With the 2014 marking the anniversary of WWI we are provided the opportunity of sober reflection. Also in 2014 we are faced with an unprecedented conversation of gender in popular culture. If we can inform ourselves in the present through study of the past, then perhaps these two concepts can be linked. Historian Joanna Burke would agree, and her work Dismembering the Male addresses the relationship between WWI and the male gender specifically. I have been tasked with providing a convincing reason as to why Canadians as a whole should learn about their history, specifically WWI. I believe that studying the WWI male can both demystify the past help us solve our contemporary problems The gendered nature of the Great War is obvious. The fighting was committed disproportionately by men, with a Canadian force of over 600,000. For over 65,000 of these men the impact of the war was absolute, and another 250,000 men suffered severe physical and mental trauma as a result. Bourke’s work suggests that the war was transformative for those men who made it through relatively unscathed, with a plethora of personal accounts confirming this. The men of WWI were aware that were changing even as it was happening. This transformation took many forms, whether it be physical debilitation, PTSD, spiritual desolation, or scarring memories. When approaching these numbers we also ought to look at the masculine paradigms of the time, and whether they hold up under scrutiny. The concept of “Muscular Christianity” was often invoked, where men go overseas to battle evil with both physical and spiritual prowess. However, as Bourke points out, the number of men considered physically unfit for military service speaks to how disconnected this ideal was from the Canadian man. Further, the fact that 47,000 members of the Canadian Expeditionary Force who served were conscripted suggests that many Canadians did not identify with this noble war. The evidential failure of this paradigm suggests that to apply it to the Canadian male population on mass would be a highly inaccurate stereotype. The failure of this paradigm to properly encapsulate the experience of the Canadian male speaks to a variety of factors. As Bourke suggests, concepts such as Muscular Christianity were elitist and that the common man would not have likely identified with such ideas. The concepts of aggressive manliness were also fostered largely for propagandistic purposes. One of the most cogent points Bourke makes is that the Great War was organized in such a way that “the male body was intended to be mutilated.” Considering the conflict in these terms provides a juxtaposition between the goals of the state and the lived experience of the men who fought. A gender based perspective of WWI is clearly not the only method of analysis, however it can be useful in developing in our understanding of the past. Analyzing WWI in these terms humanizes those who came before, and provides us an opportunity to better empathize with those who are here today. Thus we are faced with a variety of questions. What is the gendered nature of conflict today? Is there a discrepancy between male archetypes and the lived experience of males themselves today? How does society treat the physical bodies of males today? Though the context has changed, appreciating the complexity of the past may help us tackle the complexity of the present. Bourke, Joanna. 1996. Dismembering the Male: Mens Bodies, Britain, and the Great War. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. As this post is for a course, I highly encourage you to comment on this post!
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 06:13:18 +0000
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