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Library of Social Science presents
Binaries in Battle: Representations of Division and Conflict
Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Binaries in Battle: Representations of Division and Conflict
Enemy Images in War Propaganda Editors: Marja Vuorinen, Noora Kotilainen and Aki-Mauri Huhtinen
Contributors: Marja Vuorinen, Ann Valtonen, Virpi Sorsa, Ilona Pajari, Pia Mikauder, Julia Malkki, Virpi Lehtinen, Anitta Kynsilehto, Noora Kotilainen, Saara Jantunen, Aki-Mauri Huhtinen, Mark Harmanmaa;
Pages: 301
ISBN: 978-1-4438-6126-7
Publication Date: 2014
Format: Hardcover
Availability: In Stock
List Price in USD: $52.99
Discount Price (20% off): $42.39

For information on ordering,
please click here.

Use the offer code "LSSBINARIES" at checkout to receive the special discount.
Cambridge Scholars Publishing has produced an astonishing array of original edited collections—many of them dealing with issues of political violence and warfare—with which Library of Social Science readers have become familiar. Frequently authored by young scholars, they stand at the cutting edge of contemporary research on these topics.

We are pleased to present Binaries in Battle: Representations of Division and Conflict, an exciting volume focusing on the role of the enemy as constitutive of the nation or group. We encourage you to order a copy of this book for yourself, and for your library (see details and special offers directly below).

To read the introduction and first
chapter at no charge, please click here.

Cambridge Scholars Publishing is offering readers of the LSS Newsletter a 20% discount off the list price. For information on ordering, click here. Simply use the offer code "LSSBINARIES" at check-out to receive this special discount.

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This important book belongs in every library seeking to build an excellent collection of scholarly books. It will be valuable for your own research, as well as for the work of students. Please bring or send this page to your librarian—and ask her to order the title (the box above provides the relevant data).

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Orion

Excerpt from Binaries in
Battle: Representations of
Division and Conflict

"According to Carl Schmitt, a political movement is born when it finds an enemy – a real or imaginary outside force that appears to threaten its core values and/or thwart its fundamental goals. Opposing the chosen antagonist then becomes the movement’s mission. This kind of constitutive enemy serves as the negation of what the group cherishes, whom it seeks to protect or what it promotes; paradoxically, the rhetoric of hate is the rhetoric of love inversed."

Book Description

Defining things through binary opposition – male/female, familiar/foreign, life/death – forms the base of human thinking. Adding moral assessment to logic, we often represent binaries even as divisions into good and evil. Exclusions based on the division of Us vs. Them make their presence felt during any conflict, and become crucial in times of war.

To read the introduction and first
chapter at no charge, please click here.

However, binary thinking is inherent also in peaceful, everyday conversation, when politics, social issues, ethnicities and religious identities are described and debated.Binaries in Battle: Representations of Division and Conflict is a wide-ranging multidisciplinary anthology that presents the fundamental rationale of binary thinking from many different angles.

The evidence is drawn from cases ranging from historical to contemporary and near future, covering both wartime and peacetime conflicts. The writers apply a wide variety of methods, including linguistics, visual semiotics, ethnography, and leadership and organisational analysis. Seemingly unconnected topics, such as humanitarianism and warfare, or death and tourism, appear strangely connected, and the relevance of speed to cyber warfare is revealed to contain a paradox.

Mass immigration is observed from several, mutually exclusive angles to provide a 360 degree view. Despite its multifaceted baselines, the book provides a solid understanding of the manifestations of binary thinking. By deconstructing ideological discourses it dispels black-and-white imageries, replacing them with softer shades of grey.

 

Binaries in Battle: Representations of Division and Conflict

Table of Contents

Introduction
Noora Kotilainen and Marja Vuorinen

Part I: War

  • Chapter One: The Thrill of Dark Tourism (Anu Valtonen)
  • Chapter Two “Us”, “Them” and the Fallen: The Burial of Fallen Soldiers
    and the Image of the Enemy (Ilona Pajari)
  • Chapter Three: Gruesome Entertainment: The Representation of the Iraq War
    in the Italian Press (Marja Härmänmaa)

Part II: Soldiership

  • Chapter Four: Drones, Missiles and Teddy Bears: The Crisis of 21st Century Soldiership (Saara Jantunen and Noora Kotilainen)
  • Chapter Five: The Kinaesthetic-Sensational Body of the Western Male Soldier:
    Reflections from the Phenomenology of the Body (Virpi Lehtinen)

Part III: Mobility, Conflict and Terrorism

  • Chapter Six: Western Values Under Threat? Perceptions of “Us” and “Them”
    in History Textbooks in Finnish Schools (Pia Mikander)
  • Chapter Seven: Irregularity as a Securitized Phenomenon in the Hubs of Transit Migration:
    Practicing Security at the EU’s External and Internal Borders (Anitta Kynsilehto)
  • Chapter Eight: Case Breivik: A Solitary Madman’s Crusade or a Reality Check
    for Western Democracies? (Marja Vuorinen)

Part IV: Strategy, Planning and Organisation

  • Chapter Nine: Strategists in Trouble? An Analysis of a Disagreement in a Strategy
    Formulation Meeting (Virpi Sorsa)
  • Chapter Ten: The Linchpin and the Effectiveness of the Military Organisation (Juha Mälkki)
  • Chapter Eleven: A Parallax View of Violence and War in the Real and Virtual Worlds (Aki-Mauri Huhtinen)

Contributors