The Scar That Binds: American Culture and the Vietnam War

Keith Beattie

Open Access Published by New York University Press 1998

The Scar That Binds

American Culture and the Vietnam War

Keith Beattie

https://doi.org/10.18574/nyu/9780814709108.001.0001

Overview
Contents

About this book

At the height of the Vietnam War, American society was so severely fragmented that it seemed that Americans may never again share common concerns. The media and other commentators represented the impact of the war through a variety of rhetorical devices, most notably the emotionally charged metaphor of "the wound that will not heal." References in various contexts to veterans' attempts to find a "voice," and to bring the war "home" were also common. Gradually, an assured and resilient American self-image and powerful impressions of cultural collectivity transformed the Vietnam war into a device for maintaining national unity. Today, the war is portrayed as a healed wound, the once "silenced" veteran has found a voice, and the American home has accommodated the effects of Vietnam. The scar has healed, binding Americans into a union that denies the divisions, diversities, and differences exposed by the war. In this way, America is now "over" Vietnam.
In The Scar That Binds, Keith Beattie examines the central metaphors of the Vietnam war and their manifestations in American culture and life. Blending history and cultural criticism in a lucid style, this provocative book discusses an ideology of unity that has emerged through widespread rhetorical and cultural references to the war. A critique of this ideology reveals three dominant themes structured in a range of texts: the "wound," "the voice" of the Vietnam veteran, and "home." The analysis of each theme draws on a range of sources, including film, memoir, poetry, written and oral history, journalism, and political speeches. In contrast to studies concerned with representations of the war as a combat experience, The Scar That Binds opens and examines an unexplored critical space through a focus on the effects of the Vietnam War on American culture. The result is a highly original and compelling interpretation of the development of an ideology of unity in our culture.

Author / Editor information

Beattie Keith :

KEITH BEATTIE is Director of the Contemporary Studies Program of the University of Queensland, Australia.

Reviews

Beattie shows us how ideological strategies operate and, thereby, prepares us to outflank them in the future. The importance of his contribution to the study of American culture can hardly be overstated.

Andrew Ross,New York University:
Offers the broadest perspective to date on the social and cultural legacy of the Vietnam War.

George Lipsitz,author of Time Passages:
Keith Beattie's impressive analysis of popular culture representations identifies the core metaphors around which popular memory of the war in Vietnam has coalescedthe open wound, the silenced voice, and longing for home. . . . Beattie provides dramatic demonstration of the mechanisms and mediations within commercial culture that transform the hurts of history into stylized representations that hide the very past they claim to recover.

. . . brilliantly shows how the war lost abroad was subsequently won at home.

Bold. . . . The greatest pleasure the book offers is the often thought-provoking close reading of both familiar and long-forgotten movies and fiction of the Vietnam War era.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1. The Healed Wound
Habeas Corpus and Common Sense Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	15
The Wound That Dare Not Speak Its Name Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	18
Stab Wounds Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	21
"Us" and "Them" Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	24
Healing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	25
Vietnamnesia Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	28
The Personal Imperative Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	34
Rituals of the Community Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	38
The National Allegory Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	43
The Unhealed Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	49
2. The Vietnam Veteran as Ventriloquist
Silencing the Messenger Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	63
"If I Only Had the Words" Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	69
A Unique War Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	75
You Had to Be There Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	78
Teaching the Truth Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	85
The Voice of Unity Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	90
Talking Back Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	96
3. Bringing the War "Home"
The Home Front Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	108
Repatriation Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	127
The Therapeutic Family Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	133
Nostalgia Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	138
There's No Place Like It Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	142
Articulating Difference and Unity Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147
Conclusion Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	151
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	157
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	195
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221
About the Author Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	230

Language: English
Publisher: New York University Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;

eBook

Published: May 1, 1998
ISBN: 9780814709108