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Book Review
Disabled Veterans in History. Edited by DAVID A. GERBER. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000. 348pp. $49.50 (cloth).
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This is the fifth book in the series Corporealities: Discourses of Disability, edited by David T. Mitchell and Sharon L. Snyder. Unlike the previous works, which have a more recent focus, this book must wrestle with the fact that, as editor David Gerber states, "Disabled veterans are neglected figures in the history of war and peace, and the historical scholarship about them at present is fragmentary." Even that is probably an understatement. The fact of the matter, as Gerber points out, is that there are barely any works in the field of history that deal exclusively with disabled veterans. |
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This lack of previous publications (and the attendant lack of a large group of historians that work on this topic) may be why Gerber was forced to take a more multidisciplinary approach in his collection of historical contributors. The work is subdivided into three parts: Representation, Public Policy, and Living with a Disability: Adjustments and Maladjustments.Within this framework, the thirteen other authors and historians fit nicely, though as one might expect from a subject dealing with hierarchical organizations, power, and the body, the dead hand of Michael Foucault rests heavily on several of the selections. Not all of the works, however, are historical. Some blur the line between conventional history and social critique (and in one case art history) but the overall effect is pleasant and enlightening, something unique to this book as opposed to many other collections that attempt to fuse disparate fields. |
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In the first section, three authors, Gerber included among them, present essays dealing with how the disabled veteran has appeared in art and movies. Although this method may appear ahistorical at first glance, two of the essays dealing with Hollywood in particular do a good job of examining and exposing shifts in public perceptions through the lens of the Hollywood director. One author, in dealing with the post-Vietnam treatment of veterans, made an especially interesting observation. Martin F. Norden relates, |
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