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Sep. 29th, 2006 03:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwywnnyddSomething that's been mulling around in my head recently.
The American Civil War (The War Between the States, The War of Northern Agression, etc.) is unique in US history, in the level of documentation we have for it. It was the first major conflict where the average soldier knew how to read and write (at an elementary level), and the military censors hadn't caught up with this sea change. Letters home provide us with an often-unflinching view of the day to day life of a soldier, a sailor, a preacher.
I think the war in Iraq is going to achieve the same level of uniqueness, for mostly the same reason. We have as-it-happens reports, CNN.com and the BBC and Al-Jazeera. We have the online journals of soldiers, interactive views of the mostly tedious with segments of gut-wrenching adrenaline life. What will we take from this? We have media coverage of every offensive, we have civilian-created video logs (Tokyo Rose in the digital age...).
Will we learn anything from this wealth of information we have at our fingertips?
The American Civil War (The War Between the States, The War of Northern Agression, etc.) is unique in US history, in the level of documentation we have for it. It was the first major conflict where the average soldier knew how to read and write (at an elementary level), and the military censors hadn't caught up with this sea change. Letters home provide us with an often-unflinching view of the day to day life of a soldier, a sailor, a preacher.
I think the war in Iraq is going to achieve the same level of uniqueness, for mostly the same reason. We have as-it-happens reports, CNN.com and the BBC and Al-Jazeera. We have the online journals of soldiers, interactive views of the mostly tedious with segments of gut-wrenching adrenaline life. What will we take from this? We have media coverage of every offensive, we have civilian-created video logs (Tokyo Rose in the digital age...).
Will we learn anything from this wealth of information we have at our fingertips?
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Date: 2006-09-30 01:38 am (UTC)Long couple of hours.