Description
Book SynopsisThis new handbook is about the practices of conducting research on military issues.
As an edited collection, it brings together an extensive group of authors from a range of disciplinary perspectives whose chapters engage with the conceptual, practical and political questions raised when doing military research. The book considers a wide range of questions around research about, on and with military organisations, personnel and activities, from diverse starting-points across the social sciences, arts and humanities.
Each chapter in this volume:
- Describes the nature of the military research topic under scrutiny and explains what research practices were undertaken and why.
- Discusses the author's research activities, addressing the nature of their engagement with their subjects and explaining how the method or approach under scrutiny was distinctive because of the military context or subject of the research.
Trade Review
‘In the face of increasing conflict and growing security and defence threats, social scientists today are increasingly interested in the armed forces. Drawing together leading scholars in the field, this volume dissects the distinctive methodological challenges which attend military research. It will be required reading for any scholar interested in researching the armed forces.’-- Anthony King, Warwick University, UK
Table of Contents
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- An Introduction to Military Research Methods, Matthew F. Rech, K. Neil Jenkings, Alison J. Williams & Rachel Woodward
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SECTION 1: Texts
- Reflections on Research in Military Archives, Matthew Farish
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- From Declassified Documents to Redacted Files: Tracing Military Compensation, Emily Gilbert
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- Biography and the military archive, Isla Forsyth
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- Analysing Newspapers: Considering the use of print media sources in military research, K. Neil Jenkings & Daniel Bos
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- The uses of military memoirs in military research, Rachel Woodward & K. Neil Jenkings
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- A Military Definition of Reality: Researching Literature and Militarization, John Beck
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- Archaeological Approaches to the Study of Recent Warfare, John Schofield & Wayne Cocroft
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SECTION 2: Interactions
- Comparing Militaries: The Challenges of Datasets and Process-Tracing, Jocelyn Mawdsley
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- Conducting ‘Community Orientated’ Military Research, Ross McGarry
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- Ethnography in Conflict Zones: The Perils of Researching Private Security Contractors, Amanda Chisholm
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- Researching Proscribed Armed Groups: Interviewing Loyalist and Republican Paramilitaries in Northern Ireland, Neil Ferguson
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- Psychoanalytically-informed Reflexive Research with Service Spouses, Sue Jervis
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- Ethnomethodology, Conversation Analysis and the Study of Action-in-Interaction in Military Settings, Christopher Elsey, Michael Mair, Paul V. Smith, Patrick G. Watson
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- Researching Normativity and Non-Normativity in Military Organizations, Aaron Belkin
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SECTION 3: Experiences
- The Aesthetic of Being in the Field: Participant Observation with Infantry, John Hockey
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- Ethnography and the Embodied Life of War-making, Ken MacLeish
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- Biting the Bullet: my time with the British Army, Vron Ware
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- Researching Military Men, Stephen Atherton
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- Putting ‘Insider-ness’ to Work: Researching Identity Narratives of Career Soldiers about to Leave the Army, David Walker
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- Researching at military airshows: a dialogue about ethnography and autoethnography, Matthew F. Rech & Alison J. Williams
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- Perceptions of past conflict: researching modern understandings of historic battlefields, Justin Sikora
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SECTION 4 - Senses
- Researching the visual and material cultures of war and conflict, Jane Tynan
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- Studying Military Image Banks: A Social Semiotic Approach, Ian Roderick
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- Critical methodologies for researching military-themed videogames, Daniel Bos
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