Etudiantes américaines, militantisme et guerre du Vietnam : guerre, paix et « genre » dans les années 1960

 The opposition to the Vietnam War (1964 – 1973) was unprecedented in American history; and the universities took the center stage. As a sub-group, the female students deserve a particular attention. First because the interaction between sexuality/gender and war is part of History and any war story, and second, their increasing number from the mid 1950s on suggests that they made up a new and unexpected “force” that significantly added to the opposition. Thus, this paper explores what made up the female activist experience. I will then remark on the perception(s) of their roles that oscillated between tradition and change. This involves in turn an examination of the notions of legitimacy and visibility of female activism. Last, I will consider the consequences of the inconsistencies between the Movement ideals and rhetoric and the reality as far as gender roles were concerned. Ultimately, this paper will briefly assess if women’s roles and voices as activists in the public and political sphere have generated a new discourse

Propagandes, films et guerre du Vietnam : histoires d’hommes et de femmes ou propagande du « genre » de The Deer Hunter (1978) à Path to War (2002)

Drawing from a selection of movies (and a documentary), I propose to study some images of men and women in the context of the Vietnam War, taking a closer look at women’s. To some extent, they contribute to revealing how the “field of battle” has become a “field of gender” and what is at stake. The film as a medium is involved in what we may call “war propaganda”: in the movies, there are elements that are part and parcel of what makes the traditional image of men and women in wartime. It is mostly about defining men as visible acting characters on stage and women as secondary characters (Path to War), playing the part of the apolitical and maternal Other (Heaven and Earth). Indeed, their historical identity mainly defines them as “those who do not make war” (The Deer Hunter). Sometimes, the female image is ambivalent. But the portraits of those who betray their gender, the women warriors (Full Metal Jacket) and the unfaithful (Coming Home), though proposing new facets, do integrate into gender war propaganda. Occasionally the images showed also reveal new voices and paths (Regret to Inform, In Country, Heaven and Earth). It is true that overall we encounter no heroines but “super-hero soldiers” who rescue women (Heaven and Earth, Coming Home); however the representations offer a new space, emancipated from historical and social expectations. But do these stories suggest that women’s stories may be war stories and be part of history

Les femmes américaines et la guerre du Vietnam : mise en place et utilisation d’un processus de mimétisme

By and large, women have been maintained at a “reasonable” distance from the war. Their historic identity has mainly been that of mother, and therefore that of those who do not make war. They are not to belong to this sphere; it is to remain masculine, a men’s world. The Vietnam War (1964-1973) is no exception to the rule. This characteristic may be even more visible in the context of Vietnam given the power granted to authenticity: “having been there” has been essential. However, it seems that, just as Vietnam was a confused war, the border between genders has been sometimes blurred as well. We have thus found that some women have constructed and developed a strange process, a(n) (unconscious) strategy, in order to enter the world of war while not “having been there” really, while not knowing physically what war is and was. If “Vietnam is the land of [their] imagination”, as Barbara Sonneborn put it (Regret to inform, 1999), mimetism has allowed them to fill out the blanks, to uncover and discover their man’s reality, to “see what it was he saw […] to be in the field with him”, says Gail Gilberg (Snake’s Daugher, 1997). I will therefore expose and study this phenomenon that appears in various women’s stories, written or told, by themselves or others, through their own narrative styles and speeches. In doing so, I intend to examine whether the use of this mechanism reinforces the traditional representations of men and women in war: Does it allow a re-writing of these excluded female voices, while putting forward the specificities of women’s experiences in war? Does it grant women a voice and a visible presence? Considering that “societies are, in some sense, the sum total of the war stories” (Jean B. Elshtain), it seems interesting to examine to what extent this strategy allows the American women to find their place in the story of the Vietnam war, in a very specific way

Les années Johnson : ruptures, continuités et héritage

International audienc

Media, Images, Propaganda

Ce numéro de La Revue LISA réunit une grande partie des contributions présentées à l'occasion des journées d'études « Media, Images, Propagandes et Anglophonie » qui se sont déroulées à la Maison de la Recherche en Sciences Humaines de l'Université de Caen les 20, 21 et 22 octobre 2005. Organisées par l'Equipe de Recherche LSA (Littératures et Sociétés Anglophones, EA 2610), ces journées ont permis de poursuivre les réflexions autour d'une des thématiques principales de notre recherche sur la propagation des idées médiatiques et la (ré-) écriture de l'Histoire, à travers divers exemples qui ont traversé le XXe siècle anglais, irlandais et, dans une moindre mesure, américain. Ces journées, bien qu'ayant encouragé quelques visées comparatives, se sont largement concentrées sur les îles Britanniques

Propagating Ideas and Images

Ce numéro de la Revue LISA/LISA e-journal réunit une version enrichie des communications effectuées lors du colloque pluridisciplinaire international Media, Idées, Propagandes qui s’est déroulé au Mémorial de Caen et à la Maison de la Recherche en Sciences Humaines de l’Université de Caen en octobre 2006. Dans la continuité des travaux du centre de recherche « Littératures et Sociétés Anglophones », ce numéro présente une réflexion croisée sur la Première et la Deuxième Guerres mondiales et aborde des expériences plus contemporaines. Rédigés par des Historiens français et étrangers, des Anglicistes, des Américanistes, des Irlandistes mais aussi des linguistes et chercheurs en communication culturelle, les articles privilégient une pluralité de points de vue et portent sur des aspects divers d’une propagande plus ou moins subtile en temps de paix et en temps de guerre