|
Showing 1 - 5 of
5 matches in All Departments
This book includes a variety of chapters that consider the role and
importance of anthropology in small wars and insurgencies. Almost
every war since the origins of the discipline at the beginning of
the 19th century has involved anthropology and anthropologists. The
chapters in this book fall into the following myriad categories of
military anthropology. Anthropology for the military. In some
cases, anthropologists participated directly as uniformed
combatants, having the purpose of directly providing expert
knowledge with the goal of improving operations and strategy.
Anthropology of the military. Anthropologists have also been known
to study State militaries. Sometimes this scholarship is undertaken
with the objective of providing the military with information about
its own internal systems and processes in order to improve its
performance. At other times, the objective is to study the military
as a human group to identify and describe its culture and social
processes. Anthropology of war. As a discipline, anthropology has
also had a long history of studying warfare itself. This book
considers the anthropology of small wars and insurgencies through
an analysis of the Islamic State’s military adaptation in Iraq,
Al Shabaab recruiting in Somalia, religion in Israeli combat units,
as well as many other topics. The chapters in this book were
originally published as a special issue of the journal, Small Wars
& Insurgencies.
This book includes a variety of chapters that consider the role and
importance of anthropology in small wars and insurgencies. Almost
every war since the origins of the discipline at the beginning of
the 19th century has involved anthropology and anthropologists. The
chapters in this book fall into the following myriad categories of
military anthropology. Anthropology for the military. In some
cases, anthropologists participated directly as uniformed
combatants, having the purpose of directly providing expert
knowledge with the goal of improving operations and strategy.
Anthropology of the military. Anthropologists have also been known
to study State militaries. Sometimes this scholarship is undertaken
with the objective of providing the military with information about
its own internal systems and processes in order to improve its
performance. At other times, the objective is to study the military
as a human group to identify and describe its culture and social
processes. Anthropology of war. As a discipline, anthropology has
also had a long history of studying warfare itself. This book
considers the anthropology of small wars and insurgencies through
an analysis of the Islamic State's military adaptation in Iraq, Al
Shabaab recruiting in Somalia, religion in Israeli combat units, as
well as many other topics. The chapters in this book were
originally published as a special issue of the journal, Small Wars
& Insurgencies.
In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has
made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy
goals. From the counterproductive strategic bombing of Vietnam to
the misguided accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan, the
US has blundered around with little consideration of local cultural
beliefs and almost no concern for the long-term effects on the host
nation's society. Cultural anthropology--the so-called 'handmaiden
of colonialism'--has historically served as an intellectual bridge
between sovereign Western powers and local nationals. What light
can it shed on the difficult intersection of the US military and
foreign societies today? Each chapter in this book tells the story
of an anthropologist who worked directly for the military, such as
Ursula Graham Bower, the only woman to hold a British combat
command during WWII. Each faced challenges including the negative
outcomes of exporting Western political models to societies where
they don't fit, and errors of perception that prevent understanding
of indigenous societies. Ranging from the British colonial era in
Africa to the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Military
Anthropology illustrates the conceptual, cultural and practical
barriers encountered by military organisations.
The Human Terrain System (HTS) was catapulted into existence in
2006 by the US military's urgent need for knowledge of the human
dimension of the battlespace in Iraq and Afghanistan. Its
centrepiece was embedded groups of mixed military and civilian
personnel, known as Human Terrain Teams (HTTs), whose mission was
to conduct social science research and analysis and to advise
military commanders about the local population. Bringing social
science - and actual social scientists - to the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan was bold and challenging. Despite the controversy over
HTS among scholars, there is little good, reliable source material
written by those with experience of HTS or about the actual work
carried out by teams in theatre. This volume goes beyond the
anecdotes, snippets and blogs to provide a comprehensive, objective
and detailed view of HTS. The contributors put the program in
historical context, discuss the obstacles it faced, analyse its
successes, and detail the work of the teams downrange. Most
importantly, they capture some of the diverse lived experience of
HTS scholars and practitioners drawn from an eclectic array of the
social sciences.
|
|