Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-pftt2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-09T07:46:10.276Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Women: The Secret Weapon of Modern Warfare?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 March 2020

Abstract

The images from wars in the Middle East that haunt us are those of young women killing and torturing. Their media circulated stories share a sense of shock. They have both galvanized and confounded debates over feminism and women's equality. And, as Oliver argues in this essay, they share, perhaps subliminally, the problematic notion of women as both offensive and defensive weapons of war, a notion that is symptomatic of fears of women's “mysterious” powers.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © 2008 by Hypatia, Inc.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abu‐Lughod, Lila. 2002. Do Muslim women really need saving? American Anthropologist 104 (3): 783–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ahmed, Leila. 1992. Women and gender in Islam. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Bennet, James. 2003. From student to suicide bomber. International Herald Tribune (Paris), May 30.Google Scholar
Black, Joanne. 2004. Girls can do anything. Dominion Post (Wellington, New Zealand), May 24.Google Scholar
Bragg, Rick. 2003. I am a soldier, too. The Jessica Lynch story. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Chow, Rey. 1989. Violence in the other country: China as crisis, spectacle, and woman. In Third world women and the politics of feminism, ed. Talpade Mohanty, Chandra, Russo, Ann, and Torres, Lourdes. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Cloud, Dana. 2003. To veil the threat of terror. Quarterly Journal of Speech 90 (3): 285306.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cocco, Marie. 2004. Scandal shows women acting like men. Newsday (Long Island, N.Y.), May 13.Google Scholar
Cooke, Mariam. 2002. Saving brown women. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 28 (1): 468–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cuniberti, Betty. 2004. Women soldiers face extra scrutiny. St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 23.Google Scholar
D'Amico, Francine. 2004. The women of Abu Ghraib. (Syracuse) Post-Standard, May 23.Google Scholar
Daraghmeh, Mohammed. 2003. Women as bombers test tenets of Islam. South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale), June 1.Google Scholar
Dodds, Paisley. 2005a. Report: Sex tactics used on detainees at Guantánamo; Account describes grilling by women. Associated Press. Chicago Tribune, January 28.Google Scholar
Dodds, Paisley. 2005b. Women used sex to get detainees to talk. The (Montreal) Gazette, January 28.Google Scholar
Dowd, Maureen. 2005. Torture chicks gone wild. New York Times, January 30.Google Scholar
Ehrenreich, Barbara. 2004. Feminism's assumptions upended. In Abu Ghraib: The politics of torture. Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books.Google Scholar
Eig, Jonathan. 2003. Why you've heard of Jessica Lynch, not Zan Hornbuckle; As sentiment about war evolves, victims grab attention, not fighters. Wall Street Journal, November 11.Google Scholar
Jaber, Hala. 2003. The avengers. Sunday Times (London), December 7.Google Scholar
Jacoby, Jeff. 2005. Saying nothing is torture in itself. Boston Globe, January 30.Google Scholar
Kristeva, Julia. 2007. For Teresa Brennan. Trans. Hoff, Shannon. In Living attention, ed. Jardine, Alice, Lundeen, Shannon, and Oliver, Kelly. Albany: SUNY Press.Google Scholar
Kristof, Nicholas D. 2003. A woman's place. New York Times, April 5.Google Scholar
Larzeg, Marnia. 1994. The eloquence of silence: Algerian women in question. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
News Journal. 2005. Torturers tricks: Debasing countries missions at Guantánamo Bay. Daytona Beach, Fla., February 7.Google Scholar
Novak, Viveca. 2005. Impure tactics. Time 165 (8): 33.Google Scholar
Oliver, Kelly. 2007. Women as weapons of war: Iraq, sex, and the media. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Ollove, Michael. 2004. Women in photos of abuse intensify the shock. South Florida Sun‐Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale), May 13.Google Scholar
Parker, Kathleen. 2003. In search of a face for the ERA; Saving Pfc. Lynch from artificial legacy. Chicago Tribune, April 9.Google Scholar
Parker, Kathleen. 2004. Why were women at Abu Ghraib anyway? Grand Rapids Press, May 30.Google Scholar
Rich, Frank. 2003. Pfc. Jessica Lynch isn't Rambo anymore. New York Times, November 9.Google Scholar
Ryan, Joan. 2002. Women hold the key to future in Kabul. San Francisco Chronicle, March 31.Google Scholar
Scripps, Bonnie Erbe. 2004. Don't blame abuse on women in military. Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah), May 23.Google Scholar
Sontag, Susan. 2004. Regarding the torture of others. New York Times Magazine, May 23.Google Scholar
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. 1988. Can the subaltern speak? In Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, ed. Nelson, Cary and Grossberg, Lawrence. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Steward, Nkrumah Shabazz. 2005. Gitmo interrogators reportedly relied on sex humiliation. I'm juxtaposing. http://8BM.com.Google Scholar
Thomas, Cal. 2004. Sexual politics behind whorehouse behavior at Iraq prison? Grand Rapids Press, May 25.Google Scholar
Victor, Barbara. 2003. Army of roses: Inside the world of Palestinian women suicide bombers. St. Martin's Press. New York .Google Scholar
Viner, Katherine. 2002. Feminism as imperialism. The Guardian (Manchester), September 21.Google Scholar
Warner, Brooke. 2004. Abu Ghraib and a new generation of soldiers. In Abu Ghraib: The Politics of Torture. Berkeley, Calif.: North Atlantic Books.Google Scholar