What do gender-sensitive lenses tell

us about war?

War depends on telling gendered war stories

based in a logic of protection, and on silencing or

deligitimizing stories that challenge them

Where are the women?

If women are present in the LOTR, their roles tend to be minor

What work is masculinity doing?

Strategies and relationships among the Fellowship are highly masculinized

Members are all unmarried, and the group

is hierarchically structured

How can the “hero” storybe challenged?

The story of the LOTR is told from Frodo’s

perspective, but what about other narratives which might be “messie

r” than Frodo’s view?

Hobbits illustrate how gendered and hierarchical relationships can

perpetuate insecurity and inequality

for feminized “dependents”

People who are not recognized as

important actually do influence key events in significant ways

Eowyn and Merry emerge as

unexpected heroes in the Battle of Pelennor Fields

Dehumanizing or feminizing

enemies allows for projecting of

dominating relationships onto the international

relations between groups

World War 1 was seen as a cure for society’s ills

and a way to promote positive masculine values

Masculinized, militarized nationalism promoted beliefs that war would be quick and easy because “our men”

were superior

“Just warriors” were called on to

defend defenseless women and

children (“beautiful

souls”) from bad guys (barbaric

Germans)

The decision of potential

recruits whether or not to enlist

was determined by their

“manliness”

Jus ad bellum(just reasons)

Requires that war be fought only for

reasons characterized by

right intention, just cause, right authority,

proportionality of ends, and for last

resort

Jus in bello(just conduct)

Requires that war be conducted only

when noncombatants are insured immunity, and when wars do more good than

harm

A redefinition of “reasonable chance of

success” should include Justice in the longer term during and after war

Sanctions imposed before the war were

unjustly aimed at civilian targets

Post-war civil strife was the opposite of a feminist understanding of what

“success” in Iraq would look like