/2019/06/22/staying-with-the-feeling-trauma-humility-and-care-in-ethnographic-fieldwork/ Sat, 29 Jun 2019 16:43:02 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.5 /2019/06/22/staying-with-the-feeling-trauma-humility-and-care-in-ethnographic-fieldwork/comment-page-1/#comment-2658 Sat, 29 Jun 2019 16:43:02 +0000 https://anthrodendum.org/?p=3010#comment-2658 The brief comments on the concept of Complex Trauma provided insight on trauma I experienced as a child and teenager. While the nature of these on going episodes has dimmed by 70 years of living, I must admit to some benefits that accrued to me later in life when I was drafted by the U.S. Army. Upon entering basic training I was painfully and constantly aware of the brutality that my fellow recruits and draftees were being prepared for to face the enemy in Vietnam. I was intimately acquainted with brutality and bullying. I immediately began to question why I should involve myself further. The Vietnamese people were fighting for their freedom from the French plantation owners. They wanted to feed themselves and their families. I saw the military chain of command as bullies and cowards, no different than the people I had encountered in my childhood. I was forced to think for myself due to past trauma. Otherwise I would have simply enjoyed the comradery of my fellow soldiers and bought into the preparation of war. However, bucking the system also brings grave danger to the nation in times of a true national emergency. Young people must still serve honorably. The immense question becomes, what is a just war and what is simply military adventurism?

]]>