Gendering the new hero narratives: Military death in Denmark and Sweden
| Author | Maria Wendt,Cecilia Åse |
| Date | 01 March 2018 |
| Published date | 01 March 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0010836717728540 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0010836717728540
Cooperation and Conflict
2018, Vol. 53(1) 23 –41
© The Author(s) 2017
Reprints and permissions:
sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/0010836717728540
journals.sagepub.com/home/cac
Gendering the new hero
narratives: Military death in
Denmark and Sweden
Cecilia Åse and Maria Wendt
Abstract
During the 20th century, wars were fought primarily in the name of protecting the homeland.
Making the ‘ultimate sacrifice’ was a national masculine duty and a key feature of military heroism.
Today, human rights and international values justify war-making and legitimise military action.
In one of these post-national wars, the International Security Assistance Force operation in
Afghanistan, more than 700 European soldiers have lost their lives. How have these deaths been
legitimised, and how has the new security discourse affected notions of masculinised heroism and
sacrifice? This article investigates how the dimensions of national/international and masculinity/
femininity are negotiated in media narratives of heroism and sacrifice in Denmark and Sweden.
Regarding scholarly discussions on the professionalisation, individualisation and domestication
of military heroism, the empirical analysis demonstrates that the Danish/Swedish nation
remains posited as the core context for military heroism and sacrifice. In the media narratives,
professionalism is represented as an expression of specific national qualities. The media narratives
conflate nation and family and represent military heroes as distinctively masculine and national
figures. It is argued that a family trope has become vital in present-day hero narratives. This trope
is disposed towards collective emotions, national loyalty and conservative gender ideals.
Keywords
Gender, family, heroism, International Security Assistance Force mission, narratives, nationalism
Introduction
Blood, soil and sacrifice were what military heroes were made of in 20th-century European
wars. A soldier’s death in war was perceived as the ultimate masculine duty, and war
heroes were worshipped in what George Mosse (1990) terms ‘the cult of the fallen.’ To die
for the nation invoked collective gratitude as a soldier had sacrificed his life to protect and
sustain the nation. In contemporary times, human rights and international values – rather
Corresponding author:
Maria Wendt, Department of Political Science, Stockholm University, 10691 Stockholm, Sweden.
Email: Maria.wendt@statsvet.su.se
728540CAC0010.1177/0010836717728540Cooperation and ConflictÅse and Wendt
research-article2017
Article
24 Cooperation and Conflict 53(1)
than the homeland – justify war-making and legitimise military action. One example is the
UN-authorised military operations in Afghanistan, where more than 700 European sol-
diers have been killed since 2001. On whose behalf and for what values are lives sacri-
ficed in ‘postnational’ wars?
Feminist scholars have discussed to what extent a shift to postnational and cosmo-
politan values means that soldiers sacrifice themselves not for their co-nationals but
for ‘distant others’ (Kronsell, 2012: 78–80, cf. Bergman Rosamond, 2013; Duncanson,
2013). The alleged universalism of these values has been questioned by, for example,
Judith Butler (2009), who notes the distinctions made between lives that are worth
protecting – and are therefore grievable – and those that are not. The types of sacrifices
that are justified, for whom and in the name of what remain significant ethical and
political issues.
The historical representations of sacrifice and masculine military heroism are chal-
lenged by shifts in the global security discourse in three main ways. First, the connection
between national soil and sacrifice has been severed as soldiers do not lose their lives
exclusively in defence of the territorial homeland. Second, multi-national military coop-
eration and organisation have loosened the archetypical connection between the nation-
state and its armed forces. Finally, the military is decreasingly a male arena. The entry of
women into the armed forces has encouraged a renegotiation of the soldier as the epit-
ome of masculine duty and national honour.
There are conflicting scholarly interpretations regarding the extent to which tradi-
tional values and identities remain important in contemporary military hero narratives.
A key question is whether the ideological trope of the anonymous citizen-soldier sacri-
ficing himself for the nation has yielded to more individualised and personalised narra-
tives. Scholars have argued that heroism today is constructed around conceptions of
military professionalism that also include softer values and caring capacities (Drake,
2012; Hedetoft, 2009; King, 2010; Zehfuss, 2009). Others claim that national identifi-
cation and patriotism are still present in contemporary hero narratives. This research
highlights the way that forms of military commemoration continue to exhibit apprecia-
tion for selfless service to a historical national community (Dahl Martinsen, 2013;
Danilova, 2015a, 2015b). Moreover, the extent to which the inclusion of women in
combat roles challenges the masculine imprint on military heroism has been debated
(Basham, 2008; Ette, 2013).
This article contributes to the scholarly discussion of the extent to which globalisation
and a new security discourse have challenged or changed established perceptions of
legitimate war and its gendered construction of heroism. Recognising that a vital aspect
of contemporary warfare concerns the way that war is played out in the media, we exam-
ine media narratives of military heroism and sacrifice in Denmark and Sweden. In the
‘battle of hearts and minds,’ democratic states need to foster public support for the war
effort through the media (Carruthers, 2011; Cottle, 2007). We specifically engage with
media representations of the Afghanistan/International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)
experience. The analysis emphasises the dimensions of national/international and mas-
culinity/femininity in relation to Danish and Swedish soldiers’ deaths in Afghanistan and
these soldiers’ repatriation and funerals. The main research questions are as follows:
What national/international values are invoked to justify these military deaths? In what
To continue reading
Request your trial