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The Peoples’ War?The Second World War in Sociopolitical Perspective |
eBook Available
A fresh approach to understanding the diverse experiences of the Second World War.
Some 60 million people died during the Second World War; millions more were displaced in Europe, Africa, and Asia. The war resulted in the creation of new states, the acceleration of imperial decline, and a shift in the distribution of global power. Despite its unprecedented impact, a comprehensive account of the complex international experiences of this war remains elusive.
The Peoples’ War? offers fresh approaches to the challenge of writing a new history of the Second World War. Exploring aspects of the war that have been marginalized in military and political studies, the volume foregrounds less familiar narratives, subjects, and places. Chapters recover the wartime experiences of individuals - including women, children, members of minority ethnic groups, and colonial subjects - whose stories do not fit easily into conventional national war narratives. The contributors show how terms used to delineate the conflict such as home front and battle front, occupier and occupied, captor and prisoner, and friend and foe became increasingly blurred as the war wore on. Above all, the volume encourages reflection on whether this conflict really was a “Peoples’ War.”
Challenging the homogenizing narratives of the war as a nationally unifying experience, The Peoples’ War? seeks to enrich our understanding of the Second World War as a global event.
The Peoples’ War? offers fresh approaches to the challenge of writing a new history of the Second World War. Exploring aspects of the war that have been marginalized in military and political studies, the volume foregrounds less familiar narratives, subjects, and places. Chapters recover the wartime experiences of individuals - including women, children, members of minority ethnic groups, and colonial subjects - whose stories do not fit easily into conventional national war narratives. The contributors show how terms used to delineate the conflict such as home front and battle front, occupier and occupied, captor and prisoner, and friend and foe became increasingly blurred as the war wore on. Above all, the volume encourages reflection on whether this conflict really was a “Peoples’ War.”
Challenging the homogenizing narratives of the war as a nationally unifying experience, The Peoples’ War? seeks to enrich our understanding of the Second World War as a global event.
Details
408 Pages, 6 x 9
12 photos, 4 tables
ISBN 9780228014713
November 2022
Formats: Cloth, Paperback, eBook
"Each chapter provides a contribution to an understanding of the war beyond long dominant narratives. Moreover, this collection seeks to propel further research into the impact of the war from the same societal-political level of examination that it employs. The Peoples’ War? is intentionally posed as a question, in part, to stimulate additional questions itself and, at this essential function of scholarship, it delivers." Journal of Military History
Alexander Wilson is lecturer in security studies at King’s College London, co-director of the Second World War Research Group for Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, and a councillor of the Army Records Society.
Richard Hammond is a historian and senior lecturer in the Politics and History Division at Brunel University, London, and a vice-president of the Second World War Research Group.
Jonathan Fennell is a reader in modern history at King’s College London, co-director of the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War, and co-founder and president of the Second World War Research Group.
Richard Hammond is a historian and senior lecturer in the Politics and History Division at Brunel University, London, and a vice-president of the Second World War Research Group.
Jonathan Fennell is a reader in modern history at King’s College London, co-director of the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War, and co-founder and president of the Second World War Research Group.
Introduction: In Search of a New History of the Second World War 3
Alexander Wilson, Richard Hammond, and Jonathan Fennell
Theme One Problematizing “People’s Wars”
1 World War, Worldwide Mobilization: How Global History Complicates the “People’s War” Narrative 19
Andrew N. Buchanan
Theme Two: Mobilization and Remobilization for “People’s Wars”
2 Fascist Warfare on the Home Front: War Mobilization and the Fragmentation of Italian Society, 1935-1943 45
Nicolò Da Lio
3 Building an Enemy: Great Britain as Depicted by Italian Fascist Propaganda 71
Jacopo Pili
4 Growing Up in Kaifeng: Young People, Ideology, and Mobilization in Occupied China, 1938-1945 90
Mark Baker
5 “What the Soldier Thinks”: Mobilizing the Mind of the American Soldier in the Second World War 113
Edward J.K. Gitre
Theme Three: “People’s Wars” as Drivers of Change
6 Health Care and Disease in Italy’s War, 1940-1945 135
Fabio De Ninno
7 The Second World War and the New Deal for American Science 162
Richard V. Damms
8 Edward Murrow and the “Little People” of the Blitz: A Study in American Idealism 185
Sean Dettman
Theme Four: Wars Among the People
9 German Anti-partisan Warfare: The Spectrum of Ruthlessness to Restraint 207
Ben H. Shepherd
10 Italian Occupation Policies and Counterinsurgency Campaigns in France and in the Balkans, 1940-1943 230
Emanuele Sica
11 Divided Loyalties: Indian Prisoners of War in Singapore, February 1942 to May 1943 251
Kevin Noles
12 Spawning Fratricide: Occupation and Resistance in Greece, 1941-1944 276
Christina J.M. Goulter
13 Gender and Community During War: The Amorous Relationships of Western POWs and German Women in Nazi Germany 300
Raffael Scheck
Theme Five: The History and Memory of “People’s Wars”
14 Framing Myths of the Second World War through Ministry of Information Propaganda Posters 327
Katherine Howells
15 Beyond a “People’s War”: The Polish Past and the Second World War in Contemporary Perspective 353
Jadwiga Biskupska
Contributors 377
Index 383
Alexander Wilson, Richard Hammond, and Jonathan Fennell
Theme One Problematizing “People’s Wars”
1 World War, Worldwide Mobilization: How Global History Complicates the “People’s War” Narrative 19
Andrew N. Buchanan
Theme Two: Mobilization and Remobilization for “People’s Wars”
2 Fascist Warfare on the Home Front: War Mobilization and the Fragmentation of Italian Society, 1935-1943 45
Nicolò Da Lio
3 Building an Enemy: Great Britain as Depicted by Italian Fascist Propaganda 71
Jacopo Pili
4 Growing Up in Kaifeng: Young People, Ideology, and Mobilization in Occupied China, 1938-1945 90
Mark Baker
5 “What the Soldier Thinks”: Mobilizing the Mind of the American Soldier in the Second World War 113
Edward J.K. Gitre
Theme Three: “People’s Wars” as Drivers of Change
6 Health Care and Disease in Italy’s War, 1940-1945 135
Fabio De Ninno
7 The Second World War and the New Deal for American Science 162
Richard V. Damms
8 Edward Murrow and the “Little People” of the Blitz: A Study in American Idealism 185
Sean Dettman
Theme Four: Wars Among the People
9 German Anti-partisan Warfare: The Spectrum of Ruthlessness to Restraint 207
Ben H. Shepherd
10 Italian Occupation Policies and Counterinsurgency Campaigns in France and in the Balkans, 1940-1943 230
Emanuele Sica
11 Divided Loyalties: Indian Prisoners of War in Singapore, February 1942 to May 1943 251
Kevin Noles
12 Spawning Fratricide: Occupation and Resistance in Greece, 1941-1944 276
Christina J.M. Goulter
13 Gender and Community During War: The Amorous Relationships of Western POWs and German Women in Nazi Germany 300
Raffael Scheck
Theme Five: The History and Memory of “People’s Wars”
14 Framing Myths of the Second World War through Ministry of Information Propaganda Posters 327
Katherine Howells
15 Beyond a “People’s War”: The Polish Past and the Second World War in Contemporary Perspective 353
Jadwiga Biskupska
Contributors 377
Index 383
