The Woman War Correspondent, the U.S. Military, and the Press

18461947

By (author) Carolyn M. Edy

Publication date:

13 December 2016

Length of book:

192 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

ISBN-13: 9781498539272

Honorable Mention recipient for the American Journalism Historians Association Book of the Year Award, this book outlines the rich history of more than 250 women who worked as war correspondents up through World War II, while demonstrating the ways in which the press and the military both promoted and prevented their access to war. Despite the continued presence of individual female war correspondents in news accounts, if not always in war zones, it was not until 1944 that the military recognized these individuals as a group and began formally considering sex as a factor for recruiting and accrediting war correspondents. This group identity created obstacles for women who had previously worked alongside men as “war correspondents,” while creating opportunities for many women whom the military recruited to cover woman’s angle news as “women war correspondents.” This book also reveals the ways the military and the press, as well as women themselves, constructed the concepts of “woman war correspondent” and “war correspondent” and how these concepts helped and hindered the work of all war correspondents even as they challenged and ultimately expanded the public’s understanding of war and of women.

Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: “A Womanly View of War,” 1846–1910
Chapter 3: “Conditions of Acceptance,” 1911–1939
Chapter 4: “To Play Men’s Rules,” 1940–1942
Chapter 5: “Women’s Stuff and the Little Stories,” 1942–1943
Chapter 6: “As Epitomes of All the Rest,” 1943–1944
Chapter 7: “A Matter of Special Facility,” 1944
Chapter 8: “Outstanding and Conspicuous Service,” 1945
Chapter 9: “Persona Non Grata,” 1945 and Beyond
Appendix 1: American Women War Correspondents during World War I
Appendix 2: American Women War Correspondents during World War II

Edy rightly claims that her book goes beyond many histories of female war correspondents that offer “rich narratives about the experiences of individual women” and weave “a tale of heroic women challenging an army of chauvinistic editors and commanders.” Treating women as exceptions to a seemingly never-changing rule, such histories—like “first and only” stories—reinforce the notion that women working in jobs typically filled by men are abnormal, rendering women’s labor largely invisible. Through careful primary source research, Edy is able to move beyond this trope, arguing that women’s achievements as war correspondents have not been out of the ordinary at all. Such documentation alone makes this book valuable.... This is a valuable book with much to offer scholars interested in war correspondence and women’s press history. Two appendices provide a list of female war correspondents that could be the starting point for further studies, making it particularly valuable for graduate students and faculty working in this area.