Content area
Full Text
Pamela R. Frese & Margaret C. Harrell, editors. Preface by John P. Hawkins. Anthropology and the United States Military: Coming of Age in the Twenty-first Century. Palgrave-McMillan, 2003. 192 pp.
All of us, in this first decade of the 21st century, live in an ever more crowded, complex, and definitely more violent world. Global wars between nation states have been replaced by asymmetric conflict of which anthropologists appear to know so little. At this very moment a new kind of American warrior, fighting a new kind of war, soldiers in far flung corners of the earth; and thus, we might well ask if it isn't somewhat premature to declare that: "with this volume we celebrate a kind of coming of age, that of the anthropology of the U.S. military". We learn in Jeanne Guillemin's contribution about: "Medical Risks and the Volunteer Army"; Pamela Frese explores: "How anthropological concepts including residence patterns, descent systems, and fictive kin intersect with social class, race, and gender in American military culture"; and she provides the conclusion to: this particular, mostly post-modern consideration of: "Anthropology and the U.S. Military." Margaret Harrell introduces the various featured topics in her: "Subject, Audience and Voice" and focuses more specifically on: "Gender- and Class-Based Role Expectations for Army Spouses". Joshua Linford-Steinfeld analyzes: "Weight Control and Physical Readiness Among Navy Personnel"; whereas Clementine Fujimura introduces us to: "Integrating Diversity and Understanding the Other at the U.S. Naval Academy". Only Robert Rubenstein and Anna Simmons focus on topics that more directly approach the complexities of relevant current military structures and operations. In their analyses of: "Peace keepers and Politics", and "The Military Advisor as Warrior-King and Other Going Native Temptations", respectively, Rubenstein correctly recognizes, and notes quite perceptively that: "Often the people we (the anthropologists) most need to affect with our work are members of communities that we (most often) stigmatize and avoid. The Central...