Excavating Soldier Deaths: A Study of Changing Burial Practices

Abstract

This study argues that warfare is permeated by attitudes toward death, and that the history of war is also a history of these changing attitudes. By focusing on body disposal and burial practices, the article traces when and how soldiers-once regarded as simple military instruments-started to be conceived as individuals qua individuals, eventually becoming the hardly expendable beings that we know today. Although a focus on disposal and burial practices might sound fanciful, how corpses are dealt with can suggest whether, and in what ways, individuals are important to the living. It can also shed light on the origins of a variety of current phenomena, such as casualty sensitivity, post-heroic warfare, and risk-transfer militarism.Author's note: This study is part of a broader inquiry on the changing meaning of soldiers' death. For extensive comments on the overall research, I'd like to thank Ted Hop, Konstantin Vo ¨ssing, and Alex Wendt. A previous version of this article was delivered at the Annual Conference of the Italian Standing Group on International Relations (SGRI), Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Trent, Italy (June 23, 2016). I am thankful to Michele Chiaruzzi for inviting me to contribute to the panel "Questioni di suprema importanza" and to the other participants, especially to Filippo Andreatta. I also owe particular thanks to Lelio Pallini for his helpful suggestions. Thanks also to the editors of International Political Sociology and to two anonymous reviewers for their insightful criticisms. Funding was provided by the Ministero dell'Istruzione, dell'Universita a e della Ricerca (2015FR7MKM).

Connected Memories: The International Politics of Partition, from Poland to India

“…For example, Yoav Galai (2017) examines the intersections of various narratives of redemption-a concept that must presuppose a certain memory of the past-Israeli, German, and Chinese, through afforestation in the Negev region. Or in Michal Givoni's (2020) study of Palestinian volunteers assisting refugees in Greece, it is through a certain commensurability of traumatic past experiences that motivates "an exception to the rules of humanitarian action" typically thought of as universalist and impartial (see also Zambernardi 2017 ;Callahan 2020 , chapter 10).…”