Return to search

Regulation of Bodies as Gendered Nationalistic Ideology: Physically Wounded Veterans as Political Props

Using the 2014 State of the Union Address as an example, I show that the public honoring of physically wounded veterans hides the emotional, psychological, social, and moral wounds of military service, creating a normative veteran identity based on mental toughness, and essentializes all veterans as honorable by default. Using Michel Foucault’s notion of Panopticism from <i>Discipline and Punish</i>, I argue that this unquestioned heroism of the veteran disciplines the nation, disengages the population from involvement, and enables unchecked, perpetual war. In response, I propose that we avoid thanking veterans publicly and abstractly, instead approaching each and every veteran personally in full recognition of their unique set of relations. This would improve veteran reintegration, politically engage the population in discourse regarding military conflict, and ultimately serve as a check on the use of state violence.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:uoregon.edu/oai:scholarsbank.uoregon.edu:1794/19343
Date18 August 2015
CreatorsReese, David
ContributorsMann, Bonnie
PublisherUniversity of Oregon
Source SetsUniversity of Oregon
Languageen_US
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeElectronic Thesis or Dissertation
RightsAll Rights Reserved.

Page generated in 0.0017 seconds