Aggression is an essentially contested concept. What is meant by ‘aggression’ has changed dramatically over the past two centuries. What ideological, political, and economic forces have produced practices that are categorized as ‘aggressive’ at any period of time and for any particular group? The lecture will explore what these systems of classification and regulation can tell historians about gender and power in late nineteenth- and twentieth-century culture.
Joanna Bourke is Professor of History at Birkbeck College. She is the prize-winning author of eleven books, including histories of modern warfare, military medicine, psychology and psychiatry, the emotions, and rape. In 2014 she was the author of The Story of Pain: From Prayer to Painkillers and Wounding the World: How Military Violence and War- Play are Invading our Lives.
For more information see: http://www.ghil.ac.uk/seminars_and_lectures.html