This dissertation concerns the disabled veterans of the Turkish army who fought against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) guerillas as conscripted soldiers. While being valorized as sacrificial heroes, “ghazis,” in the realm of nationalist politics, these disabled veterans also face socio-economic marginalization and demasculinization anxieties in Turkey, where discrimination against the disabled is rampant. In such a context, disabled veterans emerged as important ultranationalist actors in the 2000s, championing a conservative agenda around the issues of state sovereignty, democratization, and Turkey’s pending European Union (EU) membership. In this dissertation, I locate the disabled veteran body at the intersection of medical and welfare institutions, nationalist discourses, and cultural formations of gendered normativity to trace the embodied socio-cultural and political processes that constitute disabled veterans as ultranationalist political subjects. I approach the politicization of disabled veterans through the analytical lens of the body in order to understand how veterans’ gendered and classed experiences of warfare, injury, and disability are hardened into an ultranationalist political identity. Exploring the tensions between the nationalist construction of the disabled veteran body and veterans’ embodied experiences as lower-class disabled men, I show how the dialectic between political rites of consecration and everyday rites of desecration translates disability into a political force. By unraveling the ways in which disability caused by violence generates new forms of masculinity, embodiment, and political identity, I illustrate how the disabled veterans’ suffering is brokered into militarization and ultranationalist protest in contemporary Turkey. / text

Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, military personnel participating in combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq have been plagued by traditional barriers to successful labor market attachment such as health and mental health concerns, employer stigma, and difficulty translating military training and experience to the civilian market, but also by a lagging economy. Veteran status since Vietnam has historically been linked to negative employment outcomes over the life course. Currently, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports an unemployment rate of 9.5% for male Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans, and a 12.1% rate for their female counterparts. Veterans aged 20-24 have a 20.1% unemployment rate, nearly five points higher than that of their civilian peers. To compound the problem, an overly passive labor market policy prevents access to education and training that civilian employers value most. As Veterans continue to separate from the armed forces the United States, employers and policymakers can choose to capitalize on their skills, experience, and willingness to serve, or risk alienating another generation of young service members. This paper addresses five key categories that serve as barriers to successful labor market attachment and summarizes both governmental and private-sector programs designed to assist military personnel in their transition to civilian work. Finally, it provides policy options for remedying the post-9/11 Veterans labor market transition problem through improving service coordination and delivery, deliberately developing human capital through military service, and increasing employer responsibility for skill development and labor market attachment. / text

The “global war on terrorism” has pervaded the social scene following the attacks of September 11, 2001. Although the ripple effects of the wars are continuing to spread across the globe in the various political and foreign policy arenas, the aim of this study is to turn attention to the individuals who bore the battle, have returned home, and now face new challenges. The United States veteran population has experienced an unprecedented increase in numbers as a response to troop withdrawals in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although previous research has considered the potential difficulties veterans face when reintegrating into society, this study goes a step further and investigates how news media sources are called to participate in narrating veteran stories of war and specifically their stories documenting post-traumatic stress disorder. Drawing on a variety of theoretical perspectives and utilizing a multi-methodological approach, this study seeks to answer four central questions: First, how and by what channels do sources enter the news media conversation to comment on the veteran experience? Second, are veterans the main sources narrating their experiences or do other individuals, groups, or organizations speak more often in the news media? Third, what stories circulated and gained traction by narrating the lived experiences of veterans with PTSD? And fourth, what stories did veterans tell about their experiences, and what stories were told about veterans who suffer from PTSD? This study is organized in two distinct parts. Part one employs a quantitative content indexing analysis of four veteran related news media events across various newspaper, broadcast television news, and cable television news outlets in order to determine how sources entered the news media landscape, and who the sources were. Part two turns to examine four dominant news narratives that emerged from the direct quotation and paraphrased remarks gathered from part one’s analyzed news media texts. The study concludes by illustrating the powerful role news media sources play in the news, as well as the stories that emerge to define the lived experiences of veterans who suffer from PTSD. / text

Not available / text

This report examines the state of research regarding the psychological impact of war on American soldiers deployed in military operations in Afghanistan (Operation Enduring Freedom) and Iraq (Operation Iraqi Freedom). Particular focus is given to examination of marital and relationship satisfaction within the Hispanic soldier and veteran population. A wide range of research examines the traumatic aftereffects of wartime service with predominant themes of posttraumatic stress, depression, anxiety, and substance abuse appearing across the literature. Examination of the Hispanic population is disputed with researchers producing conflicting findings: some researchers have indicated an increased risk of psychological disturbances in Hispanic wartime veterans while other have found no such difference between the Hispanic and majority groups. Attempts to explain these discrepant results have ranged from differences in acculturation, to potentially increased traumatic exposure, or to underlying feelings of persecution and alienation. However, consistent results were found in regards to the negative relationship between traumatic exposure and romantic relationship satisfaction. Younger males of lower socioeconomic status with increased trauma exposure and comorbid mental health diagnoses consistently reported less relationship satisfaction than their peers. Given the nature of family and the importance of close relationships within the Hispanic culture, it is increasingly necessary for clinicians working with Hispanic veterans to be aware of these findings. This author purposes that future researchers explore this concept of relationship satisfaction within the Hispanic veteran population with attention given to potentially mediating variables such as level of acculturation and traumatic experience exposure. / text

This report examines the place of non-citizen soldiers, veterans, and their families in U.S. political and civil life. Historically, military service has allowed marginalized groups to earn their social and political status as equal citizens. Part one of this report explores why, despite this history, recent legislative changes, and a 2002 Executive Order eliminating the legal and bureaucratic barriers to naturalization, less than forty percent of the non-citizen servicemen and women today actually acquire U.S. citizenship while on active duty. Part two examines the political and policy context surrounding a soldier's decisions to naturalize. It suggests that some soldiers may be “undocumented”; they forgo naturalization to protect themselves and their families. Part three discusses the legal, political, and normative implications of current policy. Some practices, such as the deportation of alien veterans, challenge the foundations of the American political order. The place of undocumented soldiers and veterans raises important issues about civic obligation, the cultural narratives that define membership in and service to the state, and the ruling political collations in which these narratives find support. / text

No description available.

A review of the research literature concerning the role of the social network in health and illness has indicated little attention to studying the social networks of psychiatric patients. Even less attention has been given to the study of veteran psychiatric patients. In an effort to understand more about the supportive or non-supportive aspects of social networks, an exploratory study of 224 male veteran psychiatric patients was conducted in two settings--a general hospital and a large psychiatric hospital. A description of the social networks as perceived by the patients themselves was obtained through semi-structured interviews. Network analysis was used to examine the characteristics of veteran psychiatric patients' personal networks within the social context of needing assistance or support for psychosocial problems. Some aspects of network structure, such as size and availability of family-kin members, were addressed, as well as the nature and quality of network links. Findings indicated that patients had an ample number of family-kin sources to turn to for assistance but chose to turn to only a small number (three or less) of informal sources, including nuclear family, kin, or friends. Formal sources of support were found to play a predominate part in the networks of veteran psychiatric patients. Both the immediate family and institutions were considered to be important sources of help in times of need but a great deal of ambivalence was evident concerning the use of them. A factor analysis of the data identified five social network patterns. Three multiplex patterns emerged in which patients were likely to turn primarily to the nuclear family, to kin, or to significant others for support. Two other patterns were identified--an Anomie Pattern and a Self Versus Institution Pattern--in which neither informal nor formal sources were considered by patients to be sources of support. A stepwise regression was also performed to determine the relationship of selected background variables to choice of support pattern. The variables found to be potentially important predictors of the patterns were marital status, living situation, diagnosis, religious preference, religious practice, age, and history of previous treatment. Conclusions of the study have both clinical and theoretical importance. Findings point to the need for not only reviving or expanding the supportive functions of veteran psychiatric patients' networks, but in some instances the necessity of assisting patients in establishing new personal networks.

This dissertation is a critical engagement with the myth of the reified modern state - that Leviathan that seemingly exists outside of the social while residing within the natural. In doing so it joins an effort to move the field of critical geopolitics beyond critiquing classical geopolitics to one that includes a transformative component, as expressed in the overarching field of critical theory. The undergirding methodological and theoretical approaches of this dissertation are rooted in the interplay between the semiotic, the performative, and the visual, an eclectic framework that grapples with the shifting representational practices of geopolitics - practices that are centered on maintaining a particular meta-narrative of the state - i.e., the myth of the state as a reified subject. As a means to demystify this particular paradigm of the state I look at the contradictions and the challenges proffered by a unique set of actors, soldiers and veterans. I accomplish this: military actors. This is accomplished by bringing to the forefront, through imagery, the visual and communicative performances of their everyday geopolitical practices as military actors and citizens. The three cases that make up this dissertation each address particular interconnections between soldiers, veterans, and the myth of "the state," with each employing an approach that visually interrogates the spatial and material relationships as a means to explore "the everyday" performances of their geopolitical practices. Soldiers and veterans are uniquely situated in geopolitical discourses about the state, as they are framed and/or frame themselves, depending on the context, as both "state" and "non-state" actors and, as such, through their conjoined identities can collapse the meta-narrative of the state-as-object by their very "being." In this interrogation, therefore, I add to an effort to push for a reconceptualization of the state, arguing that "it" should be re-imaged or reframed as an everyday relationship between citizens - a state as relationship rather than a state as object. This shift moves a critical geopolitical inquiry away from reproducing what it critiques, to critically engaging with the practices that produce the representations that help to constitute it.

Introduction. The relationships among military service, combat intensity and long-term health effects were investigated in a cohort of 6,355 Vietnam-era American Legionnaires who were recruited in 1984 and followed through 1998. First, the effect of Vietnam service on coronary heart disease (CHD) risk was assessed among 3,781 veterans who responded to both questionnaires. Next, the effect of serving in Vietnam and combat exposure was investigated as risk factors for the mortality of the cohort. Finally, potential threats to the validity of this study were evaluated.Methods. Military service and lifestyle factors were assessed by questionnaires in 1984 and 1998. Vital status in 1998 was determined and causes of death were ascertained through the National Death Index. Cox proportional hazards modeling was used to calculate hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for CHD incidence and mortality in relation to service location and combat exposure, adjusting for age, smoking, alcohol consumption, body mass, and hypertension. Response bias and reliability of self-reported data were examined.Results. Serving in Vietnam was associated with an increased hazard of developing heart disease (HR=1.37, 95% CI: 1.09, 1.73), after controlling for independent risk factors. Vietnam veterans experienced a 50% higher mortality than non-Vietnam veterans during 14-year follow-up (HR=1.48, 95% CI= 1.13 - 1.93), which increased with combat intensity after adjustment for other risk factors, (low combat: HR 1.17, 95% CI 0.79 - 1.73; medium combat HR=1.51, 95% CI 1.05 - 2.17; high combat HR=1.82, 95% CI 1.20 - 2.76). A stronger relationship was observed by level of combat for CHD mortality (low combat: HR =1.48, 95% CI 0.75 - 2.95; medium combat HR= 2.01, 95% CI 1.06 - 3.79; high combat HR= 2.27, 95% CI 1.08 - 4.79). Results showed that non-respondents differed only slightly from respondents for important variables potentially related to exposures and chronic disease outcomes. Furthermore, veteran self-report was moderately to highly reliable when measured over a 14 year period.Conclusions. Vietnam veterans are still experiencing higher rates of adverse health effects, even more than thirty years after their military service. These data support a long term and independent adverse effect of military service in Vietnam on cardiovascular health.