While Dragging Our Hearts Behind Us
£17.99
Don't Mention the War
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£12.74
Regular price
£16.99
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Don't Mention the War
The Australian Defence Force, the Media and the Afghan Conflict
Sale price
£12.74
Regular price
£16.99
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The war in Afghanistan is now the longest and, arguably, worst reported conflict in Australian history. In Don’t Mention the War, Kevin Foster explores why this is so and considers who engineered and who has benefitted from its impoverished coverage. He examines how and why the ADF restricted the media’s access to and freedom of movement among its troops in Afghanistan and what we can learn about their motives and methods from the more liberal media policies of the Dutch and Canadian militaries. He analyses how the ADF ensured positive coverage of its endeavours by bringing many aspects of the reporting of the war in-house and why some among the fourth estate were only too happy to hand over responsibility for newsgathering to the military. The book also investigates how political responses to the conflict, and the discourse that framed them, served to conceal the facts and neuter public debate about the war. After more than a decade of evasion and obstruction, half-truths and hype, Don’t Mention the War reveals how politicians, the military and the media failed the public over the Afghan conflict. Here is the real story behind the Australian story of the war.
Kevin Foster was born in Manchester in 1961 and has degrees from the University of Manchester, the University of Saskatchewan and Monash University. He currently teaches Media and Cultural Studies at Monash University. He has written widely on war, cultural history and national identity and his work has appeared in a range of national and international journals. His books include a study of the Falklands Conflict, Fighting Fictions: War, Narrative and National Identity (1999), What Are We Doing in Afghanistan? The Military and the Media at War (2009) and The Information Battlefield: Representing Australians at War (2011).
- ISBN-13
- 9781922235183
- Publisher
- Monash University Publishing
- Imprint
- Monash University Publishing
- Publication date
- 1 December 2013
- Format
- Paperback
- Pages
- 200
- Dimensions
- 234 x 153 mm
- Language
- English
