The Sexual Politics of Memory: The Vietnam Women's Memorial Project and “The Wall”

Prospects ◽  
1989 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 341-372 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karal Ann Marling ◽  
John Wetenhall
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Sexual Politics ◽  
Prime Time ◽  
Politics Of Memory ◽  
Sound Track ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Look

During the 1988 season, there was nothing unusual about seeing the Vietnam War on television. Back in the 1960s and 1970s, Vietnam had appeared during the dinner hour, for the most part, in ninety-second spots showing green foliage and red dust whipped into a vivid frenzy for the camera by the blades of helicopters. But in the waning 1980s, a generation after the fall of Saigon, Vietnam moved into prime time. With vintage rock blaring on the sound track, major stars began to “hump the boonies” in picturesque jungle fatigues. Magnum P.I., aiming for a more serious dramatic tone in its final seasons, afflicted the titular hero with flashbacks to his POW days. On a nearby Hawaiian set, CBS's Tour of Duty patrol (led by Terence Knox, late of St. Elsewhere, on another network) simulated the look of news footage, circa 1968.

Congress and the Politics of Troop Withdrawal, 1966–1973

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian E. Zelizer
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Public Debate ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Pressure ◽  
War Powers ◽  
Lyndon Johnson ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Presidential Decisions

This chapter examines the politics of U.S. troop withdrawal from Vietnam during the 1960s and 1970s in order to identify the strategies employed by Congress to check an imperial executive and to regain its constitutional prerogatives. When the Vietnam War escalated in 1964 and 1965, most policymakers, including Lyndon Johnson, were very sensitive to the role Congress might play in its evolution. During this period, Congress challenged presidential decisions and helped to create the political pressure that led to a drawdown in American troops fighting the war. The chapter first considers how Senator William Fulbright brought the problems with the Vietnam War to the forefront of public debate before discussing the politics of troop withdrawal since the time of Johnson, with particular emphasis on Richard Nixon's Vietnamization and a range of legislative initiatives such as the War Powers Act (1973) and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (1978).

The Politics of Speaking about the Body

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ramsay Burt
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Critique ◽  
Rational Mind ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Way

This chapter argues that some of the more radical developments in theatre dance initiated by Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Deborah Hay, and others in the 1960s and 1970s were supported by problematically dualistic ways of speaking and writing about “the body.” By valuing the rational “mind” over the supposedly irrational “body,” the normative hierarchy was inverted. The chapter discusses the way in which this concern with “the body” in minimalist performances by Yvonne Rainer became political in the context of protests against the Vietnam War. The new sensitivity to corporeality that emerged from minimalism then formed the basis for Hay’s Circle Dances and Paxton’s Magnesium. Drawing on Boltanski and Chiapello’s discussion of the political critique of the 1960s and 1970s counterculture, and Jean-Luc Nancy and Giorgio Agamben’s discussion of community, the chapter analyses the politics underlying the way that these dance practices involved talking and writing about “the body.”

Book Reviews

2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 88-107
Author(s):  
Louise K. Davidson-Schmich ◽  
Jennifer A. Yoder ◽  
Friederike Eigler ◽  
Joyce M. Mushaben ◽  
Alexandra Schwell ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Print Media ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
The West ◽  
Politics Of Memory ◽  
German State ◽  
East German ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S

Konrad H. Jarausch, United Germany: Debating Processes and Prospects Reviewed by Louise K. Davidson-Schmich Nick Hodgin and Caroline Pearce, ed. The GDR Remembered:Representations of the East German State since 1989 Reviewed by Jennifer A. Yoder Andrew Demshuk, The Lost German East: Forced Migration and the Politics of Memory, 1945-1970 Reviewed by Friederike Eigler Peter H. Merkl, Small Town & Village in Bavaria: The Passing of a Way of Life Reviewed by Joyce M. Mushaben Barbara Thériault, The Cop and the Sociologist. Investigating Diversity in German Police Forces Reviewed by Alexandra Schwell Clare Bielby, Violent Women in Print: Representations in the West German Print Media of the 1960s and 1970s Reviewed by Katharina Karcher Michael David-Fox, Peter Holquist, and Alexander M. Martin, ed., Fascination and Enmity: Russia and Germany as Entangled Histories, 1914-1945 Reviewed by Jennifer A. Yoder

scholarly journals Dirty tricks on the underground press

1981 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 47-50
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Rips
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Freedom Of Information ◽  
Underground Press ◽  
General Terms ◽  
The Us ◽  
Psychedelic Drugs ◽  
Us Constitution ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
The 1960S

What was known in the United States as the ‘underground press’ – self-published newspapers of the youth counterculture sold at street corners and around campuses in American cities during the 1960s and early 70 s – was once a significant network estimated at over 400 publications. Their hallmark was opposition to US involvement in the Vietnam War, criticism of the authorities, of uncontrolled technology and big business, advocacy of sexual freedom and artistic experimentation and, frequently, the advocacy of marijuana, LSD and other psychedelic drugs. Few of these publications have survived the past ten years, and their disappearance has been variously attributed to the cooling of radical interest after the American withdrawal from Vietnam, as well as to the vague and shifting nature of the ‘hippie’ scene. Complaints by their publishers during the early and mid-seventies that printers refused their business, that office rents suddenly doubled, that advertising was cancelled, that papers were lost – these were seen as local accidents and were rarely reported by the established media. Claims of official or officially-sanctioned harassment were dismissed – even by fellow radicals – as paranoid. Recent research by Geoffrey Rips of the PEN American Center has revealed the extent and variety of official pressure exerted against alternative publications during the Vietnam War period. Using evidence from government hearings like the Church Committee, which reported in 1976, actual FBI documents released to American PEN under the Freedom of Information Act, and other sources, Mr Rips argues that such harassment contributed materially to the closure of certain publications and in general terms constituted a gross infringement on the protection afforded to dissenting opinion and to a free press under the US constitution. We publish edited extracts here from Geoffrey Rips' report which will be published in full by the PEN American Center and the City Lights Press.

scholarly journals The Voice of the Lord from a Record Player (Vietnamese Highlands, 1960s)

2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 257-284
Author(s):  
Gábor Vargyas
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
The World ◽  
Record Player ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Voice

In this paper, I present a short excerpt from an 18-hour-long Bru life history recorded in 1989 in the Central Vietnamese Highlands among the Bru/Vân Kiều of Quảng Trị. The excerpt sheds light on the circumstances of Christian evangelization among the Bru through the recollections of a Bru man who was not Christian himself but was in contact with the key protagonists of the events, the missionaries and the evangelized Bru people. The interview reveals on how the evangelized and non-evangelized viewed the evangelists. What were the ways of promoting evangelization? Were the Bru impressed by the world of the evangelizers? How did the Bru conceive of the evangelizers? How convincing did they find their arguments? Beside its immanent value, this intercultural encounter has a significance beyond itself insofar as it is situated in and reflective of the icy political and ideological milieu of the Vietnam War in the 1960s–1970s, the impacts of which were still lingering when the recording was made.

Epilogue

2021 ◽  
pp. 150-168
Author(s):  
Uta A. Balbier
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Business Culture ◽  
American Business ◽  
Political Protest ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
Political Landscapes ◽  
The 1960S

This chapter explores the transformed religious, economic, and political landscapes in Europe and the United States at the time of Graham’s return to Berlin and London in 1966. It explains why Graham was now facing sharper criticism: the theological climate had shifted even further away from Graham’s rather fundamentalist theology, which now appeared outdated. The 1960s counterculture articulated an increasing consumer critique that zoomed in on Graham’s unconditional support for American business culture and the American way of life. And the Vietnam War, from which Graham never really distanced himself, loomed large over his revival meetings, where he now faced open political protest. But even more so, the increasing secularization of crusade cities such as London and Berlin made it significantly harder to rally support for Graham’s revival work at the same time when Graham’s highly professionalized revivalism was increasingly perceived as secular and formulaic.

Fly Until You Die

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chia Youyee Vang
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Ethnic Minorities ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
The United States ◽  
Complex Nature ◽  
Social Fabric ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Many

The Vietnam War is the subject of hundreds of scholarly studies, policy reports, memoirs, and literary titles. As America’s longest and most controversial war, it coincided with domestic turmoil in the United States and in Southeast Asia, led to the displacement of large numbers of people, and strained the social fabric of Cambodian, Lao, and Vietnamese societies. The complex nature of the war means that despite the many books that have been written about it, much remains to unfold, in particular the experiences of ethnic minorities in Laos who became entangled in Cold War politics during the 1960s and 1970s. This book fills the gap by exploring the dramatic forces of history that drew several dozen young Hmong men to become fighter pilots in the United States’ Secret War in Laos, which was in direct support of the larger war in Vietnam. They transformed from ethnic minorities who mostly lived on the margins of Lao society to daring airmen working alongside American pilots. After four decades in exile, surviving pilots, families of those killed in action, and American veterans who worked with them collectively narrated their version of the historical events that resulted in the forced migration of nearly 150,000 Hmong to the United States. By privileging Hmong knowledge, this book begs us to reconsider the war from overlooked perspectives and to engage in the ongoing construction of meanings of war and postwar memories in shaping ethnic and national identities.

Vietnamese American Literature

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele Janette
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Direct Analysis ◽  
Social Identities ◽  
Displaced Populations ◽  
Vietnamese American ◽  
Transnational Connections ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Refugee Experience

While the Vietnam War looms large in American national culture of the 20th century, Vietnam, Vietnamese people, and Vietnamese American experiences have been little attended to. Vietnamese American literature engages this erasure both in writing about Vietnamese perspectives on that war and by expanding the signification of “Vietnam” beyond being a synonym for a war. Beginning in the 1960s, Vietnamese American literature in English was dominated for the next few decades by memoirs, largely designed to educate American readers about Vietnamese politics and history. Rather than continuing to offer Vietnam as it appears in much other American literature, as a surreal backdrop to a US psychic wound, these writers narrate Vietnam, Vietnamese people, and Vietnamese Americans with autonomous geographical, philosophical, emotional, and intellectual presence and perspective, and often provide direct analysis and critique of both the South Vietnamese regime and its American ally. In the late 20th and 21st centuries, Vietnamese American literature has diversified in both form and content, expanding the field beyond direct engagement with the Vietnam War and the refugee experience, in work that rewrites canonical Western characters and genres, that challenges normative literary forms as well as social identities, and that explores US racialization, consumerism, and popular culture. In addition to writing Vietnam and Vietnamese American experiences into the national American imaginary landscape, this literature reconfigures the demonized and threatening tropes of the threatening, untrustworthy “gook,” and the passive, dependent “victim” figure, into the socially necessary and beneficial “critical refugee.” Through the experiences of marginalization, trauma, and survival, the critical refugee possesses insights and knowledge necessary for a 21st century of increasing displaced populations, whether from war, famine, or natural disaster. This critical perspective is also more transnational than nationalistic or exilic, exploring both physical and imaginary transnational connections.

5. Absurdism, protest, and commitment

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirsten E. Shepherd-Barr
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Gay Rights ◽  
Modern Drama ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Many Sources ◽  
The Cold War

The decades 1960–80 witnessed a seismic shift in modern drama. The rage that came to define, and fuel, much of the drama in the 1960s and 1970s is directed at the audience. ‘Absurdism, protest, and commitment’ shows it is a post-war rage stemming from many sources: the Vietnam War, the Cold War, a feeling of betrayal by government and politicians, the Civil Rights Movement, Black Power, gay rights, feminism, the growing gap between rich and poor, and ethnic oppression. It is all about denying the audience what it expects of a play, provoking it out of real or perceived complacency, startling, and offending it. The plays of Pinter, Shepard, Beckett, Stoppard, Friel, and Fugard are discussed.

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