Ambivalent Anticipations

On Soldierly Becomings in the Desert of the Real

in The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology
Author:
Thomas Randrup Pedersen Royal Danish Defence College thpe@fak.dk

Search for other papers by Thomas Randrup Pedersen in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed Close
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3167/cja.2019.370107
Keywords:
action; adventure; authenticity; emplotment; future; passion; violence
Restricted access

All currencies in US Dollar

PayPal Logo

Abstract

What if war is not hell? What if war is not entertainment? What if war is, instead, the stuff dreams are made of? What is one then to anticipate of one's tour of duty in a war zone? In this article, I interrogate anticipations in relation to soldierly becomings through deployment to Afghanistan. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with Danish combat troops, I explore the uneasy coexistence of two anticipatory plotlines: ‘the passion’ and ‘the desert’. The former depicts the tour of duty as a heroic adventure driven by desire for real combat, while the latter casts deployment as an anti-heroic misadventure imposed by the dull reality in theatre. I argue that anticipation can harbour ambivalent, even antagonistic, yet simultaneous expectations of what might come. I show that anticipation is further blurred, as our anticipatory horizons are tied not only to our unsettled plotlines of becoming but also to our being's existential imperative.

Contributor Notes

Thomas Randrup Pedersen is Assistant Professor at the Royal Danish Defence College's Institute for the Study of Military History, Culture and War. He received his PhD from the Department of Anthropology at the University of Copenhagen in 2017. His dissertation explores Danish soldiering as a project of existential, moral and social becoming. He has contributed to ‘Studying the Military’, a special issue of Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology (forthcoming) and to Civil-Military Entanglements: Anthropological Perspectives (Sørensen and Ben-Ari [eds], forthcoming). His latest publication in English is ‘Get Real: Chasing Danish Warrior Dreams in the Afghan “Sandbox”’ in Critical Military Studies (2017).

  • Collapse
  • Expand

The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology

Cover The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology
Article Category:
Research Article
Page Count:
16
Keywords:
action; adventure; authenticity; emplotment; future; passion; violence
Print Publication Date:
01 Mar 2019
Online Publication Date:
01 Mar 2019
Copyright:
© The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 2019

  • Ahmed, S. 2014. Willful Subjects. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

  • Ardener, E. 1989. The Voice of Prophesy and Other Essays. Oxford: Berghahn Books.

  • Badiou, A. 2007. The Century. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.

  • Bubandt, N. and R. Willerslev. 2015. ‘The Dark Side of Empathy: Mimesis, Deception, and the Magic of Alterity’. Comparative Studies in Society and History 57 (1): 5–34. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417514000589.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Csordas, T. J. 2004. ‘Asymptote of the Ineffable: Embodiment, Alterity and the Theory of Religion’. Current Anthropology 45 (2): 163–185.

  • Daugbjerg, M. 2019. ‘Heroes Once Again: Varieties of Danish “Activism” in Conflated Commemorations of the War in Afghanistan and the Prusso-Danish War of 1864’. Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology 84 (1): 160–178. https://doi.org/10.1080/00141844.2017.1396232.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Daugbjerg, M. and B. R. Sørensen. 2017. ‘Becoming a Warring Nation: The Danish “Military Moment” and Its Repercussions’. Critical Military Studies 3 (1): 1–6. https://doi:10.1080/23337486.2016.1231994.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Fredensborg, R. 2010. ‘Mellem helte og bødler’ [Among Heroes and Executioners]. Filmmagasinet Ekko 48, 31 July.

  • Gordon, R. J. 2006. ‘“Oh Shucks, Here Comes UNTAG!”: Peacekeeping as Adventure in Namibia’. In L. A. Vivanco and R. J. Gordon (eds), Tarzan Was an Eco-Tourist and Other Tales in the Anthropology of Adventure. New York: Berghahn Books, 217–234.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Harari, Y. N. 2008. The Ultimate Experience: Battlefield Revelations and the Making of Modern War Culture, 1450–2000. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Hastrup, K. 2004. Action: Anthropology in the Company of Shakespeare. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press.

  • Heidegger, M. 1962. Being and Time, trans. J. Macquarrie and E. Robinson. Oxford: Blackwell.

  • Hollan, D. 2008. ‘Being There: On the Imaginative Aspects of Understanding Others and Being Understood’. Ethos 36 (4): 475–489. https://doi:10.1111/j.1548-1352.2008.00028.x.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Jackson, M. D. 1983. ‘Knowledge of the Body’. Man 18 (2): 327–345.

  • Jackson, M. D. 2005. Existential Anthropology: Events, Exigencies, and Effects. New York: Berghahn Books.

  • Jensen, C. 2010. ‘Velkommen til Armadillo’ [Welcome to Armadillo]. Filmmagsinet Ekko 48, 12 June.

  • Mack, A. J. 2019. ‘On Anticipatory Accounts: Adjudicating Moral Being and Becoming in the Los Angeles Mental Health Court’. Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 37 (1): 93–107.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Mattingly, C. 1994. ‘The Concept of Therapeutic Emplotment’. Social Science & Medicine 38 (6): 811–822.

  • Mattingly, C. 2010. ‘Moral Willing as Narrative Re-envisioning’. In K. M. Murphy and C. J. Throop (eds), Toward an Anthropology of the Will. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 50–68.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Mattingly, C. 2014. Moral Laboratories: Family Peril and the Struggle for a Good Life. Oakland, CA: University of California Press.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Pedersen, T. R. 2017a. ‘Get Real: Chasing Danish Warrior Dreams in the Afghan “Sandbox”’. Critical Military Studies 3 (1): 7–26. https://doi:10.1080/23337486.2016.1231996.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Pedersen, T. R. 2017b. ‘Soldierly Becomings: A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark's New “Warrior Generation”’. Ph.D. diss., Dept. of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Pedersen, T. R. 2018. ‘“Sidste mand lukker og slukker”: Rekviem for en krigerdrøm’ [‘The Last One to Leave Turn off the Lights’: Requiem for a Warrior Dream]. Jordens Folk 53 (3–4): 24–35.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Ricoeur, P. 1991. ‘Life in Quest of Narrative’. In D. Wood (ed.), On Paul Ricoeur: Narrative and Interpretation. London: Routledge, 20–33.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Sørensen, B. R. 2017. ‘Public Commemorations of Danish Soldiers: Monuments, Memorials, and Tombstones’. Critical Military Studies 3 (1): 27–49. https://doi.org/10.1080/23337486.2016.1184417.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Sørensen, B. R. and T. R. Pedersen. 2012. ‘Hjemkomstparader for danske soldater: En ceremoniel fejring af krigeren og den krigsførende nation’ [Homecoming Parades for Danish Soldiers: A Ceremonial Celebration of the Warrior and the Warring Nation]. Slagmark: Tidsskrift for Idéhistorie 63: 31–46.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Stephan, C. 2019. ‘A Generative Theory of Anticipation: Mood, Intuition and Imagination in Architectural Practice’. Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 37 (1): 108–122.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Stephan, C. and D. Flaherty. 2019. ‘Experiencing Anticipation: Anthropological Perspectives’. Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 37 (1): 1–16.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Throop, C. J. 2010. ‘Latitudes of Loss: On the Vicissitudes of Empathy’. American Ethnologist 37 (4): 771–782. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1425.2010.01284.x.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Throop, C. J. 2014. ‘Moral Moods’. Ethos 42 (1): 65–83. doi:10.1111/etho.12039.

  • Tidey, S. 2019. ‘Keeping the Future at Bay: Waria, Anticipation and Existential Endings in Bali, Indonesia’. Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 37 (1): 47–60.

    • Crossref
    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Žižek, S. 2002. Welcome to the Desert of the Real: Five Essays on September 11 and Related Dates. London: Verso.

Metrics

All Time Past Year Past 30 Days
Abstract Views 662 385 107
Full Text Views 97 2 0
PDF Downloads 89 5 0