Virtual War and Magical Death: Technologies and Imaginaries for Terror and Killing
Neil L. Whitehead
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Description for Virtual War and Magical Death: Technologies and Imaginaries for Terror and Killing
Hardback. The contributors to this provocative collection scrutinize the relations between anthropology and contemporary global war, contending that modern high-tech warfare is analogous to rituals of magic and sorcery, and examining the U.S. military's exploitation of ethnographic research. Editor(s): Whitehead, Neil L.; Finnstrom, Sverker. Series: The Cultures and Practice of Violence. Num Pages: 304 pages, 15 photographs, 2 tables. BIC Classification: JHMC; JWA. Category: (P) Professional & Vocational. Dimension: 239 x 160 x 23. Weight in Grams: 567.
Virtual War and Magical Death is a provocative examination of the relations between anthropology and contemporary global war. Several arguments unite the collected essays, which are based on ethnographic research in varied locations, including Guatemala, Uganda, and Tanzania, as well as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and the United States. Foremost is the contention that modern high-tech warfare—as it is practiced and represented by the military, the media, and civilians—is analogous to rituals of magic and sorcery. Technologies of "virtual warfare," such as high-altitude bombing, remote drone attacks, night-vision goggles, and even music videoes and computer games that simulate battle, reproduce the ... Read more
Virtual War and Magical Death is a provocative examination of the relations between anthropology and contemporary global war. Several arguments unite the collected essays, which are based on ethnographic research in varied locations, including Guatemala, Uganda, and Tanzania, as well as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and the United States. Foremost is the contention that modern high-tech warfare—as it is practiced and represented by the military, the media, and civilians—is analogous to rituals of magic and sorcery. Technologies of "virtual warfare," such as high-altitude bombing, remote drone attacks, night-vision goggles, and even music videoes and computer games that simulate battle, reproduce the ... Read more
Product Details
Format
Hardback
Publication date
2013
Publisher
Duke University Press United States
Number of pages
304
Condition
New
Series
The Cultures and Practice of Violence
Number of Pages
304
Place of Publication
North Carolina, United States
ISBN
9780822354352
SKU
V9780822354352
Shipping Time
Usually ships in 7 to 11 working days
Ref
99-1
About Neil L. Whitehead
Neil L. Whitehead (1956–2012) was Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. His books Dark Shamans: Kanaimà and the Poetics of Violent Death and In Darkness and Secrecy: The Anthropology of Assault Sorcery and Witchcraft in Amazonia (coedited with Robin Wright) are both published by Duke University Press. Sverker Finnström is Associate Professor of Cultural Anthropology at ... Read more
Reviews for Virtual War and Magical Death: Technologies and Imaginaries for Terror and Killing
"Virtual War and Magical Death is a creative project that is bound to stimulate constructive conversation. It inserts contemporary technologies of warfare, particularly the U.S. Army's Human Terrain System, into sociocultural anthropology's current reflections on its theoretical and methodological practices, as well as the purposes of ethnographic inquiry within and beyond the discipline."—Carol J. Greenhouse, author of The Paradox of ... Read more