as simple as breathing: his trademark bodhisattva-like smile. At the 1980 Oahu conference that launched the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies, convened by David and his colleague Bob Bobilin, there were more than just one or two frustrating logistical snafus. Whatever the crisis, however, David never lost his cool. He would smile and in his typically unhurried manner offer a helping hand or a word of calm advice, seemingly in the belief that good karma, compassionate Buddha nature, or God's grace would help rectify the situation.David stories abound—humorous, poignant, moving. Those who worked with him as colleagues in religious studies, the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies... (shrink)

A woman is listening to Sinatra before work. As she later describes it, ‘suddenly from nowhere I could hear my mother singing along to it … I was there again home again, hearing my mother … God knows why I should choose to remember that … then, to actually hear her and I had this image in my head … of being at home … with her singing away … like being transported back you know I got one of those (...) … like shivery feelings really suddenly’ (Anderson 2004, 9-10). An older couple, discussing their honeymoon forty years ago, each say that they can’t remember the show they saw, until through iterative, puzzled cross-cuing they finally get there – ‘Desert Song, that’s it’ (Harris et al 2011, 292). An elderly English veteran of a prisoner of war camp in Japan, finishing up morning tea with a young Japanese social scientist interested in reconciliation, suddenly calls out loudly - in Japanese - ‘stand to attention’. He stands to attention in front of her: like many of the men she interviews, he physically re-enacts fragments of that long-past world of the camp, bringing that absent past into this new present context with a visceral shock (Murakami 2001, 2012; Middleton & Brown 2005, 133-136). (shrink)

This article probes some of the issues The Great War and Modern Memory raises today, whether by Fussell himself, by critics at the time of its original publication, or by rereading the book anew now, in the context of a veritable renaissance in the study of World War I and of the revolution effected by the "literary turn" in historical study. I situate Fussell's book against the backdrop of three foundational works or points of view in cultural history that came (...) to the forefront after 1975. My purpose is not to chide Fussell for failing to anticipate the future directions of the cultural history of war, but rather to show how his work fits into the development of that history.I argue that The Great War and Modern Memory itself became a lieu de mémoire or "site of memory" of the Great War. But like many very successful works, Fussell's book became famous not exclusively or even primarily because of its originality, but because of its ability to reformulate or reinscribe pre-existing ways of understanding. As critic and as veteran, Fussell reasserted the "evidence of experience" as the cornerstone of war writing in the twentieth century. In addition, some of the impact of The Great War and Modern Memory can be explained by the way it supported the most venerable narrative explanation of the Great War, that of tragedy. (shrink)

Since Jonathan Shay's work with Vietnam veterans, moral injury has largely focused on the harm done to soldiers' moral character through their participation in warfare. This essay argues for the inclusion of noncombatants in the scope of inquiry involving moral injury. Specifically, it argues for the necessity of ordinary citizens assuming responsibility for the moral injury done to soldiers and civilians alike in the post‐9/11 wars.

This book explores numerous ways in which vulgar language, grotesque appearances, and horrific experiences affect us in our relationships with others and with ourselves. Its compelling case studies and revealing interviews bring together ideas and issues that are a lingering, but unexplored, focus in psychotherapy literature. The grotesque and the vulgar are major inhabitants of the vast unconscious. Their variations and haunting presence are anticipated and reflected in the transactions of everyday life. So too do they manifest themselves in our (...) social institutions, maintaining their presence in the seven lively arts as much as in mental hospitals, rehabilitation facilities, and psychotherapy practices. Most of all, the grotesque and vulgar challenge the contemporary search for meaning and sanity. This book will help the psychotherapist better deal with the rich soil of grotesqueness and vulgarity in the interplay between the psychotherapy patient and the experiential world. Reading it will open new vistas of treatment possibilities. As each contributing author explores the potentialities and obstacles inherent in the competing and complementing forces of the grotesque and socially condoned sensibilities, you will learn about the value of the grotesque in the consultation room. You will further learn how the flaunted and unconscious vulgarities of everyday life enrich the creative vision inherent in therapeutic conversations. Most important, you will be challenged by what it means to abide with the sometimes pesky vulgar and grotesque guises in each of your client's lives. Here's a sample of what you'll find in Inhabitants of the Unconscious: The Grotesque and the Vulgar in Everyday Life: Louis Fierman's recollection of his treatment of a Nazi soldier, which offers fascinating therapeutic possibilities when issues of the grotesqueare at hand an extraordinary analysis of the role of the grotesque in artwork, with special attention paid to the work of Hieronymus Bosch a fascinating look at Sigmund Freud's perspective on the grotesque&#; and what it says about Freud himself the remarkable formative experiences of children with craniofacial difference &#;an exposition that will enrich your therapeutic interventions with children and adolescents who face atypical challenges extraordinary case studies&#;by Robert Marchesani about his therapeutic endeavors with a Vietnam veteran caught in the aftermath of his incestuous past and by E. Mark Stern about a dying woman who was unable to detach from, but ultimately vivified by an unyielding masochistic fixation. (shrink)

On the morning of April 23, 1971, a long line of Vietnam Veterans formed near the lower west terrace of the US Capitol building. Thousands of spectators and a contingent of journalists gathered around them. At 10 a.m., after an aged veteran in olive fatigues blew taps on a bugle, a 27-year-old former Marine sergeant named Jack Smith threw his combat medals over a crude chicken wire and wood fence that surrounded the Capitol. “We cast these [medals] away,” (...) he announced, “as symbols of shame, dishonor, and inhumanity” (p. 113). Observers estimated that between 600 and 3000 vets followed him,…. (shrink)

In the late 1980s and 1990s, American popular culture has been increasingly rife with conspiracy narratives of recent historical events. Among cultural producers, filmmaker Oliver Stone has had a significant impact on popular understanding of American culture in the late twentieth century through a series of docudramas which reread American history through the lens of conspiracy theory and paranoia. This paper examines the films of Oliver Stone-in particular Platoon, Born on the Fourth of July, JFK, and Nixon-asking why they have (...) achieved popularity and brought about catharsis, why they are the subject of attack, and why it is useful to look beyond the debate about truth and falsehood that has surrounded them. It analyzes the ways in which Stone's status as a Vietnam veteran allowed Platoon to be accorded the authenticity of survivor discourse, whereas JFK and Nixon were subject to almost hysterical attack, not only because of Stone's assertions of conspiracy, but also because of his cinematic style of tampering with famous images. Taking these films as its point of departure, this paper examines the role of images in the construction of history, the form of the docudrama, the reenactment of historical images, fantasies of history, and ways in which paranoia is part of the practice of citizenship. (shrink)

Veteran scholar and peace activist David Cortright offers a definitive history of the human striving for peace and an analysis of its religious and intellectual roots. This authoritative, balanced, and highly readable volume traces the rise of peace advocacy and internationalism from their origins in earlier centuries through the mass movements of recent decades: the pacifist campaigns of the 1930s, the Vietnam antiwar movement, and the waves of disarmament activism that peaked in the 1980s. Also explored are the underlying (...) principles of peace - nonviolence, democracy, social justice, and human rights - all placed within a framework of 'realistic pacifism'. Peace brings the story up-to-date by examining opposition to the Iraq War and responses to the so-called 'war on terror'. This is history with a modern twist, set in the context of current debates about 'the responsibility to protect', nuclear proliferation, Darfur, and conflict transformation. (shrink)

Based on an account of the Brighton Photo-Biennial Memory of Fire: The War of Images and Images of War, curated by Julian Stallabrass in late 2008, this essay considers the photographic coverage of the recent imperialist interventions in the Middle East. Taking its cue from Stallabrass's event, it reflects on the decline of documentary and photojournalism since the Vietnam War and the current attenuated politics of the media. It argues that the problem of the sublime extends beyond the current (...) genre of 'aftermath'-photography and asks what might constitute a more cognitively adequate politics of the image. (shrink)

Although post-traumatic stress disorder is now constituted by a set of characteristic symptoms, its roots lie in Post-Vietnam Syndrome, a label generated by a Vietnam-era advocacy movement that focused not on symptoms but on war’s traumatic context. When Post-Vietnam Syndrome was subsumed into the abstract, individualistic, symptom-centered language of DSM-III and rendered as PTSD, it not only lost this focus on context but also neglected the experiences of veterans who suffer from things done or witnessed, not (...) primarily from what was done to them, in war. This agent-related trauma has been rediscovered in contemporary work on moral injury, but moral injury too is increasingly subjected to the hegemony of the symptom. Focusing on symptoms, however, unhelpfully pathologizes and individualizes trauma, neglects traumatic context, and legitimates problematic therapeutic approaches. Trauma researchers and clinicians should decenter the language of symptoms and focus instead on context and on alternative accounts of trauma. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Literature 27.2 (2003) 341-362 [Access article in PDF] Virgin Father and Prodigal Son Stephen Brockmann I IN BOTH THE UNITED STATES and Germany—as well as in much of the rest of the Western world—the baby-boom generation now holds a controlling position in politics, economics, and culture. The election of Bill Clinton (born in 1946) to the Presidency signaled the generational shift in the United States as early (...) as 1992, and that shift was confirmed by the election campaign of 2000, in which both candidates, Al Gore (born in 1948) and George W. Bush (born in 1946), in spite of their differences, represented the same generation. In Germany the political shift in generations did not occur until 1998, when Gerhard Schröder (born slightly before the beginning of the German baby boom, in 1944) defeated Helmut Kohl (born in 1930).Significantly, Kohl is a member of the generation of Germans born during the 1930s and reared during the years of the Third Reich but too young to have played any significant role, either negative or positive, during the Nazi era. No member of this generation born in the 1930s ever became President in the United States, where the generation of World War Two veterans dominated national politics from Eisenhower to George Herbert Walker Bush. However what in America is a "silent generation" has been, in Germany, the generation most closely identified with the success of the Federal Republic of Germany: these were the so-called Flakhelfer (antiaircraft helpers) who had been children during the war. Kohl therefore famously referred to them as having the "grace of late birth," meaning that they, unlike the war veterans, were presumably untouched by any form of collective guilt for Nazi crimes against humanity. Whereas in the United States the Presidency was transferred directly from the World War Two veterans to [End Page 341] baby boomers—and in the case of the two Bush presidencies, literally, albeit indirectly, from father to son—in Germany the transition from the World War Two veterans (particularly former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt) to the baby boomers was interrupted by a long period of domination by the in-between generation of Flakhelfer.In both countries the baby-boom generation represents a significant shift in sensibilities and encompasses the generation involved in student protest and oppositional social movements in the 1960s and 1970s. In the United States these included the anti-Vietnam War movement, the feminist and gay-rights movements, the sexual revolution, the civil-rights movement, and the ecological movement, as well as, on the extreme fringes, terrorist groupings such as the Weather Underground and a great many religious sects and cults. In Germany the baby boomers formed many parallel groups and movements, including antiwar, feminist, ecological, and gay segments, as well as a proliferation of sectarian Marxist political groupings (so-called K-Gruppen, with the "K" meaning "Kommunist"). In the United States, Bill Clinton was an antiwar protester in the 1960s and 1970s, while both Gerhard Schröder and his Green Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer (born in 1948) had participated in left-wing political movements during the same period.In both West Germany and the United States the heyday of protest movements in the 1960s and 1970s signaled a generational split, with younger people—the very generation that is now in power in the two countries—accusing their elders of Machiavellian cynicism, imperialism, patriarchy, and worse. Such accusations can be recalled by the formerly popular slogans "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?" in the United States and "Unter den Talaren der Muff von tausend Jahren" ("under the academic regalia the stench of a thousand years") in Germany. The latter slogan was a reference not just to a generalized stodginess on the part of elderly German academics but to Hitler's invocation of a "Thousand-Year Reich;" German students were none-too-subtly suggesting that many of their professors had once been Nazis.The difference in these two slogans—one referring to past and the other to present sins—corresponds to a major distinction between the two baby... (shrink)

Treatment of military-related posttraumatic stress disorder is a major public health care concern. Since 2001 over 2.5 million troops have been deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, many of whom have experienced direct combat and sustained threat. Estimates of PTSD rates related to these wars range from 8% to over 20%, or 192,000 to 480,000 individuals. Already, nearly 250,000 service members of Operations Enduring Freedom, Iraqi Freedom, and New Dawn have sought VA health care services for PTSD. This recent increased need (...) for mental health services comes in addition to the ongoing needs of Vietnam-era and other veterans who continue to suffer from PTSD. PTSD is related to high co-morbidities of other mental health difficulties, poorer physical health status, and increased medical care utilization. Such high demand for services is an important contributor to the large cost associated with combat-related PTSD. Accordingly, promoting successful, cost-effective treatment strategies for PTSD is a chief public health care priority. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION In any society relatively few disputes are brought to judges for resolution. Most are handled informally or forgotten. Fewer still are cases that go to trial. Most are settled. Compromises are reached even in cases where issues are hotly contested and where millions or billions of dollars in damages are claimed. Recently, for example, one of the most controversial lawsuits of our time, the Agent Orange case, was settled. In that case, veterans of the Vietnam War, their (...) spouses, and their children alleged that a defoliant — Agent Orange – used in Southeast Asia contained dioxin and was responsible for deaths, debilities, miscarriages, and birth defects suffered by members of the plaintiff class. Class members argued that the manufacturers of the defoliant, seven major chemical companies, knew that it was tainted and should be made to compensate them for their injuries, claiming billions of dollars in damages. The case received national exposure and became a rallying point for veterans, a means they hoped to use to publicize their plight and to spur Congress to come to their aid. On the eve of trial, the case was settled. The defendants, who denied liability throughout the pretrial period, agreed to pay the veterans $180 million. In turn, the plaintiff class agreed to drop the suit. Thus ended a controversy which not only presented novel legal issues and tested the ability of the federal courts to handle complex lawsuits, but concerned the well-being of a large number of veterans, their spouses, and their handicapped children as well. (shrink)

The point of this article is to test how well Josiah Royce’s philosophy of community can be utilized to conceptualize moral injury and recovery.1 The term “moral injury” is of recent coinage, articulated by those working with combat veterans and their challenges returning to civilian life, particularly veterans returned from Vietnam and from America’s recent presence in the Middle East. The basic idea is that, in combat, soldiers harm their own moral capacities by committing or participating in (...) acts that they understand to be morally repugnant. The consequences of such harm include difficulty with participating well or fully in civilian life, even to the point of committing violence against loved ones. Despite the... (shrink)

United States Air Force planes fly across mountains of green forest; behind them, fine white streams of chemical spray fill the sky. The planes fly alone or in formation covering wide swaths of the entire landscape. These images of the herbicide spraying during the United States-Vietnam War are ubiquitous in media material about Agent Orange, the most heavily used of the fifteen herbicides sprayed during the war. This representation of the war does not include guns, grenades, tanks, bombs, or (...) dead bodies. Instead, contemporary documentary filmmakers offer images of airplanes and chemical barrels to provide evidence of another weapon of war, pan dead and leafless forests in an otherwise lush landscape of green, and zero in on children’s deformed bodies to show the lasting environmental and health effects of Agent Orange. In this essay I share preliminary thoughts from my new project on Agent Orange and film in the United States and Vietnam. The bulk of social science writing on Agent Orange has focused on American veterans and their fight to secure benefits, while film scholars have analyzed the Vietnam War in Hollywood movies and television. I investigate documentary film, the transnational activism that generates these films, and the representations of gender, disabilities, bodies, history and culture within them. Here I offer a close reading of two turn-of-the-twenty-first-century documentaries about Agent Orange in Vietnam. (shrink)